A recent practice test for the college entrance exam sparked controversy, as it required students to write an essay in Chinese titled: “My mom is a surrogate.”
The mock test — administered in high schools Taipei, New Taipei City, Keelung, Taoyuan and Hsinchu County — instructed students to write a first-person narrative on how they would feel if surrogacy were legalized in Taiwan and their mother was a surrogate mother.
The test also provided short writing samples, in which surrogacy was described as “a continuation of love for people” and “helping others fulfill dreams of being parents.”
Photo: Reuters
Some students criticized the task, saying that the instructions and writing samples implied that the writer had a preconceived position regarding this issue.
Others said that students who might disagree with surrogacy would be forced to criticize their own mothers in the essay, calling it “really unnecessary.”
Han Lin Publishing Co (翰林出版公司), which designed the mock test, said in a written statement that it is “deeply sorry” for the confusion, discomfort and concerns the test had caused.
The publishing firm vowed to take immediate action, including inviting more teachers and educators to review practice tests.
“When examining the tests, reviewers would be more sensitive to the appropriateness of questions and essay topics, and ethical issues that might arise from them,” the company said in a written statement signed by chairman Chen Yen-liang (陳彥良).
The company pledged to bolster the training for employees in the editorial department.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare last year sought to legalize surrogacy by proposing an amendment to the Assisted Reproduction Act (人工生殖法), but following controversies, it decided not to address the issue through the amendment. Instead, the amendment focused on allowing single women and lesbian couples to access assisted reproductive technologies, in addition to heterosexual couples.
Deputy Minister of Health and Welfare Lin Ching-yi (林靜儀) said that the ministry maintains the position that issues related to surrogacy would be handled separately from its proposed amendment to the act, adding that the amendment is still being reviewed by the Executive Yuan.
Lin did not comment on whether it was appropriate to use surrogacy as the topic for an essay, but said that she was surprised that the task generated such heated discussions among high-school students.
“In the past, many people considered surrogacy as a generous and altruistic deed, as they could use their bodies to help others fulfill their wish of becoming parents. However, the incident has shown that young people might think differently when their own family members are involved,” Lin said.
“Such tasks give people an opportunity to see if they can still consider policies in a fair and objective manner when they are relevant to them,” Lin said.
The Taiwan Anti-Surrogacy Action Group said asking students to imagine that their mothers were surrogates and writing an essay about it does not train them on how to write or educate them about the issue.
“Students are forced to show empathy for surrogates, assuming that women’s sacrifices are reasonable... If the purpose of the essay is to teach students about empathy, they should have been allowed to choose their positions and explore different perspectives, rather than taking a position on an imagined reality without telling what surrogacy really is,” the group said.
EdYouth, a student group of college and high-school students, said that the essay task only reinforces stereotypes about mothers and fails to consider that families can exist in various forms.
“Not all families have mothers, and the role of a mother in a family is not always assumed by females. What is more, not all females have the ability or intent to have children. As such, students might not necessarily be able to imagine having a mother who is also a surrogate,” it said.
The group said that it applauded the efforts of incorporating a prominent issue into the mock test, but such tests should train students to think independently rather than leading them to think in a certain way.
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