Monday, December 26, 2016

Taiwan 'Nazi rally' school principal resigns


Taiwan 'Nazi rally' school principal resigns

  • 26 December 2016
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  • From the sectionAsia





Mock Nazi rally in Taiwan school, 24 DecImage copyrightEPA
Image captionThe school will now hold a series of educational programmes

The principal of a Taiwanese school whose students held a mock Nazi rally for a Christmas parade has resigned.
Cheng Hsiao-ming, head of the Kuang Fu High School in Hsinchu, said he took "full responsibility" and apologised.
Friday's "rally" featured a parade of swastika banners and a cardboard tank carrying one student performing a Nazi salute.
Israel's representative called the event "deplorable" and Taiwan's presidential office has apologised.
Announcing his resignation, Mr Cheng said: "As educators, we should have taught students to have the right values. We will learn from the mistakes we made and have asked students to do so too."





Mock Nazi rally in Taiwan school, 24 DecImage copyrightEPA
Image captionStudents apparently thought it would be easy to convert school uniforms

He said the school would hold a series of educational programmes, including showing films about the Holocaust such as Schindler's List and Life is Beautiful.
The Israel Economic and Cultural Office would also be invited to address students, he said.
The Taipei Times said that one of the school's teachers, Liu Hsi-cheng, had suggested Arabic culture as the theme for the parade but the students decided to go with Adolf Hitler after two rounds of voting.
The paper said some students opted for the Nazis for the Christmas and Thanksgiving Costume Parade because they could easily convert their school uniforms.





Principal Cheng Hsiao-ming (R) and dean Liao Ching-lin apologiseImage copyrightEPA
Image captionSchool principal Cheng Hsiao-ming (R) and dean Liao Ching-lin apologise

After the images emerged, Asher Yarden, Israel's representative to Taiwan, wrote on the mission's Facebook page: "It is deplorable and shocking that seven decades only after the world had witnessed the horrors of the Holocaust, a high school in Taiwan is supporting such an outrageous action.
"We strongly condemn this tasteless occurrence and call on the Taiwanese authorities, in all levels, to initiate educational programmes which would introduce the meaning of the Holocaust and teach its history and universal meaning."
Taiwan's presidential office promptly apologised for the incident, saying it showed an extreme lack of respect for Jewish people and a profound ignorance of history.

blob:http://time.com/3f146a47-8fa0-4d47-a584-3afb10ba8d06

High School Students in Taiwan Staged a Nazi-Themed Parade. It Wasn’t Received Well

A high school principal in Taiwan has resigned after students at his school reportedly dressed up as Nazis for a holiday parade, prompting outrage from local educators and the island’s Israeli representative.
According to the Taipei Times, the school’s principal, Cheng Hsiao-ming, took full responsibility and will step down as the head of Kuang Fu High School in Taiwan’s Hsinchu City.
Photos of students hoisting swastika banners and parading behind a cardboard tank went viral over the weekend. One student was seen emerging from the tank and giving the Nazi salute, a red armband appended to his or her jacket.
The event, which the school originally branded as “cosplay,” immediately caught the attention of Israel’s de facto diplomatic mission in Taiwan, the Israel Economic and Cultural Office in Taipei (ISECO), which called the event “deplorable and shocking.”
“Schools should educate for tolerance and understanding among people, and we are deeply disappointed that this took place in Taiwan,” read a statement shared on the ISECO Facebook account.
“We strongly condemn this tasteless occurrence and call on the Taiwanese authorities, in all levels, to initiate educational programs which would introduce the meaning of the Holocaust and teach its history and universal meaning,” the statement continued.
The Taipei Times reports that Cheng, the principal, has pledged to strengthen Holocaust awareness by screening films such as Schindler’s List and Life Is Beautiful, and says that the school would invite speakers from the Israeli office to address students.
Cheng reportedly said that a teacher had recommended Arabic culture as a theme for the event, but that the students twice voted against it in favor of a Nazi parade. The students were advised that the theme would be controversial, according to the Taipei Times, but the teacher decided to respect their decision.
Some students seemed unaware of Hitler’s atrocities, while others said they chose the theme because it would be reportedly easy to convert their school uniforms into Nazi costumes.
Educators say the botched event exposed inherent flaws in Taiwan’s school system; the self-ruled island off the coast of eastern China has its own fraught history of authoritarianism and violence, and history curricula are often closely managed by the government.
“The students’ lack of empathy to the historical trauma suffered by others shows that Taiwanese history and civic education is in crisis,” Hua Yih-fen, a history professor at the National Taiwan University, told the Taipei Times.
She and other educational professionals say authoritarian imagery and practices such as strict uniform codes and militaristic anthems have become institutionalized in schools on the self-ruled island — which was a place of refuge for nationalists exiled from the mainland following Mao Zedong’s communist victory in the Chinese civil war in 1949.
“Events that took place in the past continue to have reverberations in the present,” Hua told the Taipei Times, “and the incident in Hsinchu proved that Taiwan still has a long way to go on its path toward transitional justice and in dealing with its own historical traumas.”

Adults at fault for Nazi incident: Tsai

FAILURE:Human rights education needs to focus on the past and take in all areas of study so young people understand the importance of universal rights, the president said

By Stacy Hsu  /  Staff reporter

President Tsai Ing-wen, center, speaks at a meeting of the Human Rights Advisory Committee at the Presidential Office in Taipei yesterday.

Photo: CNA


Adults, not students, are at fault for a Nazi cosplay incident on Friday last week, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday, adding that it was the result of the nation’s “superficial” human rights education and failure to teach young people about state repression of rights in the past.
Tsai made the remarks at the 25th meeting of the Presidential Office’s Human Rights Advisory Committee yesterday afternoon, urging Taiwanese to make an effort to let the nation’s human rights freedoms set the bar for other nations.
Since the cosplay event, students and school authorities at Hsinchu Kuang Fu High School have received an outpouring of criticism, with the former accused of ignorance and the latter of negligence.
The event also drew ire from the representative offices of Israel and Germany. The school’s principal, Cheng Hsiao-ming (程曉銘), resigned on Sunday.
“Human rights are universal values, but they can only be realized when we constantly put them into practice at the local level,” Tsai said.
Speaking about the criticism of the students who dressed as Nazis at the school cosply event, Tsai said that it is adults who are to blame, not the students.
“This happened because our human rights education has only scratched the surface. We neglect incidents of discrimination and prejudice in our daily lives, and we have failed to teach our young people what they should learn from history and state repression of human rights,” Tsai said.
Self-reflection is required of everyone, Tsai said, adding that the event underscores the imperative need to reinforce human rights education and incorporate issues related to rights in different subjects.
The president said the day when one can call the education system a success is the day when the nation’s students understand the suffering others have endured, respect each other’s rights and stand up for justice.
To fulfill that goal, Tsai said she would invite the Executive Yuan and government agencies to deliver a report to the committee on the nation’s human rights education.
Taiwanese regarded democracy and freedom as the most valuable of human rights during the nation’s authoritarian period, Tsai said.
“Because of the sacrifices made by many of our democratic forebears, we are able to enjoy a mature democratic political system today and see our freedom of speech protected by the Constitution,” Tsai said.
However, there is no end to the pursuit of human rights, Tsai said.
“When it comes to human rights standards, we should always look upward to learn. As a matter of fact, there is still much room for us to make improvement,” she said.

Nazi cosplay event stuns educators

SYTEMIC PROBLEM:Taiwanese educational practices directly contradict modern principles by consolidating authority through unreasonable discipline, a critic said

By Lin Hsiao-yun and Jonathan Chin

Students who dressed as Nazis at a campus cosplay event demonstrated the failure of the nation’s education system and national ignorance about history, Academics and education groups yesterday said.
Over the weekend, images shared on social media of students marching in Nazi costumes at a school function held by the Hsinchu Kuang Fu High School on Friday sparked a public outcry, and a statement from the Israel Economic and Cultural Office in Taipei described the incident as “deplorable and shocking.”
“We feel that we have not worked hard enough, and have allowed this absurd, ignorant and indifferent attitude toward the universal value of human rights to spread and become an international joke,” said a joint statement issued by Our Story Alliance of History Teachers and Action Coalition of Civics Teacher.
“The students’ lack of empathy to the historical trauma suffered by others shows that Taiwanese history and civic education is in crisis,” said National Taiwan University history professor Hua Yih-fen (花亦芬), who recently published a book entitled Rebirth from the Wounds of History: Germany’s Path to Transitional Justice.
History is not irrelevant to the present, she said, adding: “Events that took place in the past continue to have reverberations in the present, and the incident in Hsinchu proved that Taiwan still has a long way to go on its path toward transitional justice and in dealing with its own historical traumas.”
History textbook guidelines have not allowed students to gain an understanding of human rights or imparted respect for the value of human life and dignity, as the teaching materials used are a mishmash, Hua said.
Humanist Education Foundation executive director Joanna Feng (馮喬蘭) said that modern educational principles emphasize teaching resistance to authoritarianism and totalitarianism through critical thought, but Taiwanese education had largely failed to adopt those standards.
Taiwanese educational practices directly contradict modern principles by consolidating authority through unreasonable discipline and educators are frequently ignorant of or indifferent to democratic values, Feng said.
“School teachers, deans and principals need more work than the students,” Feng said.
Our Story Alliance of History Teachers spokeswoman Huang Hui-chen (黃惠貞) said political indoctrination, by the school system and historical influences by the “New Life Movement” are to blame for postwar Taiwanese society’s indifference to fascism and infatuation with its aesthetics.
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) launched the New Life Movement in the 1920s to imitate fascist movements in the West, which led to the institutionalization on campus of militarized uniforms, mandated morning assemblies, teacher-graded weekly diaries, military song contests and military instructors on campus, Huang said, adding that many of those practices still exist.
In the three decades following the end of the Martial Law era, transitional justice and self-reflection in the education system have failed to materialize, Huang said.
“The display of Nazi paraphernalia at the student event in Hsinchu showed that the participants were completely ignorant of the deaths, suffering and inhumanity that the Nazi regime stood for in its 12 years of rule. Their insensitivity and indifference should be frightening to us because it demonstrated they possessed no critical facility to power,” Huang said.
Meanwhile, Action Coalition of Civics Teacher spokesman Chiang Pai-chuan (江佰川) said schools should re-examine their reasons for requiring students to wear militaristic uniforms and check whether fascist ideology had survived in their student codes, and lawmakers should legislate for mandatory classes on social justice and require transitional justice on campus.
“Taiwanese education could not care less whether students understand history; it is merely concerned with how well they do in history exams, after which the students forget everything. To change students, history education must do away with curriculum guidelines and tests,” said social activist Yu Teng-chieh (游騰傑), a student at Chia Nan University of Pharmacy and Science.



Sunday, November 27, 2016

Jhuolan H.S. Recruitment With Powerful Points

      I was asked to give an English presentation on Wednesday November 23rd to Taiwan EFL students. I would drive with Leona to Jhuolan Senior High School in Jhuolan, Miaoli to present "Read the World and the World Reads You" but it was more than that.

     The organizer, who learned of me through Kang Hsuan publisher, flippantly said I should talk with the students about the multiculturalism in New York City, but I thought it was far-fetched and incendiary with what I know from being a teacher there for twenty-five years unless I was to give some lame propaganda tourism. For a Taiwanese child, multiculturalism in NYC wouldn't work.



      It would be an effort for an immigrant child to find a way through New York City without injury. I had in mind a scenario of a child in Jhuolan H.S. who goes home one day to his parents telling him they will move to New York City that summer. The title of the new power point presentation was going to be "A Stranger in a Strange Land; A Child's View of New York City." The slides show would include topics such as Satellite Children, Snakehead Refugees, Child Labor Sweatshops and Construction, Territorial Gangs, Safeguarding Yourself from Pick-Pockets and Robberies,  Bullying in Schools, Racism and Sexism, Being a Latch-Key Kids, but also How to Get the Most Out of Your Metrocard, The Lower Eastside Tenement Museum, Museum of Chinese-American History, Ellis Island, and The Statue of Liberty. 

     Multiculturalism in New York City might be an interesting topic for foreign adult visitors, only that ethnic restaurants wouldn't even matter; no Taiwanese visitor would dare go to the places I would introduce or eat any foreign food besides pizza. It would be boring for the kids to hear. The organizer wasn't thinking of them. 
     I asked Leona to ask the organizer to ask the teachers to ask the students to ask questions. When she asked, she learned the students I would be presenting to weren't students of the high school that I would be presenting at; the high school is using my presentation to recruit students from local junior high schools. 
     With only a few days before the presentation, it would be impractical for the students to brainstorm topics. With no preparation, unlike what the  students did in Hu-Wei(https://e-e-o.blogspot.tw/2016/05/read-world-and-world-reads-you.html) with no idea of what they would be hearing, or understanding, the power point would be most important. I would stop after each slide and try to use  reported speech to get students involved.


     That morning, we set out in a driving rain to National Jhuolan Senior High School on the edge of Miaoli in the mountainside, forty minutes from Taichung, across two washes northeast of the Taichung reservoir for me to give a presentation to the twenty junior high students the school was recruiting. I used the “Read the World” and “NYC 7 Day-Trip” power point presentations, combined with an emphasis on using English to travel abroad. Using ‘reported speech’ as a medium, I tried to engage the shy children in asking and answering reported questions, but sticking to the presentation.
      I began with an introduction of myself through slides, emphasizing my connection to Taiwan. I then went into selections from the “Read the World” slide show, stopping at “Places of Interest Outside Taiwan,” “Requirements for Foreign Travel,” “Affording to Live and Travel,” “English Resources for Students,” “Methods for Communication; Reported Speech,” and “Caring for Pets and Wildlife” stopping to give the “Emergency” quiz in which students chose, by raising hands, three items to rescue in a fire the three pets, of course! I then went into the  "New York City; Far From the Madding Crowd 7-Day Trip” slide show.
"Read The World And The World Read You"  
https://1drv.ms/p/s!AjeCH0KvEOz8hUFMLbJZfapNIjvd

"New York City; Far From the Madding Crowd 7-Day Trip” 

https://1drv.ms/p/s!AjeCH0KvEOz8iV9semqeiq2qu4Zy

      Before I started the "New York City; Far From the Madding Crowd 7-Day Trip” slide show, I asked how much they thought it would cost; one teacher guessed it would cost 100,000 NT-$3125 for a seven-day trip to New York City. I worked on that premise, showing the children the cost of expenses like airfare, hotel lodgings, subway and attraction admission, and food, making a joke out of eating ramen noodles and slices of pizza and how they could get by on that amount.
     The children loved the slides that had videos embedded in them, such as the "Museum of the Moving Image" video with views of Star Wars costumes they have on display, and the videos of Wonder Wheel, The Cyclone, and The Parachute Jump (defunct as it is) on the Coney Island slide. 
     Before we knew it, time was up. It was a delightful 90 minutes for the children and me. The children in this obscure Hakka town that had been devastated by the 1999 earthquake loved having a foreign teacher  from New York City visit and talk with them. They could see how important it was to learn English well. 


Tuesday, November 22, 2016

Education act amendment passed

Education act amendment passed

TRAINING BOOST:Department of Teacher and Art Education Director Chang Ming-wen said NT$6m had been earmarked for scholarships for teacher interns

By Sean Lin  /  Staff reporter
The Ministry of Education yesterday passed a draft amendment to the Teacher Education Act (師資培育法), which requires college students to pass teachers’ certification exams before they can work as interns.
Deputy Minister of Education Tsai Ching-hua (蔡清華) said that the amendment was proposed to improve the quality of education, as it would cut the number of interns assigned to teaching work, while helping university students preparing for teachers’ certification exams focus on their studies and not be distracted by internships.
Department of Teacher and Art Education Director Chang Ming-wen (張明文) said that education majors who qualify as teachers would be required to do internships of six months and start teaching at junior-high schools, elementary schools and kindergartens in rural areas or overseas from the third month.
Interns will be required to fulfill work quotas of no more than eight hours per week and would be paid, he said.
The ministry has earmarked NT$6 million (US$190,724) in scholarship funding to go to 100 interns from middle and low-income families, with each student expected to receive NT$10,000 per month during their internship, Chang said.
The draft amendment is to be delivered to the Executive Yuan for approval before going to the legislature for final review.

Taipei teacher rehiring quizzed

Taipei teacher rehiring quizzed

KO U-TURN?Music teacher Hsiao Hsiao-ling said that if the mayor had used ‘so-called transitional justice’ as a means to humiliate her, then he should ‘take it back’

By Sean Lin  /  Staff reporter

Former Zhongshan Junior High School music teacher Hsiao Hsiao-ling, center, speaks behind a row of certificates at a news conference in Taipei yesterday.

Photo: Kuo Yi, Taipei Times

The Control Yuan yesterday asked the Taipei City Government to explain the legal basis behind its decision to rehire music teacher Hsiao Hsiao-ling (蕭曉玲).
In a letter signed by Control Yuan President Chang Po-ya (張博雅), the agency said that Hsiao’s dismissal by Zhongshan Municipal Junior High School had been upheld by the Supreme Administrative Court and should not be repealed.
It asked the local government to explain what its legal basis was when it overruled the court, saying in September that it would have the Taipei Department of Education rescind the dismissal order.
Hsiao accused the school of persecuting her, including through firing her in 2008 after she initiated a lawsuit against then-Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) over Hau’s “one guideline, one curriculum” education policy.
Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) last month told the Taipei City Council that rescinding Hsiao’s dismissal order does not mean she would be rehired and that an evaluation panel would be created to consider her reinstatement.
Ko previously said that the city would compensate Hsiao for lost wages, totaling about NT$4 million (US$127,150), a decision that drew criticism from Taipei city councilors of the pan-blue camp.
Hsiao yesterday decried what she said was a U-turn by Ko.
“If the so-called transitional justice that you claim to value so much is just a tool to humiliate me a second time, take it back,” Hsiao told a news conference in Taipei, which was attended by members of the Humanistic Education Foundation and the Taiwan North Society.
Hsiao said that she would not accept more “institutional violence” like Hau subjected her to nine years ago.
She denied having called a former student a “lowlife” — an accusation leveled against her by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Wang Hung-wei (王鴻薇) and reportedly among the reasons she was fired.
That term was directed at former Zhongshan student affairs director Chu Wu-wo (朱毋我), who Hsiao said climbed up to a window to photograph her in a preparation room adjacent to a classroom after she turned down Chu’s request that she submit to an inspection of the work area.
She dismissed questions over whether she had called students “tone deaf” and “cheeky,” as Wang has alleged.
Wang should provide evidence of the accusations, Hsiao said.
Author and civil advocate Neil Peng (馮光遠) accused Ko of “flip-flopping” in policy regarding the Hsiao case and other issues.
Ko, an independent, exploited social angst built up during a string of massive protests before the 2014 Taipei mayoral election and got himself elected, but he has never participated in a social movement, which shows that he lacks core values and would be readily swayed by issues he deems most beneficial for his re-election campaign, Peng said.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City Councilor Lee Ching-feng (李慶鋒) said that Ko’s comments last month were due to political pressure from KMT Taipei city councilors, because the city’s budget proposals are to be reviewed during the current council session.

Friday, November 4, 2016

Bill takes aim at retired Taiwan senior-level education officials

Bill takes aim at retired senior-level education officials

By Rachel Lin  /  Staff reporter
In a bid to prevent possible corruption at private universities, the Ministry of Education on Wednesday passed a draft amendment to the Organization Act of the Ministry of Education (教育部組織法), that would bar officials from assuming posts as presidents, vice presidents, directors or supervisors at such schools within three years of their retirement.
If passed by the legislature, the rule would apply to those holding the posts of minister or deputy minister of education, secretary-general of the ministry and director of the Department of Higher Education.
These officials have actual influence over higher education, as they are entitled to formulate policies and allocate resources, Minister of Education Pan Wen-chung (潘文忠) said, adding that the amendment was proposed at the request of education groups and legislators.
Whenever officials who had served in these roles took up jobs at private universities, critics complained that the former public servants were acting as “guardians” in their new roles and helping schools avoid the ministry’s supervision, Pan said.
Ex-officials who secure jobs as directors or supervisors at private schools are often described as “fat cats” because they still receive their government pensions while earning a private salary, Pan said.
“These accusations are a very harsh criticism of the ministry and myself,” Pan said.
The amendment would be sent to the Executive Yuan for approval and then the legislature for a final review, he said.
The amendment would be based on the principle of legitimate expectations, meaning that former officials who have already taken up posts at private institutions would not be affected, the ministry said.
There are 10 former senior ministry officials who now hold jobs at private universities, including former minister Yang Chao-hsiang (楊朝祥), who is president of Fo Guang University; former deputy minister Lin Tsung-ming (林聰明), president of Nanhua University; former deputy minister Chen Yi-hsing (陳益興), president of TransWorld University; and former deputy minister Chou Tsan-te (周燦德), the president of Hsing Wu University.
The Executive Yuan late last month passed a draft amendment to the Retirement of School Faculty and Staff Act (學校教職員退休條例), which seeks to bar retired public-school employees who are later hired by government-funded institutions from receiving their pensions while working.
The bill is pending a final review by the legislature.
The National Federation of Teachers’ Unions has criticized that bill for not including retired school employees who land jobs at private institutions on the list of personnel who would be barred from double-dipping.
As of August last year, 1,667 retired public servants, public-school employees and military personnel were working at private universities, ministry statistics showed.
The legislature’s Budget Center panned retirees who have adopted this practice, saying that they are basically receiving two salaries, which violates the principle of social justice