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🇹🇼 Taiwan /Culture & Society

Teachers' rights at risk as Taiwan lawmakers reject school conduct rule revisions

From Liberty Times · () Chinese

Translated from Chinese, summarized and contextualized by DistantNews.

At a glance

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  • Taiwan's Legislative Yuan's Education and Culture Committee voted to reject a revised regulation on school incident conferences, sparking criticism from the Humanistic Education Foundation.
  • The foundation argues this decision, made without specific reasons, could harm frontline teachers by creating a regulatory void and potentially invalidating new protections.
  • These protections, introduced earlier this year, included measures like prohibiting anonymous complaints and establishing a streamlined process for minor cases.

Taiwan's Legislative Yuan's Education and Culture Committee has drawn criticism for its decision to reject a revised regulation concerning school incident conferences. The Humanistic Education Foundation (HEF) condemned the move, arguing it undermines the rights and protections of frontline teachers.

The legislative yuan's rejection of the revised regulations, citing only 'areas needing revision' without specifying which articles require modification or how they should be amended, makes it difficult for the Ministry of Education to redraw them.

— Humanistic Education Foundation statementCriticizing the lack of clarity in the legislative committee's decision.

The committee, led by a Kuomintang convener, unexpectedly changed its agenda and used its majority to vote down the Ministry of Education's revised rules. The HEF stated that the committee provided no specific reasons for the rejection, merely citing a need for further revision. This lack of clarity makes it difficult for the Ministry of Education to redraft the regulations effectively, potentially leading to a prolonged regulatory vacuum.

If the Ministry of Education cannot complete the revisions within two months, the new system will become invalid, reverting to the old system and causing the loss of several protections newly added earlier this year that benefited grassroots teachers.

— Humanistic Education Foundation statementExplaining the potential negative consequences of the legislative decision.

According to the HEF, if the Ministry of Education fails to finalize new regulations within two months, the current system will become invalid. This would revert the process to the old system, nullifying crucial protections implemented earlier this year. These safeguards included prohibiting anonymous complaints, creating a diversion mechanism for minor cases, allowing teachers to have an advisor during investigations, and providing investigation reports to teachers seven days before they present their case to the Disciplinary Committee.

Why did KMT legislators and some teacher groups support rejecting the revised regulations instead of continuing to optimize the system on the existing foundation?

— Humanistic Education Foundation statementExpressing bewilderment at the opposition's stance.

The HEF expressed confusion as to why legislators from the KMT and some teacher groups supported rejecting the revisions instead of improving the existing framework. They emphasized that society generally agrees on the need for a more transparent and just system, ideally involving professional third-party investigations to avoid conflicts of interest. The foundation warned that halting these reforms could interrupt progress on measures like banning anonymous complaints and streamlining case handling, which are beneficial for grassroots teachers.

The interruption of reforms such as banning anonymous complaints, case diversion, and teacher procedural protections is not a good outcome for grassroots teachers.

— Humanistic Education Foundation statementSummarizing the negative impact of the legislative action.
DistantNews Editorial

Originally published by Liberty Times in Chinese. Translated, summarized, and contextualized by our editorial team with added local perspective. Read our editorial standards.

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