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進入《TAIPEI TIMES 焦點》 Wu likens guidelines to US textbooks
Student protesters yesterday talk near a satirical portrait of Minister of Education Wu Se-hwa in front of the Ministry of Education in Taipei as they continue their protest against changes to high-school social studies curriculum guidelines. Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
By Alison Hsiao / Staff reporter
Minister of Education Wu Se-hwa （吳思華） yesterday likened the “diversity of historical interpretations” in changes to high-school social studies curriculum guidelines to the “juxtaposition of creationist and evolutionary views in biology textbooks in the US.”
The Ministry of Education yesterday held talks with students at the K-12 Education Administration office in Taichung. The talks had been designed for at least 22 students, decided by lot, but most of the students who were selected boycotted the meeting, accusing the ministry of needlessly limiting student attendance, adding that there is no need for talks when the ministry insists that the adjusted guidelines would not be withdrawn or suspended.
After the talks, which were scheduled to last two hours, but ended after about an hour, Wu said that the meeting was rational and effective. However, the student attendees said that they terminated the talks after an hour, citing “the officials’ repetition” of the ministry’s usual rhetoric, which is resistant to students’ concerns.
The six students from different high schools at the talks questioned Wu about the procedures on which the new guidelines was decided, but Wu said that the Control Yuan has confirmed the legitimacy of the process.
“From the perspective of continuity of administrative work, what has already been done should proceed, which is the basic idea of administrative operation,” Wu said.
Addressing the substance of new textbooks, Wu said: “We have heard different opinions about historical facts, about the status of our nation and about the interpretations of historical contexts, and there is nothing right or wrong about them.”
“We want to allow students to be exposed to different views, which could make learning more healthy,” Wu said, citing an editorial from yesterday’s Chinese-language United Daily News, which he quoted as saying that biology textbooks in the US “definitely introduce the fact that some, based on religious beliefs, still uphold creationism, in addition to the evolutionary view, despite the fact that the latter has been supported by an abundance of scientific evidence, out of respect for those who have religious faith.”
Rather than discussing the content of new textbooks, the students focused on procedural flaws.
Wu said he has already apologized, “although that did not happen during my term,” for the “flaws in the process of holding public hearings [for the minor adjustments to the curriculum guidelines].”
He compared the “flaws” in this procedure with “the lighting for a soiree.”
“You cannot expect a dinner party to be called off when the lighting goes a little bit off. What can be done is to learn from it and fix it for next time,” Wu said.
When a student said that the procedure for the construction of new guidelines, which can be seen as a legal order, cannot be compared with preparations for a social activity, Wu said that the flawed procedure “did not cause obstacles to the completion of a legal order.”
Regarding the “simultaneous acknowledgement of both old and new textbooks,” the students said that what has been promised is not the effectiveness of both the old and new “curriculum guidelines,” as Wu himself also said that “it is a fact that when the new legal order [guidelines] takes effect, the old one ceases to be in effect.”
Wu said that as the old textbooks are based on old guidelines, the latter are therefore “invisibly effective.”
新聞來源：TAIPEI TIMES
A student protester lights a candle in front of the Ministry of Education to pay respects to student activist Dai Lin, who committed suicide on Thursday last week. Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
