Brian Hioeby Brian Hioe
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Photo Credit: Lord Koxinga/WikiCommons/CC BY-SA 3.0
HUNDREDS OF TEACHERS demonstrated in late January against practices on campuses criticized as leading to the bullying and targeting of teachers. Specifically, the practice of the campus incident meeting has been singled out as leading teachers to be targeted by students. As such, more than one thousand teachers participated in a demonstration outside of the Ministry of Education against the practice of “campus incident meetings.”
The practice is one intended as a corrective to the frequently recurring issue of teacher bullying of students in Taiwan. However, the system has been used to target teachers unfairly.
Incidents highlighted included when a teacher was threatened with dismissal on grounds of bullying and emotionally abusing students for asking a student to be more stringent about classroom cleaning. Another incident brought up was when a teacher faced an investigation after taking a painkiller, forcing her to hide when she ate or drank afterward.
Investigations are criticized as a waste of administrative resources, as well as frequently conducted by inexperienced personnel. As the issue ostensibly enjoys bipartisan support, it is to be seen whether changes are made. The Ministry of Education has promised it will evaluate the current system for six months before deciding whether to abolish it.
Cases of teachers bullying frequently make national news. Likewise, corporal punishment remains widespread, in spite of high-profile incidents that have resulted in death or permanent injury.
Corporal punishment remains widespread in Taiwanese schools, with survey data from 2019 showing that 70% of junior high school students had experienced corporal punishment. A 2022 incident in which a seven-year-old student practicing judo died from a brain hemorrhage after being body-slammed a total of 27 times by his instructor and other students, making international headlines, likely proves to be the most high-profile injury or death caused by corporal punishment in recent years. The teacher continued to body slam the student ten times even after he vomited and lost consciousness. Though an ambulance was called, he was already bleeding from the brain, and died seventy days later.
The instructor in question believed that the student was lying to him about being sick and unable to participate in practice that day, and that he was being disrespected. This seems to be a similar motivating cause to other cases involving students bullied or punished by teachers. Likewise, an aspect of public humiliation is often part of punishments. This occurs even when very young students are the ones being punished.
Last year, National Taiwan Normal University came under fire over coerced blood sampling of female soccer players. The athletes were members of NTNU’s female soccer team. The athletes were forced to provide three blood samples per day for a period of fourteen days. If they did not comply, the athletes were threatened with the withholding of course credits, so that they would not be allowed to graduate. There were a total of six victims who came forward. Such actions reportedly took place for several consecutive years.
Blood sampling was carried out by unqualified personnel. This has been highlighted as being potentially dangerous, in that torn muscles, infections, or other injuries that threaten players could occur from unprofessional blood sampling.
Coach Chou Tai-ying, who is seen as responsible for the incident, had her coaching license suspended. NTNU was criticized for not immediately removing Chou, however, instead ordering that she halt contact with students and blocking her from salary raises, part-time teaching, overtime, salary increases, and overseas research.
As such, it may not be surprising that schools wish to present themselves as taking action to defend students. Namely, in other cases, schools are criticized as doing the opposite, in seeking to defend teachers. It is to be seen how a balance can be found, then, regarding practices that allow for defending students against abuse while also not subjecting teachers to being targeted.