Ma Ying-jeou: Twelve years of state education taking into account educational equality and higher education

Ma Ying-jeou: Twelve years of state education taking into consideration both educational equality and higher education. Contributed by the Cultural Communication Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang. Ma Ying-jeou, Chairman of the Chinese Kuomintang, expressed on September 26...

>The Cultural Communication Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang Contributed

Ma Ying-jeou, Chairman of the Chinese Kuomintang, said on September 26 that the spirit of the 12-year state education is to take into account both educational equality and higher education: on the one hand, we must promote equal educational opportunities, achieve success for every child, and achieve social fairness and justice; on the other hand, we must take into account higher education and maintain the country’s competitiveness. He emphasized that through the twelve-year state education, the government would allow every child with different talents to have the opportunity to develop their talents in different fields. The Standing Committee of the Kuomintang Central Committee today invited Minister of Education Chiang Weining to give a special report on "Creating Taiwan's Quality Education." After listening to the report, Chairman Ma said that Taiwan does not have many natural resources and many natural disasters, but our country's ability to stand out in the world and lead in many fields has a lot to do with talent education. Although there are different criticisms of the education system from all walks of life, Taiwan's education has still cultivated a considerable number of talents in the past few decades. Speaking of Taiwan's education indicators, Chairman Ma mentioned that in August this year, the World Bank proposed the Knowledge Economy Index (KEI). Taiwan ranked 13th in the world. Other Asian countries, such as Hong Kong 18th, Japan 22nd, Singapore 23rd, and South Korea 29th, Taiwan ranked first in Asia. Ma Ying-jeou said that my country's education expenditure accounted for 5.84% of gross domestic product last year, which is slightly lower than the average of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), but not low among countries around the world. The government attaches great importance to education, and has revised the law to increase the education budget from 21.5% of the total budget to 22.5%, which will increase funding by about 20 billion per year. In the future, the government will also try to continue to increase education funding. Regarding the cultivation of talents studying abroad, Chairman Ma pointed out that the Ministry of Education and universities have trained doctoral students and postdoctoral students, and there is no need to rush them back to China after their studies. If these scholars can continue their studies abroad and achieve more results in academia or business, they can make greater contributions to the country after returning to China. Taking Hsinchu Science Park as an example, he said that back then, students studying in the United States returned to Taiwan to invest in Zhuke, bringing capital and technology back to Taiwan to build Hsinchu into a world science city. Therefore, if the policy in this area can be more open, I believe more people will be willing to return to work in China. Ma Ying-jeou finally emphasized that the Ministry of Education's policy directions in all aspects are correct, but each project requires a lot of effort and funding. He hopes that the Executive Yuan will cooperate as much as possible so that our country's education will not only cultivate first-class talents, but also not abandon any students with potential. This is a very important goal of the 12-year state education.