At the heart of the concept of education reform was that everyone saw the extreme pressures of the joint examination system in Taiwan, how all education was directed toward the examination, and how all educational activities were thereby distorted. That is why people determined to embark upon education reform.

Opening good schools to all children

After many years of hard work, the university joint entrance exam was terminated in 1999, while the high school joint entrance exam was eliminated in 2000, both replaced by a basic aptitude test.

I want to stress that the basic aptitude test is not a way by which the country or schools screen students. It is a minimum bar for students to get over, after which they will have broader scope to choose the school they really want to attend, while schools can choose the students they want based on the unique abilities of each individual, so that advancement to higher levels becomes a process of mutual choice. This aspect of education reform is already underway, but we are far from the ideal final objective.

The main reason we still fall short is that parents and schools always twist every well-intentioned idea of education reform into a policy to put pressure on students and frighten parents. Take for example our encouragement of students to participate in more extracurricular activities. Schools assumed this was a new criterion for advancement, and students swarmed to join clubs, hotly contesting the positions for officers, creating a terrible new source of pressure. Then there's the idea that one's entire life should not be decided by a single examination, and that emphasis should instead be placed on steady learning over time. The result has been that now every examination large and small has become harshly competitive. This is a result of misguided thinking among schools and parents.

Another example is multiple advancement channels in Taipei City, where this policy was implemented earliest and also was distorted earliest. The few top preferred schools have refused to relax their grip, and the idee fixe that "elite students must all attend elite schools, and elite schools only accept elite students" has continued to dominate. In fact, whether a school is good or not should not be judged exclusively on the percentage of its students that advance to the next level. Rather, a school should take pride in developing excellence in a variety of areas.

The bottom line is that schools should reflect the natural order of society. There are various strata in society and people of various levels of intelligence, and it should be the same in a public school. As for the so-called "star schools," they should preserve 30% of their spots for the top students as before, leaving the other 70% for students who could never have had an opportunity to attend such schools in the past. If a school is genuinely good, after three years, 100% of the children will have become good students. That's the real test of the professional abilities of the teachers.

Creativity, diversity

What education reform really aims to do is to smash the old mindset of everything having only a single correct answer and only pursuing a single set of values. We want to develop the habits of diversity, initiative, creativity, and critical thinking. That's the real spirit of education reform. Education reform is not just about loosening the reins a little bit, or making a few adjustments within the old structure. It is a genuine "re-forming."

Some people wonder whether current teachers can cope with the waves of new policies coming one after another. I can tell you that 90% of our teachers are very capable. As long as we allow them to rebuild their self-confidence and transform their outlooks, they are all very willing to actively participate.

What I have been able to do is, as much as possible, help eliminate those things which are unrelated to teaching. Teachers no longer must also serve as guidance counselors or participate in compulsory election activities. This year we have allocated money to hire 2500 new teachers. Although many schools hope that they can attain an average of two teachers per class, this is really difficult. To raise the average of teachers per class by even 0.1 requires NT$4 billion. There is still a long way to go from the current level of 1.6 teachers per class. I hope people will not always look to the Ministry of Education to resolve every problem. Sometimes they have to think outside the box, and draw on outside resources, and they will find that this is in fact even more effective.

In my tenure, besides implementing the education reform timetable, I also strongly promoted reading activities, life education, and creativity education. These are all important aspects of education reform, and I hope they will be continued in the future.