Fu Jen Catholic University yesterday lifted a curfew on female students staying at the school’s dormitory following days of protests by students.
The school board voted 90 to 51 to grant female students entry to the girls’ dormitory with an electronic card system, while unanimously deciding to eliminate penalties for students who stay out past midnight.
It also unanimously voted to allow students to elect their own dorm officials for the first time, while promising a review of the role of dorm matrons.
“Thank you everyone. I will take good care of myself,” university student association chairwoman Liao Yu-wen (廖郁雯) said, sitting in a wheelchair following a four-day hunger strike. “I still feel that human rights and gender equality are not something that should be voted on, but we have achieved our goal.”
“We never expected to win total curfew elimination and when we went to participate in the board meeting, we actually did not want to vote, because we thought the resolution would never pass,” student campaigner Huang Tai-li (黃台禮) said. “The school board’s decision shows that our demands reflected truly universal values.”
With only 20 student representatives on the school board, the motion was passed with the unexpected support of teachers and staff, she said.
According to the curfew, dubbed the “Cinderella curfew” by students, female students who returned to dorms after midnight were penalized with mandatory work, with repeat offenders forfeiting the right to participate in drawings for dormitory rooms.
Campaigners said that the rules were sexist, because they only applied to female students, leading protests on campus and outside the Ministry of Education, with Liao and two other students going on a hunger strike.
Huang said that a petition against the curfew received more than 6,000 signatures, comprising more than a fifth of the school’s students.
“The nuns’ previous method of caring for students was not something that most students felt was unsuitable,” university dean Chiang Han-sheng (江漢聲) said. “We have passed resolutions to make adjustments to the management methods that students disagreed with.”
He said that the dormitories under construction would aim to provide students with sufficient study rooms and shopping options to reduce the need for them to stay out late.
Meanwhile, the Taiwan Feminist Scholars Association and the Awakening Foundation released a joint statement calling for the Ministry of Education to proactively review whether other universities had sexist dorm management rules.
Placing curfews only for female students demonstrates persistent paternal attitudes and stereotypes, especially the idea that women need more protection than men, the statement said, adding that the practice aims to help schools avoid responsibility for accidents that might happen outside of the dorms after curfew.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
DEADLOCK: As the commission is unable to forum a quorum to review license renewal applications, the channel operators are not at fault and can air past their license date The National Communications Commission (NCC) yesterday said that the Public Television Service (PTS) and 36 other television and radio broadcasters could continue airing, despite the commission’s inability to meet a quorum to review their license renewal applications. The licenses of PTS and the other channels are set to expire between this month and June. The National Communications Commission Organization Act (國家通訊傳播委員會組織法) stipulates that the commission must meet the mandated quorum of four to hold a valid meeting. The seven-member commission currently has only three commissioners. “We have informed the channel operators of the progress we have made in reviewing their license renewal applications, and