The same online academic portfolio system can be used by home-schooled students and other senior-high-level students applying for university, with the only difference being the person who verifies the portfolio’s contents, the Ministry of Education (MOE) said yesterday.
The rights of home-schooled students applying for university would not be negatively affected by the portfolio system, the ministry said in a statement.
The system is an initiative that the ministry has been pushing among senior-high-level students with the implementation last year of its 12-Year Basic Education Curriculum Guidelines.
Photo: Wu Po-hsuan, Taipei Times
One of its aims is to encourage students to begin keeping a record of their learning from their first year of senior-high school to alleviate the burden of preparing college applications in their final year.
The ministry said its statement was in response to concerns reported in the media about how home-schooled students receiving so-called “experimental education” would submit files to their online portfolios.
All students who receive an “experimental education,” including those who are home-schooled, have access to a platform and database where they can upload files, the ministry said.
They can upload the same number of files and in the same way as other students, it said.
The only difference would be the person who authenticates the learning outcomes, it said.
Their educators, who might be parents or paid teachers, would verify submissions made by home-schooled students, while students enrolled in schools would have their submissions approved by their teachers, it said.
All senior-high-level students can submit up to six learning outcomes, as well as up to 10 pieces of work, to their online academic portfolios each year in preparation for applying for university, the ministry said.
Regardless of the format of their education, their rights would not be negatively affected if they are unable to, or choose not to, use the online academic portfolio system, it said, adding that they can still opt to submit PDFs to universities for review.
The ministry’s K-12 Education Administration last month held two conferences to explain the process to students, teachers, parents and others involved in “experimental education,” the ministry said, adding that it is to host more.
However, lawmakers on the Legislative Yuan’s Education and Culture Committee yesterday expressed concerns over the portfolio initiative.
Instead of alleviating stress among third-year senior-high students, the portfolios might become a source of stress every semester, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lin Yi-hua (林奕華) told a meeting in Taipei to review the ministry’s budget.
Taiwan People’s Party Legislator Kao Hung-an (高虹安) said that some students and parents have turned to cram schools to help prepare the portfolios.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Lai Pin-yu (賴品妤) urged the ministry to ensure information security, including plans for how data would be regularly purged.
The committee froze NT$235 million (US$8.17 million) of the ministry’s proposed budget for higher-education purposes and NT$15 million that the ministry had proposed for university admission-related tasks.
It asked the ministry to prepare a report on university admissions and the portfolio initiative.
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