The Control Yuan on Saturday urged the Ministry of Education to do more to prevent the sexual abuse of student athletes after a report revealed 548 complaints alleging contraventions of the Gender Equity Education Act (性別平等教育法) in sports programs since 2014.
Control Yuan members Fan Sun-lu (范巽綠), Hsiao Tsu-yu (蕭自佑) and Jao Yung-ching (趙永清) said in a statement that the ministry must do more to combat abuse in athletics programs.
The Control Yuan reviewed records of complaints made to education authorities involving athletics classes and sports teams at primary and secondary schools.
Photo: Hsieh Chun-lin, Taipei Times
Students participating in athletics programs are at an increased risk of abuse due to the power imbalance inherent in the student-coach relationship, the Control Yuan members said in a report.
Baseball, basketball, judo, taekwondo, and track and field are some of the programs that had the most complaints in the nation’s education system, the report said.
Part-time coaches are poorly supervised, receive no standardized gender-equality training and their hiring is governed by an “interpretation of law” document instead of regulations, it said.
While the ministry has established regulations to govern the hiring of full-time coaches, its materials for gender-equality training is oversimplified and outdated, it added.
About 60 percent of K-12 students in special sports programs board at their schools, despite a ministry policy preference for elementary and junior-high schools to not provide living arrangements, it said.
As a result, school dormitories for athletics programs have no official staff and are essentially unregulated, making them potential hotbeds of abuse, it said.
The ministry should recognize that there are students in athletic programs that live at schools, and it therefore must create regulations to protect their safety, it added.
Such oversight is also necessary for temporary lodging for students when they are competing in sports events, it said.
Students in special sports programs or on teams often live and travel together, meaning that rules must be in place to prevent or address bullying from other students or abuse from coaches, the report said, adding that the ministry should review policies to police athletics in other countries.
Students in athletics programs should also be educated on body autonomy and gender equality, it said.
The ministry’s Sports Administration and K-12 Education Administration must improve interagency cooperation in protecting young athletes, it added.
EVA Air is prohibiting the use of portable chargers on board all flights starting from Saturday, while China Airlines is advising passengers not to use them, following the lead of South Korean airlines. Current regulations prohibit portable chargers and lithium batteries from check-in luggage and require them to be properly packed in carry-on baggage, EVA Air said. To improve onboard safety, portable chargers and spare lithium batteries would be prohibited from use on all fights starting on Saturday, it said. Passengers are advised to fully charge electronic devices before boarding and use the AC and USB charging outlets at their seat, it said. South
Hong Kong-based American singer-songwriter Khalil Fong (方大同) has passed away at the age of 41, Fong’s record label confirmed yesterday. “With unwavering optimism in the face of a relentless illness for five years, Khalil Fong gently and gracefully bid farewell to this world on the morning of February 21, 2025, stepping into the next realm of existence to carry forward his purpose and dreams,” Fu Music wrote on the company’s official Facebook page. “The music and graphic novels he gifted to the world remain an eternal testament to his luminous spirit, a timeless treasure for generations to come,” it said. Although Fong’s
WAR SIMULATION: The developers of the board game ‘2045’ consulted experts and analysts, and made maps based on real-life Chinese People’s Liberation Army exercises To stop invading Chinese forces seizing Taiwan, board gamer Ruth Zhong chooses the nuclear option: Dropping an atomic bomb on Taipei to secure the nation’s freedom and her victory. The Taiwanese board game 2045 is a zero-sum contest of military strategy and individual self-interest that puts players on the front lines of a simulated Chinese attack. Their battlefield game tactics would determine the theoretical future of Taiwan, which in the real world faces the constant threat of a Chinese invasion. “The most interesting part of this game is that you have to make continuous decisions based on the evolving situation,
China’s military buildup in the southern portion of the first island chain poses a serious threat to Taiwan’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply, a defense analyst warned. Writing in a bulletin on the National Defense and Security Research’s Web site on Thursday, Huang Tsung-ting (黃宗鼎) said that China might choke off Taiwan’s energy supply without it. Beginning last year, China entrenched its position in the southern region of the first island chain, often with Russia’s active support, he said. In May of the same year, a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) force consisting of a Type 054A destroyer, Type 055 destroyer,
RSS