VZCZCXRO1622
RR RUEHCN RUEHGH
DE RUEHIN #1290/01 1022313
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 122313Z APR 06
FM AIT TAIPEI
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 9671
INFO RUEHBJ/AMEMBASSY BEIJING 5051
RUEHKO/AMEMBASSY TOKYO 7621
RUEHGP/AMEMBASSY SINGAPORE 6416
RUEHUL/AMEMBASSY SEOUL 7759
RUEHGH/AMCONSUL SHANGHAI 0027
RUEHCN/AMCONSUL CHENGDU 1186
RUEHSH/AMCONSUL SHENYANG 5139
RUEHGZ/AMCONSUL GUANGZHOU 9218
RUEHHK/AMCONSUL HONG KONG 6242

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 TAIPEI 001290 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT PASS AIT/WASHINGTON 
DEPT FOR EAP/TC, INR/EAP, EAP/PD, ELAB 
 
FROM AIT KAOHSIUNG BRANCH OFFICE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL SCUL TW
SUBJECT: Unemployed Public School Teachers in Taiwan 
 
 
SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED 
 
¶1. (U) Summary: Taiwan is home to reportedly over 50,000 unemployed 
public school teachers.  Local scholars attribute the increase in 
teacher unemployment to a decade-long "teacher cultivation program," 
which was designed by the Ministry of Education (MOE) to enable 
college graduates from universities other than normal universities 
to obtain education-related credentials.  While the number of 
newborns in Taiwan has decreased by one third over the past decade, 
the number of trained school teachers has nearly quintupled.  The 
MOE has been criticized for its failure to cut back on the teacher 
cultivation program as Taiwan's birth rate has declined.  In 
addition to tremendous educational resources that have been injected 
into the teacher cultivation program, MOE's latest decision to spend 
another NT$4 billion to resolve the problem of massive unemployment 
of public school teachers is causing further criticism of the 
program. End summary. 
 
¶2. (U) In January, the Taiwan Provincial Education Association and 
the Alliance for Education Rehabilitation held a seminar to evaluate 
the results of Taiwan's decade-long educational reform. Besides 
reviewing the results of reform in the areas of school curriculum, 
textbooks and entrance examinations for high school and college, 
scholars and experts pointed out that the teacher cultivation 
program, which was started ten years ago to promote an increase of 
supply and better qualifications for teachers, has led to massive 
unemployment of trained public school teachers in Taiwan.  According 
to the Association, over 50,000 eligible public school teachers are 
currently unemployed and are unlikely to find teaching jobs in the 
near future since the supply of teachers is greater than demand in 
Taiwan. 
 
¶3. (SBU) According to a China Times report dated January 18, 2006, 
the number of eligible teachers cultivated under the new program 
increased from 9,719 in 1995 to 19,390 in 2004.  The same press 
report also indicated that the number of Taiwan's newborns decreased 
in the same time frame from 329,581 in 1995 to 216,419 in 2004. 
Taiwan Provincial Education Association Secretary-general Wang 
Ling-hui pointed out that the policy from ten years ago has never 
been revised to reflect Taiwan's decade long decline in the birth 
rate.  As a result, most newly credentialed school teachers are 
headed for unemployment. 
 
¶4. (SBU) Wang Ling-hui also pointed out that students enrolled in 
the teacher cultivation program have spent NT$570 million on 
tuition.  The government also has injected significant resources to 
the program over the past ten years.  Official statistics released 
by the Ministry indicated that since 1997, 108,093 of 130,000 
students taking the teacher cultivation course obtained teaching 
credentials after completing the program and passing the national 
examination.  Among them, 57,335 are employed and 50,758 remain 
unemployed, but labeled as "reserve teachers."  According to 
National Teachers Association Chairman Wu Chung-tai, among those 
unemployed, only some 30,000 will continue seeking interview 
opportunities for teaching jobs while the rest of them will stop 
pursuing a teaching career.  Wu noted that the Ministry should 
revised the policy long ago. 
 
¶5. (SBU) While criticizing education authorities for neglecting 
market realities and wasting tremendous resources in the teacher 
cultivation program for the last decade, Taiwan Normal University 
Professor Wu Wu-dian expressed support for MOE's decision to 
allocate NT$4 billion over 2006 through 2009 to address the problem 
of unemployed public school teachers by increasing vacancies, 
encouraging earlier retirement and subsidizing schools that are 
suspended from running the teacher cultivation program.  Wu pointed 
out that, in addition to allocating NT$4 billion, MOE is also 
planning to cut the number of students enrolled in the teacher 
cultivation program annually from 20,000 to 9,239, starting next 
year.  Educational groups expressed grave concern over this cutback, 
noting the authorities should make a contingency plan since the 
cutback may eventually result in a shortage of teachers.  The 
Ministry reportedly also plans to halve the number of students 
recruited by normal universities and teachers colleges in 2007 as 
well as to eliminate poorly performing schools from the teacher 
cultivation program.  Scholars noted that this cutback will hurt 
schools' finances since the tuition from the program is a major 
source of additional income for most schools. 
 
 
TAIPEI 00001290  002 OF 003 
 
 
¶6. (SBU) According to a statistics released by the MOE, there are 
currently over seventy universities running the teacher cultivation 
program.  However, the numbers show that students from the four 
national normal universities have a higher employment rate than 
their peers in other regular universities and colleges.  The average 
employment rates for eligible teachers in northern Taiwan and 
southern Taiwan are 46 percent and 53 percent respectively.  While 
students specializing in special education have the best chance of 
employment (74 percent), students majored in Chinese language have 
the lowest employment rate (40 percent).  The total number of 
teachers teaching in high schools, junior high and elementary 
schools is 193,796; 65 percent of them are female.  The average age 
of public school teachers is 39; 16.34 percent of them have master 
degrees. 
 
¶7. (SBU) AIT/K discussed the problem of unemployed teachers with Lin 
Kuo-tsai, a public school teacher at a junior high school in Tainan. 
 Lin first taught at a private high school in Tainan County after 
graduating from National Central University in Taoyuan County with a 
master's degree in geology.  He participated in National Kaohsiung 
University's teacher cultivation program ten years ago when the 
program was launched.  After obtaining his teaching credentials, he 
had several interviews with public high schools in central Taiwan 
but always fell out during the second round interviews because, he 
claims, he refused to pay bribes of up to NT$800,000 to get hired. 
Lin told AIT/K that he felt frustrated about the culture of 
corruption in Taiwan's academic circles.  He finally took a job 
offer from Anshun Junior High School in Tainan City without paying a 
bribe. 
 
¶8. (SBU) According to Lin, MOE initiated the teacher cultivation 
program when it realized that the large number of teachers hired to 
sustain the nine-year compulsory education system, which was started 
in 1968, would retire beginning 1993 after twenty-five years in 
service.  Lin said that the program was aimed to provide 
replacements for those retiring teachers as well as to break the 
monopoly normal universities held over the island's supply of 
teachers.  Lin noted that the program, which was widely-applauded in 
its early years, not only solved the problem of a teacher shortage 
but also diversified teachers' qualifications by developing as 
teachers graduates from regular universities. 
 
¶9. (U) National Teachers Association Chairman Wu Chung-tai, a member 
of the Alliance for Education Rehabilitation, also noted at the 
seminar in January that the teacher cultivation program at its early 
stage was very popular that only students with outstanding academic 
performance passed the entrance examination to enter the program. 
Wu pointed out as the problem of unemployed teachers began to 
surface three years ago, when the number of excellent students 
enrolling in the program began to drop.  Wu worried that the 
teaching excellence is likely to decline since good students have 
ceased to pursue teaching credentials. 
 
¶10. (SBU) According to Lin, teaching in public school guarantees 
lifetime job security and income stability, thus attracting college 
graduates, especially at times of economic recession.   A China 
Times report dated April 2, 2006 indicated that the number of 
students taking the teacher examination this year was 3.3 times 
greater than the number from last year.  Lin attributed the growth 
to the downturn of Taiwan's economy.  He said, some students taking 
the examination exhibited sarcasm and pessimism noting that they 
first had to pass an examination to become an unemployed teacher. 
The passage rate for this year's examination is reportedly to be cut 
from last year's rate of 91 percent to 60 percent for this year 
since the supply of teachers is greater than the demand. 
 
¶11. (SBU) KMT Legislator Lee Ching-an urged education authorities to 
study the possibility of reducing the number of students for each 
public school class from 35 to 25 rather than cutting the number of 
teachers.  Deputy Education Minister Wu Tsai-shun responded that the 
Ministry had suggested local governments do so several years ago but 
none of them complied because of a lack of government funds.  In 
response to the low birth rate, MOE is planning to cut 500 classes 
nationwide for the 2006 school year.   According to Wu Chung-tai, 
this reduction will worsen the problem of unemployed teachers 
because most schools will choose not to retrench any incumbent 
teachers to counteract the foreseeable problem of excessive teaching 
staff that most schools will encounter in the near future.  Wu 
bemoaned that the presence of substitute teachers, who work "on 
 
TAIPEI 00001290  003 OF 003 
 
 
call" without benefits in elementary classrooms.  Using these 
quickly disposable teaching assets should student enrollments drop 
has been blamed for deteriorating the teaching quality in most rural 
areas.  Wu suspects that this practice will continue until student 
attrition allows a school's existing teacher force to occupy all 
available teaching slots. 
 
¶12. (SBU) Lin Kuo-tsai noted that, in addition to reducing the 
number of elementary and secondary school classes, increasing 
government subsidies for private schools to provide better salary 
and benefits will attract unemployed teachers and slowly help solve 
the problem.  According to Lin, there are vacancies in most private 
schools but many eligible teachers are reluctant to apply for them 
because teachers in private schools are not entitled to government 
pensions. Lin also recommends that the education authorities start a 
proper teacher performance evaluation system to encourage better 
teaching quality and to allow for the efficient the dismissal of 
incompetent teachers. 
 
¶13. (SBU) Comment:  Although laudatory in its beginning, the teacher 
cultivation program's continued implementation under the DPP has 
begun to cause headaches for the Chen administration.  The program 
now stands out in academic and public circles as a source of 
criticism against the current DPP-controlled MOE for government 
wastefulness and failure to advance policy reforms that will reduce, 
rather than enlarge, unemployment in Taiwan.  End comment. 
 
 
Thiele 
 
Young