TAIWAN: Way clear for Chinese students next year

Students from Mainland China will not arrive at Taiwanese universities before 2011 even though hotly disputed legislation allowing the admission of mainland Chinese finally cleared Taiwan's parliament, the Legislative Yuan, on 19 August.

Legislative amendments allowing students from the mainland to apply to Taiwan's universities for the first time since 1949 were passed after the ruling nationalist Kuomintang Party agreed to demands from the Opposition to withhold recognition of diplomas from mainland medical schools, and bar mainlanders from enrolling in university departments related to Taiwan's national security.

Mainland students would also be barred from government or professions such as medicine or law. Existing laws already prevent them taking up jobs while studying.

"This is to prevent them from competing with local students in the future," Kuomintang parliamentarian Lu Hsueh-Chang said.

Mainland students will also not be eligible for government-funded scholarships.

Initially just 2,000 mainland students will be admitted, a total of 1% of the tertiary enrolment in Taiwan.

Taiwan's Ministry of Education, which will publish detailed regulations next month, said local universities intending to enrol mainland Chinese students in masters or doctoral programmes should submit their plans before December, with the first students to be admitted in March 2011. However, the first mainland undergraduates would not be able to enrol before September 2011.

Recruitment will be based on high scores in China's competitive national university entrance examinations, known as the gaokao, which are held in June with results released in August. The changes in legislation came too late for this year's gaokao students to apply to universities in Taiwan.

This was seen as a deliberate ploy by the opposition Democratic Progressive Party - which opposes closer relations with China - to delay enrolments, after it became clear it could not block the changes. Tactics included open brawls, filibustering, non-cooperation and other methods of preventing swifter legislation.

The Education Ministry has said it would first recognise degrees granted by mainland China's 41 top universities, although the list would exclude the National University of Defence Technology in Harbin, Heilongjiang province. In addition students from China's top sports, fine arts and music colleges in Beijing will also be eligible.

A recruitment committee will be set up in Taipei next year to deal with the applications and admissions of mainland students, the ministry said. It would be responsible for undergraduate admissions.

However, universities themselves would be authorised to handle recruitment of graduate and doctorate students, though their plans will have to be "screened in accordance with the regulations governing Chinese students' recruitment and their stays in Taiwan", the ministry said.

President Ma Ying Jeou's Kuomintang government pushed strongly for the new policy, saying it would encourage Chinese students to appreciate Taiwan and promote cross-straits ties.

Beijing's education ministry welcomed the change but said in a statement Taiwan should not have discriminatory policies towards mainland students.

See also

TAIWAN: Top students head for China
TAIWAN: Lawmakers clash over students from China

yojana.sharma@uw-news.com