Ecology and Environmental Education in Taiwan

Abstract

Environmental education is still a concept which needs to be developed at various levels of education in Taiwan. As a whole, at the primary school level, the curricula incorporate many basic environmental concepts making children aware and concerned about the environment and its associated problems. However, further changes of curricula that enable the pupils to have motivation and commitment to work toward solutions to the current and projected problems are needed.

No effort has been given to environmental education above the primary educational level. Environmental Research Centre at Tunghai University has been pushing a low-key program consisting of environmental education seminars for high school teachers and the public at large. Recently a decision was made at the Ministry of Education to incorporate environmental education materials in the high school science curriculum to be revised in three years.

Several factors contribute to this benign negligence. These include an emphasis on economic development at any cost, deemphasising of ecological principles in official planning, traditional confidence about the relationship between man and nature in Taiwan, and lack of expertise in ecological and environmental sciences. No attempt to relate ecology to environmental education and economic plannings has been made, largely because most ecologists in Taiwan received too specialized and narrow ecological training in the past.