Syed Akbar Ali comments on Malaysian Education circa 2024

 The BN Prawn Head Education Policy : 

Achievements : most of the Prawn Headed ministers found lately!

*By Syed Akbar Ali*

Forwarded message:

Ok firstly congrats to Puan Yeo Bee Yin.  

This is actually at another level. 

This is her Cambridge Education coming through.

Dear Malay brothers and sisters, this is a very big difference in understanding, opinion and approach between the Chinese and the Malay-Muslims regarding education.

This is one of the main reasons why young Chinese people grow up to become towkays, managers and owners of companies and businesses, but Muslim Malay children will be chronically dependent on Malay political power to earn a living.

This is the main difference. Suka dengar atau tak suka dengar, nak percaya atau tak mahu percaya itu pilihan tuan-tuan. (To listen or not to listen, to believe or not to believe is your choice).

I would like to comment / add to a few of the points from Puan Yeo's message:

Malaysian public school (sekolah kebangsaan) achievement is at the bottom 1/3 of the international PISA scores. (The situation is so bad that the Ministry has stopped participating in the PISA education surveys. I dont think Maszlee will be too worried about the PISA either). 

Children from the B40 households (the vast majority of which are orang Melayu juga) lose the most or suffer the most from the worsening sekolah kebangsaan situation. 90% of dropouts from sekolah kebangsaan are from the B40 group.

*There is now a solid caste system among the Malays* themselves - the "have nots" and "have nothing" Malays versus the privileged, connected, cable pulling Malay "haves".  The sekolah kebangsaan now perpetuates this class division - especially among the Malays. 

Many middle class families sacrifice their wealth to send their children to private schools and international schools. Despite being very expensive (8th most expensive in the world)  enrolment in international schools is increasing in Malaysia.  

Yeo Bee Yin says that a good education system for all will make the economy flourish because of greater overall worker productivity.  At the macro level a good education system increases labour productivity and job creation. 

And at the individual level, education enables the rags to riches opportunities for all people.

In Malaysia the ROI (Return on Investment) on education is lower than in other countries.  

Then Yeo Bee Yin touches on the quality of teachers - which I would like to expand upon.

It is extremely very true that teachers play a very important role in student learning and student success. Teachers can make or break a student's future.

In Malaysia, the sekolah kebangsaan have seen so many useless changes in the past.  

The colour of school shoes have been changed to black. 

Long ago they school bags became too heavy. 

Then the size of the school bags were made smaller. 

One dunggu came up with the KBSM and KBSR. 

No one knows what was all that supposed to achieve.  

There was the switch to 100% Malay. 

Then the switch to Maths and Science in English (PPSMI).

Then switch back to 100% Malay. 

Now again they are arguing the switch again to PPSMI.

The school holidays were changed. Then switched back again.

The syllabus has been changed / upgraded.

Even the architecture of the schools has been changed.

Three-in-one Chinese-Malay-Tamil schools in one campus were introduced.

Form Six was taken out and put into Sixth Form Colleges (Kolej Tingkatan 6?)

The Band system was introduced for schools. 

There have been so many other changes as well - most of which did nothing to improve our education system. The sekolah kebangsaan are still deteriorating, anak yang keluar sekolah mungkin lebih bodoh daripada sebelum masuk sekolah. 

However the one thing that has never been touched upon, the most important thing - is the quality of teachers. 

Especially the quality of teacher training and teachers' education in Malaysia.

Despite teacher training colleges and universities, the quality of the average sekolah kebangsaan teacher has either fallen or not improved at all.

This is perhaps the single largest failure of the sekolah kebangsaan system.

First of all the vast majority of the 450,000 or so sekolah kebangsaan teachers in the country are Malays.  And most of them went into teaching because :

they had no other career choice or they had few options.

It is deemed an easy job - work ends by 1 or 2 PM.

Its a five day week, with almost 13 weeks of holidays thrown in

dapat pencen.

The hiring of over 450,000 mostly Malay teachers is certainly a very politicised matter in Malaysia. If they did not become teachers, where would those 450,000 mostly Malay people find work? The government may lose the elections. 

So teaching has become a dumping ground for Malay employment. 

And now the sekolah kebangsaan has also become a dumping ground for the "graduates" who studied religious subjects.  They too have few other career options except to become teachers. When they become teachers they transmit the religious virus (tidak boleh menggunakan akal dalam semua perkara) to the students. 

Is it any surprise that the sekolah kebangsaan are the bottom 1/3 of the PISA scores? 

Makin lama makin bodoh lah.

Tuan-tuan saudara Melayu - for those of you who are rich you can send your kids to study at the private international schools. There are many private international schools in the country now. The products of the private schools are just different from the products of the sekolah kebangsaan. The teachers, teaching and students are superior - in many aspects.

Here is something to ponder. There are expatriate Mat Salleh teachers in some (not all) of these private international schools. Also Indian expatriate teachers.

But the vast majority of teachers at the private schools are Malaysian teachers - and the majority of these teachers are Chinese and Indians. 

What does this mean? I will keep it simple. 

At the sekolah kebangsaan, the vast majority of teachers are Melayu Islam. The medium of instruction is Malay. The sekolah kebangsaan are at the bottom 1/3 of the PISA scores.

At the private schools, the majority of teachers are Malaysian Chinese and Indians. The medium of instruction is  English. And  according to Yeo Bee Yin, Malaysian private international schools are now the eighth most expensive schools in the whole world.  

May I suggest something ?

1. Switch teaching back to the English language.

2. Increase the numbers of Chinese and Indian teachers / guru besar / pengetua in Sekolah Kebangsaan.

3. Remove religion from the education system. (Mak bapak boleh belanja duit sendiri mengajar agama kepada anak-anak. Macam bapak saya buat dulu.) 

If you can do this, our education system will excel - like what it was when I was in school.

Syed Akbar Ali at 4:28:00 PM