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Educationists and parents want UPSR, PMR to stay UPDATED @ 03:21:48 PM 27-07-2010By Boo Su-Lyn July 27, 2010 PUTRAJAYA, July 27 — Political parties and educationists want the UPSR and PMR public examinations retained, an Education Ministry dialogue was told today. Representatives from political parties like DAP and MIC and non-governmental organisations such as the Parent Action Group for Education Malaysia (PAGE) and the United Chinese School Committees Association of Malaysia (Dong Zong) said that today’s meeting of about 40 representatives saw a chorus of reservation against abolishing the two public examinations. “Majority do not agree to abolish both,” said Dong Zong representative Dr Lai Hoi Chaw today. “Majority also thought this exam system has to be modified,” he added, saying that creative content should be increased in the examination system. Lai, the deputy director of the Malaysian Independent Chinese Secondary School Unified Examination Committee under Dong Zong, said tha...

The call by Ministry of Education to abolish UPSR and PMR examinations must not be based on proper quantitative and qualitative studies and not based on unsubstantiated fads or whims of the day The Ministry of Education is currently studying seriously on the proposal to abolish UPSR and PMR examinations in order to improve the standards of education and to create more “thinking” students rather than those relying purely on 'regurgitation' to pass examinations. The response from the public and interested parties to date has been generally in favour of such abolition, with some expressing reservation. I'll like to call upon the Ministry of Education to conduct a more scientific or quantitative study determine the effects of examinations on a student and his or her achievements before taking the hasty and drastic measure of abolishing examinations only to suffer irreversible damage to the quality of our education subsequently. There are a lot of studies conducted by academics ...

The Ministry of Education must not be hasty in scrapping all examinations which will create far reaching consequences for our human capital development Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin had announced that the Ujian Penilaian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR) and Penilaian Menengah Rendah (PMR) examinations may be abolished as “part of government efforts to restructure the learning system that as seen as too examination oriented and failed to provide a holistic education.” I would like to express our thanks to the DPM for also stating that “the ministry would not act in haste and wanted the public to give feedback to help improve the public examination system.” I would like to urge extreme caution from the Education Ministry on the potential move to scrap examination despite the noble objectives to “avoid producing machines” as explained by the Deputy Education Minister Wee Ka Siong. I are in complete agreement that we should reform our education system to preve...

In my "political life", one of my key themes is the fact that the Government is out of cash, and is desperately trying to raise funds via various forms of taxes, as well as sales of assets. However, the clearest indication of the shortfall of funds has to be the ridiculous nature of some of the budget tightening process at our Ministries. It raises the question as to whether the Government knows what it is doing and whether it is just being penny wise and pound foolish. Officials appear to be concentrating on minor cost cuts eating into essential expenditure, instead of the big ticket items which are often wasteful, and are the real culprits to wasteful expenditure. The opinion by former chief news editor of NTV7 and 8TV with regards to the cuts in our local boarding schools highlights the ridiculousness of the situation. Excerpts of his article are as follows. Of schools, hostels and tight budget ...After the few early callers, a lady who was put on air. But instead of co...

One of my friends, Rajan Rishyakaran, has written a response to the lower six student's letter which Tony recently posted . Rajan, himself an alumnus of form six, said most of what I want to say about the issue, and I recommend reading it —this is perhaps the most incisive part of the piece: If the Ministry of Education really wanted to move to a semester-based, coursework-heavy system, the better policy is to increase enrolment of non-Bumiputras in matriculation programs (though matriculation and Form Six are under different ministries). The cynic in me points out that would defeat the purpose of the dual-track system in Malaysia: as a tool of stealthish discrimination. I want to tackle something else instead: the issue of time management. As Rajan says himself, a lot of the people criticising the writer for their ostensible lousy time management probably didn't do STPM. I didn't do it either, but everything I know about it suggests that it is absolutely not a walk in the ...

I've received the following complaint from a Form 6 student. I don't agree with the bits which said some of the activities are a "waste of time", but the concern over long school hours is very valid. When commenting, please remember that the writer is a 17-year-old. I am a lower 6 student. A new system has recently been implemented in all schools with Form Six classes throughout the country. All Lower Six classes from 2009 will have to stay back until 4pm. This new system started in my school in early July. I found out from the teachers that this batch (2009/2010) was used to try out the suitability of the semester-based system to be implemented in schools in the future. Unfortunately for us, our exams are still not semester-based. Staying back till 4pm means we, Lower Six students will not have a chance to participate in the extra-curricular activities as all the club and uniformed body meetings are held after 1pm. What about our co-curriculum marks? We were told th...

Hot off the press . The following opposition MPs have been put on the cabinet committee for the Education portfolio: Yusmadi Yusoff (PKR), Che Uda Che Nik (PAS), Chong Eng (DAP) and for the Higher Education portfolio: Zulkifli Nordin (PKR), Salahuddin Ayub (PAS), Tony Pua (DAP). I think it's high time that the Pakatan coalition formed its own version of a shadow 'cabinet'. Hopefully this will mean a more structured focus on the part of these MPs, especially those which have been allocated the Education and Higher Education portfolios. These six MPs are an interesting and mixed bunch. Yusmadi Yusoff is a young, idealistic PKR MP for Balik Pulau in Penang and I've had the opportunity to interact with him a few times. He was a Hubert Humphrey fellow for a year here in the US and is a lawyer by vocation. I'm sure he'll bring fresh ideas and perspectives to his portfolio. Chong Eng, an experienced MP from Bukit Mertajam, is a fiery and passionate DAP MP. She's b...

A friend of mine, Rajan Rishyakaran, has written a good blog post critiquing the Malaysian university admissions process . While I don't know enough about local universities to comment on many things he raises, there are a couple of points which I think are worth emphasising: the difference between policy in theory and policy in reality, and the importance of decentralising some decisions. There are many illustrations of the difference between something in theory and something in practice, but Rajan's example of coursework is as good as any. In principle, adding coursework to the evaluation process for university admissions would be a good thing. After all, a major problem with our education system is that it focuses a lot on examinations which only assess students at one point in time, and often encourage rote memorisation instead of actual learning. If you fall sick during exam period, it can dramatically change your life's course, because you might not get into the unive...

This is an open letter written by Mr Philip Yong on whether a pass in English language must be made compulsory at SPM level. I'm publishing it in full. Open Letter to Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister Y.A.B. TAN SRI DATO' HAJI MUHYIDDIN BIN MOHD. YASSIN Dear Tan Sri, I am writing this letter in regard to your question thrown to the public to discuss. The question on whether a pass in the English language should be made mandatory to pass the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM). Before I pursued my higher education at a private institution, for the whole of my schooling life I was enrolled in a local public school. Therefore with my eleven (11) years of experience in public institutions I think I am qualified to give my point of view of this what I would call as a highly significant issue. Tan Sri, Whenever I had an English language examination in school, I would score the subject with flying colours and I was indeed very proud of myself. But that was not until I pursue...

So our Prime Minister has reshuffled his Cabinet, and our new Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin is now also our new Education Minister. Unfortunately, my sense of things is that this probably will not mark a significant change in direction for Malaysian education. Datuk Hishammuddin Hussein didn't really turn things around, if you ask me; Kian Ming is impressed by his administrative competency and I would agree that he probably kept things from getting worse. But I think it is very hard to say that things improved under Hisham. The government took some very tentative steps towards tinkering with the school system, but nearly every complaint that held water five years ago is still valid today. I am not optimistic about Muhyiddin because the Education Ministry seems to have become a political football; you often become Education Minister because you're expected to eventually become Prime Minister, and this certainly seems to be true in this case. There is still littl...

I wasn't even aware that Victoria Institution or VI had changed its name to Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Victoria until I read this article in the Star which reported that VI has gotten back its old name - VI. It reminded me of the time when I heard that some idiots in the MOE wanted to change the name of my alma mater, La Salle PJ, to Sekolah Menangah Jalan Chantek. This was some time back. This suggestion was greeted with howls of protests from the old boys and I'm very glad that it was never carried out. I'm guessing that some idiotic civil servants in MOE thought that they could get away with this name change by retaining the name Victoria in the 'new' name. I'm guessing that the VI old boys network and the VI PTA had something to do with getting the old name back. Is it important to retain the names of schools such as VI or La Salle or St Edwards or Penang Free or St Xavier's? Aren't they reminders of a colonial past which we should abandon as we mo...