Fix education by raising teaching standards, stopping wastage, Putrajaya told

Parent Action Group for Education chair Datin Noor Azimah Abdul Rahim says the Education Ministry must be more responsible in holding 'bad teachers' accountable for their poor standards in teaching. – The Malaysian Insider pic, March 14, 2015.Following Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin's admission yesterday that the education system remains in tatters despite huge allocations every year, education activists said Putrajaya should address the problem by improving the quality of teaching and plugging leakages.

They said the government should stop complaining and stating the obvious, and instead work on solving the issue without any further delay.

Parent Action Group for Education (PAGE) chair Datin Noor Azimah Abdul Rahim said there were several solutions to ensure the country's education was on par with other developed nations, which spent less on the sector than Malaysia.

"The first thing to do is to bring back the quality of the teaching profession," she added.

There are many "bad teachers" who have spoilt the name of the teaching fraternity, she said, and they have to be weeded out.

"These are teachers who are absent all the time, teachers who go into their classes and do not teach or those who base lessons on simply reading from text books.

"But no one is addressing this issue. The problem then manifests and this is the result of it," Noor Azimah said, referring to the poor performance of Malaysian students in international assessment tests.

The ministry, she added, has to be responsible in holding teachers accountable for their teaching standards to ensure that students are receiving quality education in schools.

Muhyiddin, who is the education minister, yesterday admitted that he was shocked by the performance of Malaysian students in international assessment tests such as International Student Assessment (Pisa) and Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) despite the millions of ringgit being spent to improve the education system.

He said the report of the assessments showed that the performance of Malaysian students was not up to par.

"The issue that we are facing, not only the ministry but also as an education minister, is why our education system is not as advanced as developed countries despite the huge funds being pumped into the education sector.

"They (students) are smart, but when placed in international tests like TIMMS and Pisa, it is not a secret where we stand. The bottom one-third, not the top.

"I, as the education minister, am shocked at the report but I have to accept that the education standard, although said to be good, is not good enough," he said.

Wastages

Noor Azimah, who has been vocal on educational issues, claimed that most of the millions of ringgit supposedly meant to improve the education system was not being spent in the right areas.

"I see a lot of money being spent but most of it goes to the middlemen, especially when it involves all these contracts. In the end, the value of what the school gets is very little compared with what it is supposed to get," she said.

"This is where the wastage is, but no one seems to be doing anything about it."

She said that if these leakages were plugged, the money could then be channelled to providing better training for teachers and ensuring that more capable educators are produced.

"If we eliminate the leakages, all these money could go into teacher training which is, in fact, the root of the problem. Put more money in for teacher training, bring in more capable people."

This was echoed in the Malaysian Education Blueprint 2012-2025, which Muhyiddin said would prioritise the improvement and empowerment of teachers and school leadership.

The deputy prime minister said since 60% of teachers were expected to remain in the education system for another 20 years, efforts to improve their skills and capabilities were of the utmost importance.

These include providing opportunities for them to undergo continuous skills training and competitive career-development path, he said.

Noor Azimah said the ministry should also seriously look into training teaching assistants to help relieve the burden of teachers in public schools, who also had to shoulder other responsibilities, such as in co-curricular activities and competitions.

"These teaching assistants can take over the co-curriculum from the regular teachers and they could also accompany students for competitions, for which teachers are required to go, causing them to be absent from their classes.

"This would then help teachers to fully concentrate on the teaching aspect alone and in the long run, the money spent on teaching assistants could prove to be well spent as students would be assured of quality education," Noor Azimah said, pointing out that the idea was mooted by the National Union of Teaching Profession several years ago.

Suara Guru Masyarakat Malaysia (SGMM) Mohd Nor Izzat Mohd Johari (pic) said that Putrajaya should also encourage teachers to speak up and give their views and constructive criticisms on the education system.

Nor Izzat, who was caught in the middle of the school-based assessment (SBA) controversy last year, said that this would help the government in carving out the best education, as it was listening to those on the ground.

"Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin should open opportunities to teachers from the grassroots to give their opinions and constructive criticisms and not stop or censure those who wanted to speak out (about what is wrong)," he said.

The 30-year-old teacher was transferred to a rural school some 80km away from his previous school in Jerantut, Pahang after his vocal criticism of the SBA system. The transfer was seen as an attempt to clamp down on SGMM's protest prior to that.

Education received the biggest allocation in the national budget for this year – RM56 billion - as in previous years.

Despite the huge injection, the country's education system has been criticised for the wide disparity between Malaysian students and their counterparts in other developing countries.

According to Pisa's 2012 results, Malaysian students scored below average and ranked 52 out of the 65 countries. In contrast, students in Vietnam ranked 17 out of 65.

Malaysia also ranked 39 out of 44 countries under Pisa's first assessment on creative problem-solving, while neighbouring Singapore came out tops.

In TIMSS 2011, Malaysia’s ranking in mathematics fell from 20th in 2007 to 26th in 2011 while its ranking in science dropped from 21st in 2007 to 32nd in 2011.

The average mathematics score fell from 474 in 2007 to 440 and the average science score plunged from 471 in 2007 to 426 in 2011.

- TMI