YOURSAY 'Common sense will tell you that a third-grade university cannot produce first-grade graduates. You can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.'
'Top 15pct of our graduates are world class'
Telestai!:
Seriously, International Trade and Industry Minister Mustapa Mohamed, you are delusional and you ought to get your head checked.
When foreign investors hire local graduates, they do so because they have no choice. Just because they tolerate the poor quality of our graduates doesn't make them world class.
If our graduates are truly world class, we would not have difficulty attracting MNCs (multinational companies) that require top class talent to Malaysia. Instead, these MNCs went to our neighbour Singapore.
Common sense will tell you that a third-grade university cannot produce first-grade graduates. As the saying goes, you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Instead of being in denial, do something.
Quigonbond: This is shallow thinking at its best. The issue is if our economy is weak, then there are only a few good employers. Of course, they are able to employ the best. But what happens to the average businesses?
They will have to contend with mediocrity. Even if a company puts in place proper policies and have big dreams, taking in incompetent people will simply put stress on existing talents.
These average firms won't be able to grow without innovation, and our economy as a whole will stagnate, if not regress.
Odin: My questions are: What do you mean by 'local graduates'? Have all these world-class graduates (15 percent of the total) from local universities or are they locals who have graduated from foreign universities?
Or, have some of them (the 15 percent of the total) graduated from local universities while the rest have from foreign universities?
Are you telling us that 15 percent of graduates who have graduated from local universities are of world class, while the balance of 85% are of acceptable class or even mediocre class?
If this is so, what of those who have graduated from foreign universities? What percentage of the total graduates do they make up and of what class are they?
Incidentally, Mr Minister, just because those foreign investors employ graduates who are Malaysians does not necessarily mean that they (the graduates) are world class. It may be that the graduates they employ are only the best they can find from among the mediocre.
Son Of Civil Servant: I am a hiring manager at a MNC in Malaysia. I frequently visit most of the public and private universities in Malaysia for recruitment. So, are the top 15 percent of the graduates hireable? Definitely yes, especially the top 5 percent.
The problem is there is a huge gap between them and the rest. Most of the rest are not hireable. And the top few get many offers, while the rest struggle.
Are the top 15 percent world class? They are definitely not as good as graduates from Ivy League or Ivy League -1 class universities in the United States. Has the standard of students dropped? Most definitely.
In summary, I have to disagree with Tok Pa (Mustapa). It is difficult to get similar calibre of graduates in Malaysia compared to the US. And there are definitely not enough good people to fill positions.
Boonpou: I have been to several universities in Malaysia, from peninsular Malaysia to Sarawak and Sabah. I can honestly tell you this - the university students in Unimas (Sarawak and Sabah) speak better English, but are nevertheless below average.
When it comes to peninsular Malaysia, they are horrendous. Furthermore, I have not met a single student who has a questioning mind and I don't blame them. The existing pedagogy in the Malaysian university system does not encourage students to think and to question. All it does is to encourage them to memorise the text for testing purposes.
And I can almost assure you this - a pedagogy that encourage memorisation does not produce average to first-class students. They simply don't. Most of these students cannot even remember what they memorised the day after the tests.
Such a system only produced, at best, mediocre students and at worst, inferior graduates. That is precisely what I am seeing in Malaysia.
Anonymous #02382443: How does one equate the 15 percent to world class when the creme de creme did their tertiary education overseas and the best of these never returned.
Like an ostrich, Mustapa knows not the frustration of private sector employers in having to deal with graduates from public universities, worse still if they have to employ even worse graduates from local private universities and colleges. That is a fact.
Our education system is in a shamble. We produce ill-educated graduates with lackadaisical attitude - with a few exception - who are totally untrainable. Unless those in the government come to their senses, take corrective measures soon, we will end up in serious trouble.
Onyourtoes: Minister Mustapa, I think you are wrong. The bottom 30 to 40 percent have no market (i.e. they have no jobs commensurate to their qualifications).
These bottom 30 to 40 are not supposed to be university graduates. They are supposed to be tradesmen, artisans, sub-professionals, technicians, et cetera. But now you have given them a paper called degree, they have become unemployable, not just unemployed.
Universities in Malaysia have become an employment generation industry for nincompoops to become lecturers and professors. Contrary to the idea of producing skilled human labour, universities have become a major cause of misallocation of resources.
Slumdog: Umno ministers are always racing one another to the bottom of the intellect pile by such inane comments. Mustapa said that the top 15% of graduates are world class. I am sure he is referring to Malaysian graduates as top 15 percent of third world countries.
How can he boast about such a dismal outcome of our education system? Malaysia's premier university, Universiti Malaya, has dropped to 167th place while its former sister university, National University of Singapore, is at 24th spot. It is now the top university in Asia.
Mustapa, now try and spin yourself out of this fact.
Unspin: One of the main criteria that determine university rankings is the quality and quantity of research. Depending on the ranking bodies, the weight assigned to research can range from 40 percent to 60 percent of the total score.
If the top 15 percent of our graduates are world class, why is it that these graduates cannot produce quality research papers and citations that can improve and raise the rankings of our local universities?
Mushiro: Our education policy is killing the quality of our education. Many of the non-Malay students who are not given places for matriculation and admissions to our local universities easily obtain scholarship and admission into Singapore universities.
And finally these bright students serve Singapore. What a loss of high talent and people assets to Singapore, Umno prefer to settle for the foreign workers from Indonesia, Bangladesh, Myanmar, etc.
Changeagent: Maybe 15 percent of our graduates are really world class. But this doesn't hide the fact that none of our local universities are anywhere near world class.
It is particularly concerning that Mustapa can be so excessively boastful about the employability of only 15% of the graduates - since when did the government hold itself to such low employment standards?
Swipenter: Low-ranking universities producing 15 percent of their local graduates on par with world-class standards. Sounds too good to be true. Talent Corp is wasting time chasing world-class Malaysians to come home to work and contribute; they can find plenty at home.
Progressive: Nothing will ever change with our rankings until there is political change. I had the misfortune of being appointed to aid two UM lecturers years ago on a research project that involved an area of study involving my private sector work. I was astounded.
They did not know how to frame their research, develop a methodology or use the available statistical data to derive at some form of conclusion.
More shocking was the fact that these two clowns later made their research presentation at a forum - hardly any research done, but a phony paper was presented.
How can we ever get to be anywhere with such ‘kangkong' professors as described by Professor Syed Hussein Alatas, a former vice-chancellor of Universiti Malaya, I wonder?
Doc: Mustapa claimed that the top 15 percent of graduates from local universities are world class. My question is how many of this top 15 percent are working in Malaysia?
No excuse for UM ranking, only meritocracy will do
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