YOURSAY 'DPM, what is there to be shocked about how our students perform?'

Poor performance by students shocks DPM

Anonymous_1375693422 : I think our educational policy must clearly distinguish between maintaining standards (merit system) and improving or equalising opportunity.

We should maintain or not compromise standards (including in hiring and promoting teaching staff and in grading students, awarding them scholarships, taking them into universities, and employing them after graduation) while doing everything possible to improve and equalise educational opportunity and resources for all Malaysians, beginning from pre-school.

Both are crucial. Standards must not be compromised to equalise opportunity. Equalise opportunity by all proper means. And maintain standards to spur staff and students to compete, strive and perform.

Lowering standards would naturally lead to lower effort and attainment, i.e. lower quality. This is probably the main lesson of the past half century of Malaysian experience.

Vijay47: DPM and Education Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, what is there to be shocked about how our students perform? Why is this sudden concern from you?

That our education system, managed by you, is in the pits is a well-known fact and everyone has been expressing their anxiety over where our education institutions were heading.

But you denied all the worries and instead, kept repeating some ostrich mantra that our education system was among the best in the world.

The guiding principle in the appointment of teachers, lecturers, professors, and in fact anyone in the government service was never "the best to produce the best" but wholly based on race and religion.

Schools and universities were only concerned with "protecting the faith". The fact that you mention that 21 percent of the Budget is spent on education simply reveals how lost you are even regarding your own ministry.

So, Mr ‘I Am Malay First Minister’, it is not how much funds are involved, it is quality. I know of an agency with RM42 billion that went down the drain.

Swipenter: Let the professionals run the Education Department and schools and start getting rid of the little talibans and mullahs from the national schools.

I bet the performance of our students would be better in no time. Let education institutions teach and educate instead of being semi-indoctrination centers.

Kalvin Rekhraj: This is what happens when the ministry is in denial. If we continue to enroll third, maybe even fourth, class students into matriculation as a pathway to public universities, naturally the standard of output will decline.

All this stems from our public schools. Remove the quota system and the matriculation pathway and put all students on a level-playing field. Create positive competition, where only the deserving are provided with government assistance and you will see results.

Till then continue being shocked, just like the millions of Malaysians were when Second Education Minister Idris Jusoh stated that our education is world class.

SelangorKu: Why should our DPM find it so shocking? We the rakyat already know our education standard has gone to the dogs 30 years ago.

Louis: Muhyiddin, you can pour in billions of ringgit into education, but a big percentage goes into the pockets of cronies. Secondly, what types of teachers do we have?

Thirdly, the syllabi of maths and science are made easier and easier, while other countries, notably Singapore, are getting harder and harder.

And lastly, what type of minister of education do we have, including you?

Ipohcrite: Muhyiddin must have thought that he was making an strong statement when expressing his shock at the poor standard of Malaysian students in the international arena.

But what is more shocking to the rakyat is the obvious disconnect between the education minister and the real state of our education system.

All these years, when the rakyat were so vocally lamenting the dire state of education of our schools, our education minister must have had his headset on listening to the praises of the acolytes in Umno or to Ridhuan Tee Abdullah's incoherent raves and rants.

Bash: Dear Mr DPM, it is not how much money that is poured into our education system.

Perhaps, the right attitude by all, and creating a environment where excellence and merits are encouraged and rewarded, are equally important.

Is brain drain also an issue? Many countries are probably benefitting from our abled human resources.

The Analyser: Malaysian children are doomed before they ever reach the education system through the way they are repressed and disciplined in early childhood.

But nobody will ever admit that the Malay/Chinese/Indian method of child raising could possibly be wrong. So you are doomed to make the same mistakes you have been making for the last couple of thousand years.

In Western nations, child-raising methods have evolved through 12 different systems in the last 50 years.

Children are raised to explore and create. Their parents aim to stimulate not repress and discipline.

So you can easily see where the great advances come from. All Asian students can do is pass exams.

Doc: A simple solution, DPM. Lower the examination pass mark and more Malaysian students will do well. This is a time proven strategy in the Malaysia education system for eons.

The penny has finally dropped on Muhyiddin

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