Malaysian Education Summit 2004 - Let's Participate!

[jiinjoo]

Hi everyone! Welcome back to ReCom!

Next week, our country is gonna have an interesting event: the Malaysian Education Summit 2004. There will be a lot of rethinking of the education system as it now stands, and I think as students we really want to play a part here.

Here's a writeup and the schedule to the event. You can probably google for more information.

http://www.asli.com.my/documents/write-up-edu.pdf
http://www.asli.com.my/documents/Education-Programme.pdf

Notice that Badawi is coming to open the event, i.e. this is a big one. Another thing to draw your attention to is session 7 - which is a round table discussion amongst a few reps from our local universities (UM, IIU, and MMU). This shows that students should be a part of deciding the direction our education system should go.

Over the past year I've read many good post on our current education system. Even though our views are diverse, most of us have come to appreciate that education needs to be holistic, with strong emphasis on self-improvment. However, recent developments have given a renewed interest in making our country an Education Hub, using a language that describes students as products and universties as factories. This undertone can be observed as you read the schedule closely.


After speaking to a few buddies, I thought it would be good if we can discuss the topics in the schedule here in this forum ourselves, and see if we can come up with some answers to the questions posed. If in fact we can have something good here, I intend to take this forum and summaries it into an article and put it next to what Badawi says next Tuesday on the local newspapers, with initials of every single one who contributed their ideas here.

So go ahead, pick a question and answer it. I'd really like to address the issue above, but if you have other concerns feel free to raise it.



Here are some other forum links that goes to discussions we have in the past:

Higher/Tertiary Education Of Malaysia
http://ams.homelinux.org:8000/~bachok83/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=664

Education System in Malaysia:
http://ams.homelinux.org:8000/~bachok83/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=117

[USSDefiantNX74205]

I'm not sure which questions you were refering too, jiinjoo, but if they're the ones in here:

http://www.asli.com.my/documents/write-up-edu.pdf (its the only one i could find with questions in it)

then here's my two cents worth on two of the questions.

The quality vs. quantity dilemma ? Are we producing quality graduates when annual intakes continue to increase at a rate faster than teaching personnel and resources?

The answer: No. Never. Definitely not. This has been one issue that has been continuously discussed over the years and I'm surprised it's still brought up here. Isn't it obvious that we're not producing quality graduates? Every Tom, Dick and Harry could gain entrance into public universities nowadays, so where is the quality? Perhaps having too tight an entrance requirement would be a bit too elitist, but do we really need so many graduates just to show that we are a 'developed' country? The policymakers should realize that 'developed' means having graduates that are knowledgeable, workable and dependable, not just some stock, mass produced ones who know crap about the course he or she is taking and still emerges with a degree to show for it in the end.

The government should start by taking us back to the good old days, when entering university was a big deal because it shows that a student has quality. They should start by having more stricter requirements for entering Form 6. If you look at the current pool of Form 6 students, there are a number of them (with below-par academic results and plenty of disciplinary problems) who probably don't even deserve to be in Form 6. And entering Form 6 nowadays usually means having a really good shot at entering university (even though you may get a fringe course and not the one you want). What do you think will happen if these people enter university and finally graduate? Having these people as graduates will only lower the overall image of our graduates and universities and affect the image of the ones with real quality.

The answer is obvious here: reduce the number of students and you will have yourself a pool of quality graduates. With the government's policy of promoting quantity over quality and slack university entrance requirements, no wonder our UM is ranked about 40 rungs below NUS in university rankings.

Education reform ? How far has we come in producing a pool of well-educated workforce with high moral and ethical values?

How far? Very, very far...we have unfortunately, the reputation of producing a huge pool (read: hundreds of thousands anually) of graduates who probably have the knowledge, but can't think critically. So while our current workforce may be (I say may be because some of them probably don't know what they're studying but still get their degree nevertheless) knowledgeable and well-educated, with slack admission requirements, the moral and ethical standards of our workforce has certainly dwindled. Just ask the couple who were caught on video making out in UM's dorm corridors.

Okay, so my two cents have somewhat evolved into a stab at the local education policy, so I guess I'd better shut up now... :)

[chenchow]

Just to give everyone a fast look. The 7 issues are:-

Q1.The quality vs. quantity dilemma ? Are we producing quality graduates when annual intakes continue to increase at a rate faster than teaching personnel and resources?

Q2. Education reform ? How far has we come in producing a pool of well-educated workforce with high moral and ethical values?

Q3. How Malaysian education can be further upgraded and how Malaysia can succeed as a center for educational excellence?

Q4.What are the key issues, latest developments and future trends of Research and Development (R&D) in our public and private higher learning institutions?

Q5. What are the effective means and mechanisms for the promotion and implementation of life long learning in Malaysia?

Q6. What are the prospects of and barriers to E-learning in Malaysia and the world?

Q7. What are the employers? expectations for graduates and to what extent our education products have been successful in producing competent human capital to meet the demands of the local industries?

Thanks JiinJoo, this is a very important issue for all of us to discuss. To make it easier for Jiin Joo to summarize, I will propose that we use Q1 to Q7 to indicate which question we are replying. As this summit will be on 27th and 28th, I think we need to finalize our discussions latest by 25th, so that Jiin Joo will have time to summarize and submit it. To all, crack your mind and contribute. Have constructive ideas and also not only pointing out any problem, suggest how to solve it in our country's contexts. This will help boost ReCom's name~!

Q1. I would look at this issue from the perspectives of whether we really have qualified and able teaching force. VC of UUM recently lamented that it is very difficult to find qualified teaching force and UUM has something like 30 Professor and about 100+ Assoc Prof. That is a very low figure. UM has some 200 or so Professor, which does not argur well with its being our premier education center. I would say that we should not lower the qualification level, as what we hope for are those that are really qualified. Hence, I think there should be more of an awareness for our local graduates to further graduate studies. I think that awareness is still lacking and also it depends on the sentiments of the society. Is the society able to absorb that large amount of Master and Ph.D?

On students wise, I would look at it at the issue from the perspective that we should maintain a ratio. Anyone has any ratio of how many faculty:student in IPTA. I know most of the top unis in US are around 7:1 to 10:1. So, where do we stand? Do our students from IPTA manage to get their fair share of attention, like office hours and appointments from faculty to ask more about their studies? What is the quality of our students?

Q3. I think we need to come up with sort of each IPTA, IPTS has some kind of specialities. So, each university and college has their own niche in some areas, where they concentrate their efforts on building up a fantastic programs on that, for instance Lim Kok Wing in design etc. While having that depth, those IPTA and IPTS should build up a good program overall and in terms of attracting students, the main thing will be to build up a good reputation. How is the graduates from other countries perform? If they are obtaining a good education, guess the words will spread themselves. Right now, we are taking in international students from any background, do we want to take in top students? or should we stay at where we are?

Q4. I think undergraduate research and development is essential. Although undergrad may not be able to contribute a lot, expose them in R&D will help to build the culture and hopefully they will have the awareness in the future on research and guess this will help to boost the graduate schools intake. We should also provide sufficient grants to our students to work on research.

Q5. I guess we need the support and cooperation from the employers in the country. I know that for instance, many companies in US, send their officers, or even their general employees to go for graduate degrees in universities. Some of my classmates are engineers, business people for quite a number of years and they are back to take M.Eng or MBA. Also, I think we can cater to this group of people, to take courses in evening. For instance, USM is very close to Bayan Lepas Industrial Area, and if USM could work with various MNCs to provide evening classes for those workers to upgrade themselves in various skills and knowledge, guess it will be a win-win situation.

Q6. Prospects of e-learning, we need to be open to knowledge. ReCom has the e-learning section and generally only universities in US are providing their course websites on public domain, whereas universities in other countries are not. Is Malaysia ready to take this leap frog? I think e-learning will go hand-in-hand in providing lifelong learnings and i think it is something that will enhance the quality of our graduates and general public.

Barriers to e-learning will be the awareness. I am of the observation that internet has not yet been seen as the tool of learning back home. We need to cultivate that culture. What do people in our IPTA and IPTS use internet for? One thing I find sad is that many of my friends in IPTA and also some IPTS (perhaps with the exclusion of MMU), most of them do not use computer except for writing on MS Word and perhaps Excel. It is a sad story. If this is the cream in our IPTA, what would happen?

Q7. I think a serious lacking in our graduates is the ability to think analytically and have a learning culture. As many have said and it is my most favorite phrase, "Tertiary education is to learn how to learn" . And I think most of our IPTA and IPTS have failed in this aspect. Do we cultivate the culture of learning? I am not saying that the rest of the world is doing well in this aspect, but I think it is something that we should work on? We should have closer interactions in our IPTA. Those CEOs, engineers, physicians etc, those in the real world people, in any profession, should go back to their alma mater at least, to share their experience to those would-be graduates. It will help to provide some perspectives of the real-world scenario. I also think that communication, leadership experience are also an important aspect.

Another thing will be the perception of learning. I find out that many of my friends in IPTA and IPTS shut themselves off the whole world, whenever finals or even any major exams are coming. I think in this way, the system is possibly in need of some reforms. For few weeks, they will be buried in their books and read non-stop. Guess, if you observe, many ReCom members are still online and care about the world, when exams are coming. Perhaps the amount of time spent is less, but I think we should not be so exam-oriented.

However, one thing I find positive about our IPTA and IPTS is the industrial attachment. I think some of those institutions require their students to spend a few months in industries, labs etc. That is a positive aspect.

That's all from me. Hopefully, we can have a fantastic discussion. Hope everyone will share their points of view, even for just a couple of points on any of the questions. Thank you~!

[Shian_Ling_the_Duchess]

i think that the malaysia institutions of higher learning, should allow more flexibility for students to enjoy a more liberal arts education. I believe that to the least extent, students should be able to have more say in the majors they choose. Academic results/curriculum performance is a consideration to select candidates for competitive majors like medicine; however, students' intellectual interest/freedom should be given respect too. I personally think that, too often, our education system tend to be geared too much towards career (etc: a VERY career-oriented mindset, we think more about the job market whenever we wanna choose a major). It's so geared towards market consideration that sometimes people overlook the importance of personal development, real" personal intellectual interest. Such problem is especially prominent when we see that science is given much more emphasis and respect as compared to other fields. People tend to AUTOMATICALLY put their first choice as "engineering" or "medicine" or pure science if they get good results in high school. Very few people will really consider going into other fields coz they feel that those fields are not as "prominent". This is TRUE. we do not pay as much respect to journalists, sociologists...bla bla bla as compared to other professions.

finish "bla'ing" for now. time to get back to my finals.

[Shian_Ling_the_Duchess]

also, i guess that not being active in recom does not really mean that recom members do not care about the world. There are many other channels people could get involved with discussions, activism. Online forum is one of the many ways.

[topdog]

Q3. How Malaysian education can be further upgraded and how Malaysia can succeed as a center for educational excellence?

The forum is not only for higher education, right? We need to look at ways to improve primary and secondary education too. The teaching profession has sadly become second-rate. Not many students want to become teachers nowadays. Those who do usually do so because they have "no choice" and couldn't get into a "better" field. It should not be that way.

My suggestions:
1. Pay teachers more! If the govt can afford to send thousands of students overseas each year, I am sure they can afford to pay our teachers more.

2. Implement a better renumeration scheme. It's no secret that the current scheme is VERY subject to the whims, fancies and personal biases of school principals.

3. Cut down on unnecessary workload. A teacher's job is to teach, not to do paperwork that could be done by administrative/support staff.

4. Recruit bright students, or at least highly motivated ones, into the teaching profession. As I mentioned earlier, teaching is seen as 2nd rate. The govt is not helping matters by training students who are 2nd rate to become teachers.

Perhaps the Education Ministry can consider coming up with a program like "Teach for America" here in the U.S. Basically, TFA recruits fresh college graduates, trains them to teach K-12, and posts them to schools around the country where they teach for 2 years. I have 2 friends (one a Spanish major and the other a History major) who plan to join the program, and I was amazed at their enthusiasm.

In short, we need teachers who are motivated and capable. The Ministry has to show that it appreciates them.

[ElansarGelmir]

1. Pay teachers more! If the govt can afford to send thousands of students overseas each year, I am sure they can afford to pay our teachers more.

Yeah, i like that suggestion. Most teachers are unhappy with their jobs as teaching is just like their safety net. That's why they are not proud of teaching, compared to those who chose to teach because of passion and love for teaching. So, by increasing the pay, i guess that most ppl will change their conception that teaching is not a bad job after all, and teachers will be more commited to transfer knowledge to their students... At least they will have a higher respect on their own jobs...

[pandaboy]

Q3

1. Pay teachers more! If the govt can afford to send thousands of students overseas each year, I am sure they can afford to pay our teachers more.

Yeah, i like that suggestion. Most teachers are unhappy with their jobs as teaching is just like their safety net. That's why they are not proud of teaching, compared to those who chose to teach because of passion and love for teaching. So, by increasing the pay, i guess that most ppl will change their conception that teaching is not a bad job after all, and teachers will be more commited to transfer knowledge to their students... At least they will have a higher respect on their own jobs...

Do they really deserved to be paid more? This is from my younger brother's experience in a government secondary school. His maths teacher spends most of her time giving out homeworks but less teaching. She instructs her students to do the assigment given, and she sits down to relax during class hours. Does she deserve to be paid more? It is not about the pay most of the time, I guess. My suggestion is spend more money to send the teachers to take up courses and seminars. But this should be done during the school holidays...as I always hear from my friends in a F6 school that their teachers were always not in class to attend seminars and so on. Have u guys read about the Assessment of Effiency Level (PTK)? Only about 0.9% of 130 000 teachers in Malaysia who took the assessment scored a pass.

[pandaboy]

Q3. How Malaysian education can be further upgraded and how Malaysia can succeed as a center for educational excellence?

I think the government should abolish the racial quotas. For example, the quota for students in public university. To government, maybe they see this as a way to help the bumiputeras, but in my opinion, they are actually ruining them. Knowing that there are more places for the bumis in public unis, they work less hard compared to other races. As bumis are the main population in Malaysia, their knowledge and skills are the pillars of the development of the country. Another example is the JPA scholarships. The bumis can get the scholarship even with a number of B's and yet, other non-bumis students with straight A's but not straight A1's failed to get the scholarship. Is this a way to help the bumis? I personally feel that this way is wrong, and instead of helping them, goverment are actually ruining them. There are less pressure on them, so the urge or ...determination will be less for them. And how about the other non-Bumi's student who really excels? I'm sure there are a lot of such students who suffered due to this racial quota. My lecturer, who actually obtained a good result in STPM, failed to get into UM to study medicine due to the quota and instead studied biochem and ended up being a lecturer. It was her dream to be a doctor. The quota spoilt her dream. And knowing the fact that she's from a poor family ...she was left with not much choice at that time. Anyway, just my 2 cents.

[Ic3b3rg]

Are we producing quality graduates when annual intakes continue to increase at a rate faster than teaching personnel and resources?

IMHO, the quality of graduates does not necessarily correspond with the number of teaching personnel and the amount of resources.

What constitutes as a high-quality graduate? A graduate with an undying thirst for knowledge and improvement; a graduate who is independent and disciplined whether in work or studies; a graduate who is civic- conscious. In other words, quality graduates are scholars. Therefore, the first step towards creating quality graduates is nurturing the qualities of a scholar in young children. The inquisitive nature of scholar will make him pursue knowledge and improvement, whether he is in an ill-equipped college or a world-class university.

Perhaps the concern over the increase of the annual intakes rises because we are too absorbed with the paper-chase. Parents want their children to be graduates. Students want to obtain degree; it does not matter what degree they obtain. Employers give a higher pay to graduates. Increasing the number of graduates is a good move only when the universities emphasize on the PROCESS of learning, not on the number of scrolls that they churn out year after year.

The number of undergraduates should not be limited, but at the same time, universities should only accept people who truly deserve to be called ?graduates? ? the intellectual portion of the society.

The truth is, the emphasis on quantity is already ingrained in the society. Every school prides itself in the number of students who received ?excellence? in their public examinations.

Nevertheless, high- quality teaching personnel and high-quality resources are important. Then again, the emphasis should be on the PROCESS of learning, not the utilization of high-tech gadgets.

Now the question: are we producing quality graduates?hehe... i honestly don't know....

[ElansarGelmir]

Now the question: are we producing quality graduates?hehe... i honestly don't know....
Well, i would say yes, we do produce quality graduates but less than 50% of the total graduates are adequate for the current job market... Sad to say, Malaysia's policy is to emphasize on quantity but not quality, which is by all means, lowering the grades and standards so that more ppl will pass . . . This is only a bane to those who truly deserve the job and the country as well...

[cquayhl]

Q3

1. Pay teachers more! If the govt can afford to send thousands of students overseas each year, I am sure they can afford to pay our teachers more.

Yeah, i like that suggestion. Most teachers are unhappy with their jobs as teaching is just like their safety net. That's why they are not proud of teaching, compared to those who chose to teach because of passion and love for teaching. So, by increasing the pay, i guess that most ppl will change their conception that teaching is not a bad job after all, and teachers will be more commited to transfer knowledge to their students... At least they will have a higher respect on their own jobs...

Do they really deserved to be paid more? This is from my younger brother's experience in a government secondary school. His maths teacher spends most of her time giving out homeworks but less teaching. She instructs her students to do the assigment given, and she sits down to relax during class hours. Does she deserve to be paid more? It is not about the pay most of the time, I guess. My suggestion is spend more money to send the teachers to take up courses and seminars. But this should be done during the school holidays...as I always hear from my friends in a F6 school that their teachers were always not in class to attend seminars and so on. Have u guys read about the Assessment of Effiency Level (PTK)? Only about 0.9% of 130 000 teachers in Malaysia who took the assessment scored a pass.

So...my Mum is teacing, my Dad used to teach and is now lecturing at UiTM. First of all, teachers' salaries have increased quite drastically very recently. This happened 1-2 years ago. I don't have exact firgures, but it's to the point where my Mum makes almost as much as my aunt who's a government dentist and only a few years more junior in the Service. Also, let me just say, Pandaboy, that if you pay tachers more, perhaps you'll start to attract more 'good' people. Where they would come from given the state of our universities is anybody's guess.

OK, so it's great that we started paying teachers more, but what is sad is that my Mum makes almost as much as my Dad. Maybe you can say that it's justified in a sense because they both have masters degrees. BUT bear in mind that people with bachelors degrees are on the same payscale as my Mum and people with PhDs are on the same payscale as my Dad. As many of you know, I'm thinking about taking a couple of years off from the 'traditional academic track' to teach at UM after I finish my PhD, provided they'll take me. (By traditional academic track I mean PhD at Stanford, postdoc at Harvard, tenure track at MIT or Swarthmore, that kind of thing. Not saying that I could do it, but that's what most people around me are aiming for.) It turns out that as a new lecturer at UM (after including the allowance) I'll be making 1/3 of what I make now as a GRADUATE STUDENT, 1/4 what I would make as a postdoc and fully 1/5-1/8 what the starting pay is at institutions such as Mount Holyoke and Stanford. OK, that also is fine, maybe, but I'll also be making about 1/5 the starting pay at NUS. Is if any wonder that we can't attract and retain talented researchers?

For me, I don't care much about money as long as I have enough for food and books, but I can see how this can be a very big concern for a lot of people. I was surprised how many of my fellow Stanford PhD students whom I consider fairly 'idealistic' view salary as a very important factor in deciding where to work. To the extent that a good friend decided to go into industry instead of academia to a large extent because they pay more. This is someone who teaches well (teaching awards etc.) and is a decent researcher as far as I can tell (he's not in my field).

Salaries aside, a much, much bigger concern is money for research and how it's distributed. I know for sure that I cannot do the research I'm doing now in UM. The annual operating budget of my lab alone (this is one prof, six students, 3 postdocs) is the better part of USD 1 million. There are on the order of hundreds of such labs at Stanford. This of course does not include shared facilities such as the Stanford Nanofabrication Facility (snf.stanford.edu) which makes it more cost effective for all labs to do research: economies of scale. Does anyone know the process for applying for grants in Malaysia and what the deciding criteria are? I've heard some horror stories, including from people who have 'escaped' to Singapore.

People have mentioned that we should focus on agricultural research and other areas where we can compete. I'm not saying it isn't possible. My only question is where are we going to train the people who will do this groundbreaking agricultural research? What kind of career path is envisioned for them? Science these days is done very much in a 'master-apprentice' sort of way. Where are the kelapa sawit, getah etc. masters and which are their professional bodies? In some sense, it's 'easier' to set up a good quantum computing research facility because the path is well-trodden. But what do I know? I'm not a botanist.

Now, the most important question of all, is I think how do we get inovolved with this conversation ASLI is putting on? I'm thinking of writing to them and ask, mentioning recom and the Stanford Malaysia Forum. Thoughts?

[cquayhl]

Have u guys read about the Assessment of Effiency Level (PTK)? Only about 0.9% of 130 000 teachers in Malaysia who took the assessment scored a pass.

Oh goodness, yes. Ad nauseum. So they finally got around to marking it? Last I heard they couldn't find enough markers for the dentists' exam because the questions were subjective. The teachers' one was mostly, if not entirely objective and they still took months.

The pass rate is meaningless without knowing more about the exam and what the pass criteria are. And given that the government couldn't find enough manpower to mark in a timely fasion, who's to say they didn't just throw the whole stack down the stairs and decide that the 0.9% that fell the farthest passed?

Sorry, too much cynicism. Here's one 'reasonable' comment from me to justify this post: participation in PTK was entirely voluntary and most people didn't take it. So any pass rate, legitimate or not is not representative of how many people would have passed in the whole Service had been tested.

[ElansarGelmir]

Have u guys read about the Assessment of Effiency Level (PTK)? Only about 0.9% of 130 000 teachers in Malaysia who took the assessment scored a pass.

Oh goodness, yes. Ad nauseum. So they finally got around to marking it? Last I heard they couldn't find enough markers for the dentists' exam because the questions were subjective. The teachers' one was mostly, if not entirely objective and they still took months.

The pass rate is meaningless without knowing more about the exam and what the pass criteria are. And given that the government couldn't find enough manpower to mark in a timely fasion, who's to say they didn't just throw the whole stack down the stairs and decide that the 0.9% that fell the farthest passed?

Sorry, too much cynicism. Here's one 'reasonable' comment from me to justify this post: participation in PTK was entirely voluntary and most people didn't take it. So any pass rate, legitimate or not is not representative of how many people would have passed in the whole Service had been tested.

Yeah, this is because the quality of teachers dropped... Most of those who qualify to become teachers do not wish to be as the pay is very low... And at the end of the day, the desperate government has to recruit those who are not really adequate for the job... And because of this, we have the students in Malaysia who depend heavily on tuitions rather than on school teachers.

[aquila]

Q1.The quality vs. quantity dilemma ? Are we producing quality graduates when annual intakes continue to increase at a rate faster than teaching personnel and resources?

I disagree that higher education should be elitist. Higher education is very often an open door for people to achieve better lives. If you keep it to only certain parts of the population, you will enforce the social caste we have right now and discourage social mobility. Malaysia, being a developing country, will die an early death if that happens.

Having said that, I definitely think the quality of graduates should increase. For that reason, I think Malaysia should have a system of ranking the public and private universities. Kinda like the system here in the US. Enrol the best students they can get in the best universities without regard to race, religion, etc. I'm sure that there will be enough smart and intelligent Malays to fill up those universities with their CHinese and Indian peers. I think the whole Malays are not as smart and so we must protect them is BS. My Malay friends are intellignet and they've proven to me their worth time after time. Also, since there is an overwhelmingly higher number of Malays than other races, the probability than we'll end up with a sizeable pool of Malays in these top-tier universities is quite high.

The other universities can then be filled with other not-so-qualified students. Then, we can have a wide and huge number of students with university qualifications. At the same time, we won't be compromising on quality. I think competition is self-reinforcing. With a competitive pool of undergraduates in the top universities, the quality of education will improve as professors and teachers are constantly challenged by their own students. Also, since education is a huge emphasis by the Msian government, more money should be poured into local universities. Recruit the best teachers, invite visiting lecturers and enhance the quality of academic and social life in universities. Give them high pays and reiterate the social / civic aspect of teaching. Provide them with high quality research tools. I know this is easier said than done but definitely there should be a change toward that direction.

Personally, although my parents would prefer that I earn millions of bucks by joining the private sector, I really wouldn't mind teaching or serving public interests by running for a local office. The most important thing to me though is that I'm not discriminated against because of my race. It's very depressing to be bypassed for some excellent opportunities just because you're born in the "wrong" skin color or if you believe in another religion. I am looking forward to doing public service. If Malaysia rejects me because I'm CHinese, I will go to Singapore or work for the UN. You can say that I'm a traitor for all you want but if the country rejects me first, what can I say? I feel that this is the sentiment of many nonMalay overachievers back home.

There needs to be social change but the change must start with the Malays. If Malays finally being to accept the equal treatment of other races, they will also reap the benefits of that mindset. I think it's important that we grow TOGETHER. Be helping Chinese and Indians or other races for that matter, you're not giving the Malays a smaller piece of the pie. You need to understand that other races can be social engineers too, only if you give them a chance. OK so this has inevitably come back to race but I still think it's an important issue, to me personally, as I contemplate my future.

Q2. Education reform ? How far has we come in producing a pool of well-educated workforce with high moral and ethical values?

I think civic awareness is an important part of education. If we aren't able to produce graduates who are aware of their social responsibilities enough to know that it's not alright to throw your garbage into the river or pee in the elevator, then we're definitely far away from our goals. Also, I think to enforce the honor system in universities and colleges, it is important that we have some sort of honor code and really persecute people who cheat in exams or break the law. Having said that, i must admit that I do not think that law should be repressive. Instead, law should be able to regulate behavior without oppressing people. For example, I think the enactment forbiding university students from taking part in political demonstrations is just ridiculous. How are we supposed to exercise our political rights and responsibilities if we cannot even voice our opinions? The government should give us an opportunity to tell them what we dislike about the system instead of hushing us and pretending problems don't exist. I love Malaysia and I think the only way it is going to improve is if policymakers start letting people criticize their actions, then reflect on themselves and improve.

Q3. How Malaysian education can be further upgraded and how Malaysia can succeed as a center for educational excellence?

Pour more money into the system and emphasize equality.

Q4.What are the key issues, latest developments and future trends of Research and Development (R&D) in our public and private higher learning institutions?

No comment

Q5. What are the effective means and mechanisms for the promotion and implementation of life long learning in Malaysia?

Let the love of reading start early on. For that matter, we should encourage students to go on a quest for knowledge early on. Instead of the teachers just standing in front of the class and dictating to students what they SHOULD know, teachers should start asking questions and hear from students. Let them explore and learn by thinking. I always felt like all I was doing was memorizing facts that were useless to me in real life. If students are encouraged to learn thorugh experience or active engagement, they will truly love learning and learn for learning's sake. (not just to pass exams and earn that $100,000 job.

Q6. What are the prospects of and barriers to E-learning in Malaysia and the world?

Internet is sweeping across MAlaysia fast and the government should help and make sure that happens. Subsidize on social programs and provide more equal opportunities in all aspects of public life. Where to get the income, increase taxes for top one percentile of the population. Encourage philanthropy and social participation early in students' life. Place more emphasis on volunteerism and acknowledge students who have contributed to that aspect of public life.

Q7. What are the employers? expectations for graduates and to what extent our education products have been successful in producing competent human capital to meet the demands of the local industries?

Employees still have the "foreign" mindset. Meaning that if you graduate from an overseas university, even if that uni is the worst in the country or worse than anything we have in MSia, they'll still employ you. Also, I think we have a lot of graduates without jobs because executives now think that it's no big achievement if you have graduated from a local university. The problem about Chinese liking to employ CHinese is not surprising. With the quota system now in place,. the general perception is that it's no big deal for a Malay to enter or graduate from any local university. Therefore, as I suggested earlier, if you start giving equal opportunities to everyone to higher education and enforce the best-average-safety school mentality, employers will start to value people who graduate from the top-tier universities regardless of their race. I know this first hand because my parents employ people and my uncles and aunties employ people too. There is a strong bias in their method of employment because of the social hierachy that's already in place.

[topdog]

I totally agree with aquila's thoughts on Q1.

[morpheous]

these are morpheous's 2ct of thoughts....possibly my longest postings...
first, jinjoo and other recommers should read this article "why mahathir failed to ..." at

Why Mahathir failed to change the Malays... (http://www26.brinkster.com/delidata/db/news/news_archive.asp?PagePosition=8)

5. As education is the key to the nation?s international competitiveness and prosperity, is he prepared to totally revamp the education system to ensure quality of education in tertiary, secondary and primary schools where meritocracy will be fully restored as the most important criteria, with Malaysian universities internationally recognized as in the league of the world?s best universities, with appointment of University Vice Chancellors, Professorships and academicians guided solely by meritocracy.

All For Quality Education
10:57am Fri Apr 23rd, 2004

I refer to the letters by Granma and the others. Indeed our public universities are in a mess. I would like to comment on the academics and the authorities who run the universities.

Firstly, it is a well-known fact that we don't have the best people as academic members. Many are there through their connections. As a result, we have lecturers who give the wrong information, lecturers who are always cancelling classes, lecturers who do not publish or carry out research, etc.

Yet, it is also these lecturers who are promoted because they are the cronies of those who run the universities. My concern is what do the students learn from these lecturers - nothing.

Secondly, every university has its own criteria for promotion. Some universities' criteria change to suit the people who will be promoted. Some may not be promoted even though they have published works and have carried out research while others who have nothing to show will get the promotion.

There is no transparency in the promotion exercise and the reason why a particular person is promoted is never revealed. We need standardised criteria for all universities and an independent board for promotion to let everyone know why a particular person deserves the promotion.

Thirdly, some universities don't have leaders capable of leading the university to greater heights. These leaders themselves play politics so that they can stay at the top. In playing politics, quality is sacrificed. At the end of the day, students don't get the education that they deserve.

Fourthly, academics don't have a voice. If you give constructive criticisms, you are seen as anti-establishment. Your life will be made very miserable. In the end, most good academics are so disillusioned that either they keep quiet, toe the line and carry on with their work or resign.

Fifthly, since public universities are governed by civil service department rules and regulations, academics are subject to the crazy rules of this department which does not seem to understand what academe is all about.

The most recent ruling is the PTK (Penilaian Tahap Kecekapan) which is supposed to make promotions more transparent. Under this ruling, all academics sit for a three-week course, doing assignments and passing exams that merely give you a licence to apply for a promotion.

The civil service department did not consider the fact that the decision to qualify for the PTK course lies with the dean in his/her yearly assessment of the person concerned. So, even if you pass, promotion is still at the discretion of the university authorities. Academics are thus evaluated twice yet the process is still not transparent.

The PTK course is a waste of time for academics who have to teach, do research, write and publish. They have to drop everything for three weeks just to attend the course.What a joke it will be if an internationally recognised associate professor fails the PTK because it is not his area of specialisation. Does that mean that he is not good enough?

I can imagine the medical doctors in the universities sitting for this course. Most likely, they will decide to join the private sector since it is such a hassle to get a promotion. Moreover, the civil service department cannot pay the higher salary that they can command in the private sector.

What a fiasco! Although it was pointed out to them, the civil service department refused to abolish the PTK, probably out of pride. Academics feel that the civil service has something against them as it is always coming out with criteria to make their already stressful life more miserable.

Do you still think our local universities will give you quality education? I hope the new Higher Education Minister will seriously look into this matter and do something about it. If not, in the end, our future generations will not be the dynamic and progressive lot we are hoping for.


..expose them in R&D will help to build the culture and hopefully they will have the awareness in the future on research and guess this will help to boost the graduate schools intake. We should also provide sufficient grants to our students to work on research.

What constitutes as a high-quality graduate? ...Now the question: are we producing quality graduates?

Also, I think we have a lot of graduates without jobs because executives now think that it's no ...

Post subject: What are the hot careers in Malaysia over the next ten years..
actually i wish to become a mathematician... however, the country sort of 'look high upon' engineers more than scientists - that is the policy currently...
post subject:how to save malaysia..?
post subject: Enough of technology transfer, time to make our own

Posted: Mon Jan 19, 2004 10:15 pm
saper yg harus dipersalahkan apabila berpuluh ribu graduan masih lagi menganggur.....
Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2004 11:21
Sekarang ni melambak U dan IPT kat Malaysia ni...graduan pun makin ramai....yg kerja ada dan tak kerja pun bleh tahan gak banyaknya..
Di tahun 2004 ni...adakah bilangan peratusan graduan menganggur akan meningkat atau menurun...?
Nak kata tak de kerja..kat Star tuh melambak iklan kerja..jadi di mana silapnya hinggakan ramai graduan menganggur walaupun di sektor sektor kiritikal dan professional seperti engineering, IT, dan lain lain.
Adakah kerana kita salah pilih course atau terlalu memilih?
Ramai kata pasal graduan kita cuma ada pengetahuan teori tapi takde pengetahuan praktikal. Betul ke?
Aku rasa, mungkin graduan memilih kerja..nak kerja yg jawatan best jer atau pun skill interview kita still tak menarik minat majikan nak ambil fresh graduate sebagai pekerja.
Mengenai pengalaman kerja sbg satu faktor pemangkin pengambilan pekerja..adakah ia satu diskriminasi kepada graduan baru atau cabaran kepada kita.
Apa pendapat korang?




Tech Blueprint for Malaysia: Going Beyond the MSC

Cyberjaya, April 13, 2004
Source: TechCentral - The Star

The government will introduce within the next few weeks a technology development blueprint to drive the country?s economic growth and enhance social development, Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Dato? Jamaludin Jarjis said today.

The blueprint will be launched by Prime Minister Dato? Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who will lay out a new strategy that will build upon the achievements of the Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC), said Jamaludin, who described the plan as the MSC?s ?second leap.?

?The MSC has done well, but the Prime Minister wants the technology sector to move one stage further,? he told reporters after an official visit to Multimedia Development Corporation, the company which manages the MSC.

Jamaludin said that in the last seven years, MSC companies had poured in billions of ringgit in investment, created 22,000 jobs, and filed more than 400 patents and industrial designs.

?Now we want to do much more,? he said, adding that besides economic growth, the blueprint?s other key focus would be to reduce the digital divide, as the Prime Minister wanted to ensure that ?no one would be marginalised? from the mainstream of technological progress.

The blueprint would include plans to ensure that the people had access to basic services such as the telephone and Internet access, and allow them to participate in technology-enabled economic and social activities, he said.

Refuting suggestions that the technology sector was not at the top of the current administration?s list of priorities, Jamaludin said the Prime Minister was very committed to the development of the technology sector and wanted to see it bring benefits to the people.

Asked if the Government would move quickly to implement the blueprint after its launch, he said ?yes, definitely.?

Jamaludin declined to go into the specifics of the blueprint, but said it would encompass all areas related to technology, including R&D, legislation, funding, education and training.

He said the focus on R&D would be more market-oriented and involve the country finding niche areas where it would be competitive, rather than ?taking on the big boys.?

?Our R&D efforts will begin in the market, not in the lab,? he said.

Asked if the blueprint would involve pumping in more money to stimulate currently lacklustre R&D activity in the country, he said ?we will do whatever it takes to improve technology funding.?

Jamaludin also said the blueprint would include a review of current legislation related to the technology sector, and the optimisation of resources allocated to the sector?s development.

?We want to squeeze the juice out of every ringgit spent,? he said.
Jamaludin said there would also be coordination of efforts with other ministries, such as the Higher Education Ministry, for items that required multi-ministry involvement under the blueprint.



science begat technology,technology begat industries,industries begat capitalists and society's classes, society demands and elect a stable,clean,efficient democracy government, government supports and fund science and science...


In the I-Ching, the ancient Chinese book of divination there is a hexagram called "Revolution".
In a revolution ,it says "Two mistakes must be avoided. You must not move with excessive haste nor use excessive ruthlessness against the people. What is done must be corresponds to higher truth. A revolution not founded on inner truth will come to grief. For in the end, the people will support only what they feel in their heart to be just. This is the meaning of the mandate of heaven.

[b]
alright..explanations time...there,there...the answer is right there staring at you all.....see if recommers can connect all the dots/quotes above....

who speaks the inner truth..or higher truth..???an actuary?an economist?IT guy in MSC?civil engineer? anak boss?doctor??mathematician??
what is a revolution?a cycle?a kitaran? round shape?a wheel shape?
grief??tons of unemployed msian graduates?hmm..are they grieving??

how to create and maintain an orderly and progressive society??confucius scholars ponder about this for many centuries in china...aren't many recommers consists of msian scholars??

how to cope with change?revolution is change,right? can we learn from history?learn from the past and use it to reform the present..?chinese cannons versus british warships' long range cannons??chinese discovered compass,stern rudder,gunpowder and paper.
they let them stand still.no development?
europeans ships with stern rudder sailed to china using paper map,compass for navigation and armed with long range cannons to blast them into submission..painful lessons indeed,right for the chinese?opium wars?caused lots of grief and misery to them?where did they all "cabut" to ?South east asia region....and now at a place called Malaysia?
what went wrong?wrong government?imperial dynasties with emperor has the absolute power..yeah..and eunuchs and mandarin scholars/officials competing for power...

two mistakes?one generation already gone thro NEP.. how about the next generation..?a mistake or ...??

ever heard of five elements productive cycle??here goes :
wood feeds fire,fire become earth,from earth,metal is extracted,metal melts and become water,water feeds wood.
a very very ancient old text,right??still need me to explain...??

what is fire?fire burns bright.the flame pass from candle to candle,right?candle do burns out,right?especially old candles.
knowledge passed down from one generation to another young generation.
bright equals intelligence equals science?a master and his apprentice..hmm doesn't that sounds like in graduate study?high quality graduate??A Jedi master and his padawan/apprentice?if all Jedi knights and masters are slaughtered,what happened to the galaxy or the Republic?thrown into chaos,strife and war?is that a clone war?
who is/are the "phantom menace"?conspiracies and collusion to channel support and power to who?
hunt down,persecuted and "slaughtered" msian non-bumiputra scientists in local unis and have them replaced by who??"hundreds of flowers bloom" policy adopted by mao tze-tung to persecute intellectual classes?pol-pot driving city dwellers to killing fields?NEP?politicians' hidden agenda to stay in power and remove opposition?

what is earth??clay is earth? clay can be molded into different shapes and sizes??what is technology??technology development to suit different demands,right?computer chips in toys and computer chips in commercial aircrafts,which one demands very strict requirements??who should u hire to do this job?engineers?construction technology=bumiputra contractors?whose cronies?so many infrastructure projects in msia?technology transfer =foreign direct investment...=foreign industries in malaysia=jobs creation in malaysia?

what is metal?steel is metal?backbone of industries is steel,right?no automotive industry if no steel industry?who are industrialists and entrepreneurs?bill gates,a software industrialist??spin-off?corruptions?eric chia's Perwaja?

what is water?"sui" means money in chinese?capitalists?who are they? accountants,economists,bankers,actuaries,stockbrokers,marketing executives,businessmen,etc...??
?Our R&D efforts will begin in the market, not in the lab,? he said.
[b]R&D begin in market?MSC a success?IAP advisers' words can be trusted?channel government funding to benefit people with education in marketing,economics,business...who are they??umnoputra?government officials never heard of the wheel of socio-economic changes in developed,democracy nations?

what is wood?look at a tree,what shape do u see? a triangle,right?the man at the top...prime minister or president, cabinet ministers,state government,mayor,city municipal,...,senators,MPs,..a hierachy of government....they enact laws,right??can they be lawyers..??

do we now see what is the purpose of education in buiding a nation?how to create jobs?how do we link them and correlate them with one another??should it be based on meritocracy??why democracy flourish..why china is now undergoing economic reforms and embrace capitalism..

how to save malaysia??what direction are we heading..?

Malaysia has zero capacity of producing the next generation of scientists and researchers. The education system is going on a death spiral downward...sad...imagine you are alone on a deserted,uninhabited island.how are u going to start a fire..?no lenses, no string, no matchstick,flint,etc..

The present mandate of heaven on global scale truly belongs to United States of America...

enough talk for today....

[chenchow]

Thanks ReCom's members for the good discussion. Hope that the discussion can continue well and hopefully we can get everyone to discuss objectively. Constructive criticism is strongly encouraged, however, we hope that everyone has their priority rights and see what we hope to achieve from this discussion. Mere complaining and just letting our emotion out will not help solve the problem, but I would think that a better way will be to share your opinion on how to help improve our education system in Malaysia.

I agree with aquila generally. I would say that higher education should be open to all. What do you guys think about the implementation of increasing the qualification of degree program in private college to 5 credits from 3 credits in SPM. What entry requirements that you guys think should be the right one? In one way, we want to provide education for all and in another way, we want to maintain the quality. I think a point by aquila is very interesting in the sense that we should rank our universities and colleges and allow everyone to have a chance to attain tertiary education.

Looking at it, what do you guys think about Open University and the proposed Vision University, which will cater to working adults who wish to have distance learning. How about Malaysian Universities of Science and Technology (MUST), which is pretty similar to the research system in US. What do you guys think should be an optimum number of students in MUST. MUST is only open for graduate studies and is fully on research. Right now, only 60 students are selected to study every year and every student is fully sponsored by Motorola and Government of Malaysia. Every student is involved in research and the ratio is about 3 students to 1 faculty and the faculties were all PhD holders from prestigious institutions like MIT, Harvard, Cambridge etc. So, should we make it more accessible to people, i.e. allowing more people to enter? What is the optimum number of people?

[jiinjoo]

whoa, kudos everyone! Eventhough I'm only free to look at this tomorrow, I think I need to remind you that the person summarizing this is going to have a hard time if you repeat the same points too often. 8O

Hopefully the person doing the summary have that kind of patience :D


Roughly glimpsing a few paragraphs of each post, I'd like to put forth the "devil's advocate" for the argument, hopefully you guys can make the argument more solid, or find the weakness in my argument. They are gonna be short, crisp and crude, but you'll get the point.

1. low quality students therefore reduce intake.
-- Japan only have 3% of its population without a university degree.

2. research is essential
-- Research what? where's the money? R&D is not cheap. Is there other things which might give a better net utility increase to the system as a whole?

3. computer usage + low skill
-- not gonna focus the report on this, but bear in mind computer is a recent phenomena. don't force it on people.

4. career oriented mindset
-- big nail you hit here alrite. Now how do we solve it? Introducing liberal arts? who teach? who pay for it? who wants to take the course?

5. pri/sec education more important
-- bingo! now how about the "system"? vernicular? vision? independent? impact on social interaction etc.? any effect on higher education?

6. teacher perception low
-- bingo again! great suggestions btw topdog.
-- pay high solve problem? debatable - my view is unless it is coupled with proper screening. if you pay higher, demand for teaching goes up, then you can select better teachers. market is one of the answer, this one i go with cquayhl. didn't read the rest yet.

7. racial quotas
-- suppose there is none, what can you achieve?

8. elitist system
-- US system is elitist. Only difference is that they've already figured out how to make people who didn't get into the good schools happy still, and let the elite continue to run the country.

9. civic education
-- where? where? tak nampak pun. i got a C6 for Moral in case you're interested.

10. "foreign mindset"
-- so? if we hire overseas people, we get hired overseas lor~! (i'm hanging around with hundreds of bay-area engineers now...) how would you re-define the problem? what do employees need?

11. article on mahathir failed.
-- coincidentally, i'm a big fan of 3 kingdom (my name is after one of the generals in the story, go figure).
-- back to the article - it's too long, but from picking only the first sentences, it seems that he's complaining only about one thing: NEP. After briefly reading your post, i too garnered that your point is we are spiraling downward rather than upward.
-- So How Now? You think the people in UMNO dunno all these is it? Tell them what to do!


In short, the point I'm making here is why must we sell our soul to the corporate giants that oils the economy of our country? Aren't we going to school for some higher calling? Or did I come from Mars? Why must we redeisgn our education system to focus even more on ensuring that the corporate giants have the necessary "skilled labour" that they can "buy" and "use", such that we can continue to feed money into their pockets?

If you want to change the spiral upwards, maybe you just have to change the direction 180 degrees?

btw, notice that this is a 10000 feet argument. There are a huge number of good points in all your postings, some are battles on the ground, some are broader pictures. What I hope to achieve is to paint a different picture totally, one made out of all such little things that we all wish for.

Again, read the language of conference: "Developing Malaysia's Intellectual Capital in the 21st Century" -- "The dominant competitive weapon of the 21st century will be the education and skills of the workforce" -- we're the "capital", and to make our country "competitive", we go to school, we get "skills", we become the "workforce". I'm a human being for god sake :P The country will be more potent if you build character in universities rather than build machines.


Ok, me back to work first. Let's see what we have in 2 more days.

also, i guess that not being active in recom does not really mean that recom members do not care about the world. There are many other channels people could get involved with discussions, activism. Online forum is one of the many ways.
Exactly! Let me suggest one way - help summaries this monster and send me an e-mail :) <-- why are smilies off? :P

[aquila]

no racial quotas = chinese/indian wont have "we're better than you" mindset or feel repressed and want to emigrate overseas

malays = wont trivialize the edu system

everyone = more mixing... sense of equality will enhance relationships... otherwise... each will view the other suspiciously
... more competition and ability to see the "other point of view" also, whats the point of higher edu if ppl arent challenged to move out of their comfort zone... if there's only a small number of chinese/indian in uni... this doesn't reflect the real world.... malay students wont have chance to interact with other students and learn crucial interpersonal skills...

US system is elitist, no doubt abt that... point is we should allow everyone equal access to edu w/out discriminatin on race/ econ status... u can argue that rich kids get better elem/sec edu and end up in better unis in the end... but i seriosuly think msian edu (since it's free) grants more equal opportunities regardless of econ status... also, we have mrsm don't we? if u pool all the best students together they're gonna challenge each other to get even better.. so if u want to give equal chances to the poor ppl... start when they're young... send them to places like mrsm, etc.

[USSDefiantNX74205]

5. pri/sec education more important
-- bingo! now how about the "system"? vernicular? vision? independent? impact on social interaction etc.? any effect on higher education?

Dump the vernacular system I say. You don't see the US having 'Hispanic type high schools' or 'Korean-American type high schools' do you?

Now the Chinese and Indian communities will surely cry foul, so I suggest that Mandarin, Tamil and even Malay, be optional 'secondary language subjects', taught as an extra subjecct only if the student requests it. But...

What are we gonna use to replace our beloved Bahasa Kebangsaan? Why English of course! But why use a foreign language that does not even belong to a particular race in our country as the first language? Because it is exactly that - an outside language that has no ties to any race. Only then will there be no cries of bias towards a particular race in our education system. So...

What will be the impact on social interaction? Hopefully it will foster better ties among races because then everyone will speak the same language - English. Hopefully too, it will blur the racial lines between all races. No more bumi/non-bumi or Chinese, Malay, Indian, etc. Also, it might make our people less of an embarrassment in international events. Now...

What effect would it have on higher education? Nothing. Zero, zilch, nada. That would have to depend on the schooling system. Currently, our students are masters at memorizing facts but can't think critically. The govt's move to make secondary schooling (especially F6) more like pre-u/uni/research like by introducing practical coursework is a rather lame attempt. All they ever do is neutralize acid with some alkali solution, a retort stand and a burette (not sure if I spelt this right). I'm not a uni student, but something tells me research in unis isn't done this way. Which brings us to...

What can be done? I'd say give students more room for thinking instead of memorizing. Have more field work, research based school trips (not the standard lawatan sambil belajar) and hands on stuff. The SPMs and STPMs should be done away with as they're mostly memory based examinations that don't test your understanding of a particular subject (no offence to all the brilliant recomers with brilliant SPM and STPM results here). I kinda like the American schooling system, where more emphasis is given to self development. And lastly...

Please do away with independent Chinese high schools. To have a truly unified nation, we must have a truly standardized education system. Now already I can hear cries from the Chinese community calling for my head... :D

[chenchow]

On the points that we should discard the racial system etc, I think what is important is the gradual shift. I am sure that all of you guys have seen the gradual changes that have been in place. Before my time, how hard is it to get JPA? How much during my time? and how about right now? I am sure you guys see some changes. The same goes to entry to IPTA. I have seen a significant increase of students who get into medicine/pharmacy etc every year, although I am basing it on the statistics of my school. If we rush things around, it will not be working. We need to ensure that everyone is ready, while we make the gradual shift.

I will shift to some points raised by JiinJoo

a) Japan only have 3% of its population without a university degree. ?
- really? I would think that at wildest possibility would be 3% without university degree for present generation, not the entire Japan. However, I may be wrong. Just trying to look into this data, without knowing much about Japan.

b) R&D. I am not sure whether this will work. But I will suggest that high school students, perhaps some percentage of high school students should get the opportunities to do research. I think it depends on what we are looking for in the research? Propelling our industry? --> market-driven research. Built up our students skills?

c) I think based on the observation over here, quite a huge percentage of people are very career-minded too. Would liberal arts solve the problems? Over here, I think people take liberal arts to learn stuff that they just want to learn for fun. Perhaps that's a good thing. But as Jiin Joo said, who is going to pay for that? However, I will look at cross-utilization. As most of our universities, especially IPTA are full-fledged universities, so I am sure it is possible to allow students from different majors to take courses of other majors?

d) One thing I look positively into our education system is entrepreneurship in high school. I think there is Young Entreprise etc and I think that is a good way to cultivate entrepreneurial culture among Malaysians.

e) Another good thing that I have observed in Malaysia is the uniformed bodies. I think those who have gone through many tough activities together with fellow members of uniformed bodies have thought a lot to the students. Teamwork - any mistake is equally punished on each and every member of the group and any winning is celebrated together. Guess this is integral towards our education system too.

f) I went for a talk, and Friedman, the Chairman of US Economic Advisory Counciil, talked about the failure of K-12, which is the primary and secondary school system of US. He talked about how Americans fare badly in science and technology after high school.
Is this phenomena true? What should be the measuring point? Don't think SAT is a good indication.

g) On hiring, I would look at it as a global issue. Over here in US, I am sure you guys read from newspaper about the sentiment of jobs being outsourced and a serious influx of foreign talents. If Malaysia managed to develop a very sound higher education with lots of international students, will this scenario happens? What do we expect from those international students that study in Malaysia? Finish university and leave Malaysia? Or join the job market in Malaysia? Which one is better?

h) The Double major proposal. Is it good? I would think that it is quite superficial. While it is good that everyone is allowed to learn 2 majors, will it create undue stress for the cohort? Will those without double major being discriminated in job market? Do people take double major for the sake of taking it?

i) Mentality of learning? I have observed over here that generally the problem of students learning for the sake of exam, happens not only among Malaysians, but guess this is a general phenomena of Asians. Some of my professors have commented too. Most, I am not claiming all, are learning the courses that they are taking for the sake of grades, for the sake of looking good in transcript and not for the sake of personal development or knowledge. One of the professor tried, where he gave a test where most of the stuff are inferred from the stuff taught in class. So, only those who go out of his/her way to learn outside of class notes, do well. And you can see a huge transformation, when in exam 1, asians dominate the top half and for this 2nd exam, americans dominate the top half.

j) I would think that we should touch or at least focus a bit on soft skills, which may be overlooked. I think soft skills are very essential.

[pandaboy]

Please do away with independent Chinese high schools. To have a truly unified nation, we must have a truly standardized education system. Now already I can hear cries from the Chinese community calling for my head... :D

Do away with independent chinese high schools? I think government should take them as an example...on how they can produce smart students. But most of them are weak in English language... Sorry for the generalisation!

[Ic3b3rg]

But most of them are weak in English language... Sorry for the generalisation!

haha! u are smart to apologize beforehand... most of the chinese-ed students in ATU program get the highest scores in their English language courses....

[ElansarGelmir]

But most of them are weak in English language... Sorry for the generalisation!

haha! u are smart to apologize beforehand... most of the chinese-ed students in ATU program get the highest scores in their English language courses....

Yeah yeah, and the bananas scored low . . . :(

What are we gonna use to replace our beloved Bahasa Kebangsaan? Why English of course! But why use a foreign language that does not even belong to a particular race in our country as the first language? Because it is exactly that - an outside language that has no ties to any race. Only then will there be no cries of bias towards a particular race in our education system. So...

IMHO, it's essential to maintain Bahasa Melayu as Bahasa Kebangsaan... Coz as our country's name suggest, MALAYsia should have Malay language as their national language, rite? however, our official language should nonetheless be English . . . What's the purpose of teaching everything in malay or handling official documents in malay when everything we do will only be applicable in Malaysia? Take for example, we have to translate our certificates and dossiers when applying for universities, rite? That's a very tedious thing to do and could have been avoided easily if it's in English. Just my two cents...

[Ic3b3rg]

malaysia is not the only country which faces racial issues in the education system....
http://www.cnn.com/2004/EDUCATION/04/23/brown.at.50.ap/index.html

[Sylvia]

Q1.The quality vs. quantity dilemma ? Are we producing quality graduates when annual intakes continue to increase at a rate faster than teaching personnel and resources?


Q3. How Malaysian education can be further upgraded and how Malaysia can succeed as a center for educational excellence?


i think i'll answer both of the question at once,after all having a better education system will create graduates with better quality.IPTA and IPTS in Malaysia should provide their students with more hands on experience.For example,(acording to my brother)in denmark engineers study in uni for one year and then work for a company for one year,this continues for seven years so after the engineers graduate from school he or she will automatically qualified as a professional engineer with at least 3 years of experience.

Malaysia should also have a more flexible system.Students can finish a course in certain minimum range of time acording to their own abilities.This is because everyone has a differernt learning rate so it is not necessary that everyone finish a course in the same duration of time.

[littlebigone]

wild idea, but maybe it could be compulsory for all govt sponsored students to teach for a period of time after they graduate. Maybe they can make the scholarship into a conditional bond type of deal, where if you decide to teach, then they convert it into a scholarship.

[morpheous]

morpheous's ramblings continues...alright this time ..let us stick to the questions...morpheous will answer in layman terms....
Q1.The quality vs. quantity dilemma ? Are we producing quality graduates when annual intakes continue to increase at a rate faster than teaching personnel and resources?
No. Why?becos government did not fund and support science(R&D). Please refer to my earlier posting about the wheel of socio-economic change in developed,democracy nations.

Q2. Education reform ? How far has we come in producing a pool of well-educated workforce with high moral and ethical values?

Very far behind. lagging...

Q3. How Malaysian education can be further upgraded and how Malaysia can succeed as a center for educational excellence?
Tertiary education is university education.The direction of an university is always to become a world-class research universities.Look at all those world class universities:Harvard,MIT,Princeton,Cambridge,Oxford,Tokyo Uni,etc...These universities have R&D institutes established within their campuses.
If Malaysia'slocal universities's rankings are very low,this already speaks the dire situation we are facing. If Kolej Tunku Abdul Rahman college cannot be upgraded to an university status, then something has gone terribly wrong...go and find out what went wrong...

To be an educational excellence means is to attract the best brains,researchers,academicians to teach and do research in Malaysia. Malaysia is already facing brain drain of its own...shouldn't we fix this problem first??Please refer to the thread "feedbacks on brain drain,meritocracy..."

Even if we attract these foreign "brains" or "talents" or "students" to come to Malaysia , would this cause additional social problems to us??New immigration population like what we see in Britain where foreign students remain and work illegally.Sooner or later ,they will demand for permanent residence,access to public schools,etc...What next in the long term?form a new political party?It is the Malay's say. If all arab muslims are your brothers,then why not...

Q4.What are the key issues, latest developments and future trends of Research and Development (R&D) in our public and private higher learning institutions?

exploration drive research especially scientific research.

for example:Mars program. Government has to channel money to the right persons to do this job.if we channel money to engineering professors to do development projects like building a space probe/spacecraft to be launched to Mars. How can engineers know about Mars' climate,gravity,atmosphere, space environment, orbital trajectories, habitats..etc...There are lots of unknown factors.habislah..the spacecraft/probe "hilang",musnah!!u want to put human being inside that spacecraft?

That is why scientists and engineers work together in developed nations like USA's NASA. The money should be given to a team of scientists.They will allocate the money for technology development.this is where the engineers come in.the scientists find out all about Mars and pass the information to engineers to develop the material for the spacecraft/probe...anyone following the mars rovers program??NASA engineers and computer scientists play supporting role to scientists (geologists, physicists, planetologists, astronomers,astrobiologists,...and all the 'ists" you can think of....)

scientists work ushers in space age with space age comes space law..lawyers also happy...right??if not how.??.all young and old lawyers compete in civil,corporate,shipping,etc... law to cari makan...?

scientists lay down the framework for nanotechnology and they moved on...if engineers really perfected nanotechnology..scientists will use it to probe deeper their understanding of nature and universe...so each one benefits from one another....

u must know atomic physics, from that laser is invented. once laser design is perfected by engineers.use it for laser fusion or research in fusion energy...

bardeen,shocky explained the peculiar behaviour of semiconductor crystal.they(theorist and experimentalist) fabricated the world first's transistor(one bulky size)...an engineer at Texas instrument, kilby , developed it to become smaller and created logic gates..
the rest is history..a new electronic and semiconductor industry is born....

the key point is: money is funded for pure science research..along that way ..they discovered something and engineers capitalized on the new discovery to create new industries and jobs.

more examples: IBM from mathematicians' Turing/Babbage machines, wireless communication from radio astronomy( ground station),... CCD camera/chip from optical astronomy....penicilin,insulin, synthetic compounds,
Jeffrey Yang ,the founder of Yahoo search engine(he is a phd student in electrical engineering),...first world wide webpage spun from a british scientist working in CERN, internet age ushers in..and we have cyberlaw...for lawyers ,right?more space for them to breathe....?

with computer chips and motherboards, just integrate them with monitor technology,keyboard technology,"mouse" technology(stolen from Xerox..what a laugh!!) and put in operating software(another stolen goods)..voila!! you have the billionaire Bill Gates..
that is what industrialists do best.integrate and use technologies to create new products and services....
integrate wheel technology and combustion engine technology..voila!!..Henry Ford's model T car...automotive industry is born in early 1900......and Malaysia's Proton is how old??
so how can we know about combustion engine technology if we do not know thermodynamics,...stirling's cycle,carnot's cycle..do work here and there....and thermodynamics is a science subject....

and many more examples....

how about Malaysia's own scientist Dr.Lam at ANU doing quantum teleportation,optics and information..?? He may be "Charles Babbage" who is ahead of his time...a scientist in 19th century to conceive ideas of computer/machine that do calculations. Only in 20th century, this concept or machine finally materializes..what a terrible loss to malaysia..!!!
do you know how hard the malaysian chinese community "quietly hentam teruk-teruk" liong sik about Dr.Lam's episode...when his story first appeared in newspaper..what is TARC for all these years...??

who doesn't want to be CEO of a company pioneers in teleportation technology!!!you make automotive industry obsolete!!!highway useless!!even if it works on physical materials like in the movie "timeline" ..UPS and FedEx can go bankrupt!! think about it...

Q5. What are the effective means and mechanisms for the promotion and implementation of life long learning in Malaysia?
same answer to first question. Government must funds and supports science development continuosly.both pure and applied science are crucial...

Q6. What are the prospects of and barriers to E-learning in Malaysia and the world?

first define what is e-learning.if e-learning is learning thro internet..then ask ourselves what are the most useful information/knowledge we can get from internet?
amazon website?BBC news??latest products from Intel,Fujitsu,Samsung??online games?online casino?gossip magazines?Hong Kong pop stars' news??web forum like recom forum??oops!!?...download movies and songs??IRC chat??

nope...nope ....none of the above. the most useful knowlege/information is scientific research journals...yeah...sounds boring ,right??here is why...

Malaysians like Ah Meng can download a scientific/engineering research journal ,read it , understand the scientist's works and all he can do is to tell Abu .."pls get $1 million from your dad, the umnoputra official...yes.....we can set up a laboratory ,set up this experiment,do this and that ,..presto!! we discovered a new device.then we patented it.set a new company called Mengabu Sdn Bhd....profits me 80% you 20%..i be the CEO....You be the president.president's job is mingle with government officials..all those "wayang show" act,okay?i got the brain..u got the look!,let make lots of money....how is that..?what say you...??" and Abu replied "YES!"

what is triac??a new electronic device developed from diode...right??u can learn about diode in a scientific journal dated back to 19th century....

so what barriers are we talking about..information is everywhere around us..the prospect is tremendous!!
so what entreprenuer ministry is all about..??to recruit his supporters from his constituencies?create "bowl of iron" jobs for his supporters??sigh!!

but there is a catch here....how can ah meng read and understand scientific journals ?? ....who has to teach,educate,train and guide him in the first place..?Do we have the capacity?Please refer to my first posting...

Q7. What are the employers? expectations for graduates and to what extent our education products have been successful in producing competent human capital to meet the demands of the local industries?

again, the keyword industries....local industries?local industries needs local technologies and local graduates in science and engineering to do the R&D.pls refer to the wheel of socio-economic change.

why foreign direct investment into china cannot make money for foreigners??well..that is because their university graduates are well trained in science and engineering background....give them a process fabrication list for Intel's latest microprocessor.they not only know the knowlege-how but the knowledge-why ....
the knowledge-why explains why you need to do this process step.if this step is modified,what other steps need to be modified to compensate..the chinese graduates know how to go about this...

with this knowledge..they already "curi" foreign technology and set-up their own companies/industries...and the chinese people supports them by buying their products!!!hence no huge profits for western capitalists! can msian science and engineering graduates do that?can we "curi" Intel, motorola,samsung,sony,etc...technology and duplicate them?

phew!...enough for today....entertained??

[gal_flower]

maybe my post is a little too late but juz my thoughts here anyways...

i think the PTK fails to evaluate the quality of teachers. seriously, so wad if the PTK tests on tis tis n tad tad. in my high school, i know of a teacher who passed one paper n failed the other but i do not see how less qualified a teacher he is. he is one of the best teacher who students from other schools want to go tuition to. both my sis were under him n they think he can really teach. u know, we students tend to judge teachers by those we think can teach n those who juz cant teach n r juz wasting our bloody time. i guess many teachers in my school failed the test; some probably don qualify to b a teacher in the first place. but they are so many brilliant teachers around, u know. how do we know wad kind of fail did they get. near zero, or near the passing mark. n wad test can actually tell us wad teachers r qualified to teach or not. teaching is a profession tad black n white cannot show how good or how bad. so wad if u know how to answer the PTK n watever tests for tad matter if u cant relay ur knowledge to ur students n also to captivate ur students into actually listen to u. so my dad failed the PTK too. so wad?! to him, as long as he does his duties as a teacher, tads it. he's the kind of teacher who others want him to teach tuition to their kids too. does the PTK reflect tad my dad is a poor teacher? tell me.

[jiinjoo]

wawa has done an excellent job summarizing the forum! Thank you wawa!

Please read this over once and give me feedback directly to my e-mail at jiinjoo@<hidden>. I'd appreciate comments etc, but don't send me back another word document for me to hunt down the change you made. Just let me know via e-mail on the diff.

Please do this today (i.e. 24 hours from now). Tomorrow, I'll be sending out the finalized version so that we can have a concerted effort in mailing the press. Instructions on who exactly to send to will be posted tomorrow or the next day. You'll probably just have to change the contact information in the release and send out e-mail, which is very easy to do.

If you want to know about this via e-mail, please send me an e-mail indicating that.

And here's the document (in MS Word format).

http://www.stanford.edu/~jiinjoo/ReComPressRelease.doc

[chenchow]

Jiin Joo and Lin Lee, thanks for a great job. Really hope that ReCom's members can help in reading the Press Release and help provide constructive comments.

To the rest, still take the time to chip in more ideas and comments, opinions in ReCom.org, as after this Press Release, ReCom.org will be in the parameter of public eyes.

[chenchow]

May be we can look into Harvard's Arts and Science College Curriculum Review.

http://www.fas.harvard.edu/curriculum-review/report.html

Those who are free, please help to summarize the main stuff out of the report and hopefully, we can generate more ideas for discussions, and hopefully this will help transform our education system.

[USSDefiantNX74205]

Well the MS-Word document summarizes everything here perfectly. I certainly have nothing to complain about... :D

[chenchow]

Just wondering if anyone could translate it into Malay and Mandarin, so that we can hit all the main-stream audience in Malaysia. Thanks for those who are willing to do so. Thank you.

Jiin Joo has also updated the Press Release, so hopefully those who have read it earlier, could read it again and share your comments. This is a very important issue for all of us, something that is close and dear to our hearts.

[aquila]

Are you guys trying to write a proposal about how our education system should change?

I think we should probably emphasize on studying abroad. Give kids in local unis a chance to at least study abroad for a semester.

It's interesting to note that Harvard now wants its students to have an itnernational experience. In the past, they have 97% students staying on campus all 4 yrs. and those who want to study abroad have to work through Brown's program.

[chenchow]

Basically what we plan to do is to address the issues that are going to be discussed in the Malaysian Education Summit. See Jiin Joo's first post in this thread.

[gal_flower]

check out yday's the star newspaper...
dato hishamuddin admits tad the PTK shud not be called penilaian tahap 'kecekapan' but penilaian tahap 'kecemerlangan' as it evaluates not a teacher's 'ability' but a teacher's 'excellence'. it's a good article.. he claims tad most teachers 'pass' by his standards....he also said tad to pass the PTK, a teacher has to obtain 80%...

[topdog]

gahmen's education strategy:

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/4/28/nation/7861595&sec=nation

i like this part: "high-quality language lessons in Chinese, Tamil or Arabic should also be taught in national schools and be an optional subject for all students regardless of race."

have they been reading recom? :)

[Schye]

wild idea, but maybe it could be compulsory for all govt sponsored students to teach for a period of time after they graduate. Maybe they can make the scholarship into a conditional bond type of deal, where if you decide to teach, then they convert it into a scholarship.

Thailand government is doing exactly what Kevin has stated. All their scholars are free to study until master or Phd but all of them are required to teach in Thai local universities for a period of time (10 years if i am not mistaken) after graduating.

[jiinjoo]

I hope with these initiatives, they can slowly rebuild the confidence in our national schools.

?National schools should be topmost in providing foundation skills and knowledge as well as in cultivating inter-racial tolerance and understanding,?
I think the Chinese community will be willing to give up the independent school system if they can get the same kind of education from the national schools.

[jiinjoo]

Ok 2nd draft ready -

http://www.stanford.edu/~jiinjoo/ReComPressRelease.doc

Made a few changes. I'm moving this off the forum to save this for the discussion - if you want to "do the press thing", please send me an e-mail with your name, major, uni / school, and your e-mail address (if different from the one you use to send me e-mail).

Domo Arigato Gozaimasu!

[Schye]

I hope with these initiatives, they can slowly rebuild the confidence in our national schools.

?National schools should be topmost in providing foundation skills and knowledge as well as in cultivating inter-racial tolerance and understanding,?
I think the Chinese community will be willing to give up the independent school system if they can get the same kind of education from the national schools.

Now only I see why the government wants all science subjects to be taught in English (slow huh*banging my head on the keyboard * :roll: ) ---- so that Chinese and Indians wont complain/have difficulties when national schools is implemented as everything will be the same for both independent/vernacular school and national school.

[topdog]

heh...an alternative theory is that mahathir switched medium of instruction to english as a punishment to his people for abandoning umno in GE99...but that's pure gossip la.

i think changing hte medium of instruction for math n science to english ranks as one of the stupidest decisions made by gahmen of all time. it serves no purpose. it won't improve students' command of english, neither would it produce better scientists or mathematicians. i can't figure out what they are trying to achieve.

[jiinjoo]

That's one aspect of it. There are many others. Here's another one: interracial tolerance and appreciation. Step into a chinese independent high school, and you'll not hear any discussion about other races - why? coz there's no one to talk about. Every non-chinese they know are either neighbors or people in the news. There's this artificial "comfort" that one end up drawing upon in that kind of environment. This doesn't help the kid at all if he or she were to thrive locally.

However if you put them together, there will be that exposure factor. Just like Badawi said, If students are clickish, that's ok, at least they get the chance to interact of some other races. I myself lament the fact that I have to travel 10000 miles from home to get some of my first close Malay friends. Isn't this ironic?

[topdog]

umm....one aspect of what? were you referring to my previous post?

[jiinjoo]

one of the clearly voiced out reasons is that we need to catch up, and we can't always wait for someone to translate a book from english to malay before learning it. No it is not solely for command of english, rather, it exposes the kids to many others things, including foreign textbooks and the Internet. This way, even if the teacher in school isn't that good in explaining that concept, the kid can reach out the thousands of websites and books to seek further knowledge.

My teachers told me that it is a pain anyway. We learn our sciences in malay, but then we are also given some materials in english. very confusing. I remember my A.maths teacher saying: Kami guna a untuk pecutan dan bukan p, kerana a ialah accelaration... sama untuk halaju - v untuk velocity juga! Interesting? grrr....

[jiinjoo]

umm....one aspect of what? were you referring to my previous post?

First one was for schye's post, the next one is yours :P

i type too slowly!

[topdog]

That's one aspect of it. There are many others. Here's another one: interracial tolerance and appreciation. Step into a chinese independent high school, and you'll not hear any discussion about other races - why? coz there's no one to talk about. Every non-chinese they know are either neighbors or people in the news. There's this artificial "comfort" that one end up drawing upon in that kind of environment. This doesn't help the kid at all if he or she were to thrive locally.

However if you put them together, there will be that exposure factor. Just like Badawi said, If students are clickish, that's ok, at least they get the chance to interact of some other races. I myself lament the fact that I have to travel 10000 miles from home to get some of my first close Malay friends. Isn't this ironic?
tell that to dong jiao zong. they won't even consider the vision school proposal.

[Ic3b3rg]

IMHO, the vision school will sound more attractive and perhaps work more efficiently if residential schools are included in it. :wink:

[Ic3b3rg]

Btw... sorry if i sound like a wet blanket.... but the press release only outlines the general changes that we want in the education system.....will it make much difference? After all, many of the ideas we gave have already been presented by academicians, politicians, youth organizations, etc...

[zAiTsEv]

check out yday's the star newspaper...
hishamuddin admits tad the PTK shud not be called penilaian tahap 'kecekapan' but penilaian tahap 'kecemerlangan' as it evaluates not a teacher's 'ability' but a teacher's 'excellence'. it's a good article.. he claims tad most teachers 'pass' by his standards....he also said tad to pass the PTK, a teacher has to obtain 80%...

ptk doesn't reflect a teacher's ability 2 teach. u don't simply tag a teacher as excellent just by looking at his or her outstanding ptk results. 2 me, an excellent teacher is some1 who's able 2 pass on his or her knowledge 2 students effectively, not some1 who passes any penilaian with flying colors but in reality fails to produce quality students.

[ElansarGelmir]

check out yday's the star newspaper...
hishamuddin admits tad the PTK shud not be called penilaian tahap 'kecekapan' but penilaian tahap 'kecemerlangan' as it evaluates not a teacher's 'ability' but a teacher's 'excellence'. it's a good article.. he claims tad most teachers 'pass' by his standards....he also said tad to pass the PTK, a teacher has to obtain 80%...

ptk doesn't reflect a teacher's ability 2 teach. u don't simply tag a teacher as excellent just by looking at his or her outstanding ptk results. 2 me, an excellent teacher is some1 who's able 2 pass on his or her knowledge 2 students effectively, not some1 who passes any penilaian with flying colors but in reality fails to produce quality students.

This step is taken to jaga the face of the teachers . . . Of course you don't want the teachers who fail the PTK labelled as "failed to have the ability to teach"...


he claims tad most teachers 'pass' by his standards....

Does this mean that his expectation from the teachers are pretty low . . .?

[Ic3b3rg]

gal_flower wrote:
check out yday's the star newspaper...
hishamuddin admits tad the PTK shud not be called penilaian tahap 'kecekapan' but penilaian tahap 'kecemerlangan' as it evaluates not a teacher's 'ability' but a teacher's 'excellence'. it's a good article.. he claims tad most teachers 'pass' by his standards....he also said tad to pass the PTK, a teacher has to obtain 80%...

ptk doesn't reflect a teacher's ability 2 teach. u don't simply tag a teacher as excellent just by looking at his or her outstanding ptk results. 2 me, an excellent teacher is some1 who's able 2 pass on his or her knowledge 2 students effectively, not some1 who passes any penilaian with flying colors but in reality fails to produce quality students.

yeah... i agree with zaitsev.... a teacher who is so concerned about being excellent by passing tests or wat not may not be so concerned about the future of his students.... especially poor students who have difficulty in learning... since they are not able to give excellent results and earn him a promotion

[zAiTsEv]

ASIA'S BEST UNIVERSITIES 2000 OVERALL RANKING

1 Kyoto University
2 Tohoku University
3 University of Hong Kong
4 Seoul National University
5 National University of Singapore
6 Chinese University of Hong Kong
7 Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
8 Australian National University
9 University of Melbourne
10 University of New South Wales
11 Nagoya University
12 Taiwan University
13 University of Sydney
14 Korea University
15 Kyushu University
16 Cheng Kung University
17 Yonsei University
18 Tsing Hua University
19 Hokkaido University
20 Sun Yat-sen University
21 University of Auckland
22 Keio University
23 University of Western Australia
24 Central University
25 University of Queensland
26 University of Adelaide
27 City University of Hong Kong
28 Chao Toung University
29 Waseda University
30 Monash University
31 Sogang University
32 Ewha Womans University
33 Sungkyunkwan University
34 Chonnam National University
35 Kyungpook National University
36 Kyung Hee University
37 Taiwan Normal University
38 Hanyang University
39 Pusan National University
40 Jawaharlal Nehru University
41 University of Otago
42 Tongji University
43 Chonbuk National University
44 Chengchi University
45 University of Wollongong
46 Tianjin University
47 UNIVERSITY OF MALAYA
48 University of the Philippines
49 Ochanomizu University
50 Chungnam National University
51 Thammasat University
52 UNIVERSITI PUTRA MALAYSIA
53 Prince of Songkla University
54 Xi'an Jiaotong University
55 Victoria University of Wellington
56 Macquarie University
57 UNIVERSITI SAINS MALAYSIA
58 University of Canterbury
59 Khon Kaen University
60 Southeast University
61 University of Indonesia
62 Chiang Mai University
63 Kasetsart University
64 University of Dhaka
65 Chung Hsing University
66 Aoyama Gakuin University
67 Ritsumeikan University
68 Gadjah Mada University
69 Doshisha University
70 Fu Jen Catholic University
71 De La Salle University
72 Ateneo de Manila University
73 Diponegoro University
74 University of Santo Tomas
75 Airlangga University
76 University of Mumbai
77 University of Colombo

[zAiTsEv]

This step is taken to jaga the face of the teachers . . . Of course you don't want the teachers who fail the PTK labelled as "failed to have the ability to teach"...

jaga the face of the teachers??? out of 130,000 teachers who took the test, only 1,170 managed 2 pass. 99.1% failed.

all in all, ptk is just another bullshit introduced by the 'tak ada pasal, cari pasal' kementerian 2 add more burden 2 the teachers who r already bz handling their problematic students.

[ElansarGelmir]

This step is taken to jaga the face of the teachers . . . Of course you don't want the teachers who fail the PTK labelled as "failed to have the ability to teach"...

jaga the face of the teachers??? out of 130,000 teachers who took the test, only 1,170 managed 2 pass. 99.1% failed.

all in all, ptk is just another bullshit introduced by the 'tak ada pasal, cari pasal' kementerian 2 add more burden 2 the teachers who r already bz handling their problematic students.


THe minister made a mistake by introducing this PTK, which in the end, memper-SIA SUI-kan the teachers (0.9% pass only, rite?)... That's why now to jaga the maruah of the teachers, they change the name of PTK to Kecemerlangan, so that the 91.9% of the teachers who are initially labelled as unable to teach will be labelled as not that excellent in teaching . . . But still, the PTK is still redundant . . . Malaysia should increase the passing marks of teachers that graduate from the universities, so as to produce higher quality, in lieu of more quantity, teachers in Malaysia

[Ic3b3rg]

Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, in outlining the strategy, said changes and improvements needed to be implemented to make national schools the preferred schools while safeguarding the position of national-type schools.

The Prime Minister said that to help the national schools achieve this objective, the Government would:


IMPROVE the quality of teaching;

INCREASE the number of non-Malay headmasters;

CREATE more opportunities for the different races to mix; and

HAVE high-quality language lessons.

quoted from http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/4/28/nation/7861595&sec=nation

[zAiTsEv]

changes and improvements needed to be implemented to make national schools the preferred schools while safeguarding the position of national-type schools.


safeguarding? i doubt that. take 4 example, chinese schools face a serious shortage of teachers (approximately 3000). the government never looked into this matter seriously although the problem had existed since the 1970s. instead, the government trained too many malay teachers who don't know chinese & send them 2 teach in chinese schools. this has greatly undermined the proper functioning of chinese schools.

besides that, although chinese school students make up 20% of the total no. of primary school students in malaysia, the government never gave ample financial support 2 chinese schools. between 1991 & 1995, chinese schools merely received 8.14% of the development funds allocated 4 all primary schools. between 1996 & 2000, it dropped further 2 2.44%. in order 2 make sure that chinese schools can continue 2 develop, the chinese society have 2 raise funds from time 2 time.

even though there is a serious lack of chinese schools in heavily populated areas such as klang valley, it's hard 2 get approval from the government 2 build more chinese schools. even if the government approves, the chinese society still has 2 raise the building funds & buy the school lands on their own.

the position of national-type schools is not safeguarded. it's threatened. i believe the position of tamil schools is even bleaker.

for your information, there r currently 1285 chinese schools in malaysia. 88-90% of chinese kids study in chinese schools. there r about 650,000 students in chinese schools currently. this includes 65,000 students of other races, mainly malays & indians.

[z]

Please do away with independent Chinese high schools. To have a truly unified nation, we must have a truly standardized education system. Now already I can hear cries from the Chinese community calling for my head... :D

i'm not from a chinese independent high school.
i don't see the problem of private schools running their own show. if people think that these schools fulfill their needs, so be it.

wonder why the specific reference to chinese independent highs, what about international schools? :)

and btw, i've heard good things about our private universities (e.g. MMU)... apparently they're doing pretty well and is on par with UM (can anyone confirm? thanks)

[USSDefiantNX74205]

88-90% of chinese kids study in chinese schools.

88-90%? Is the number really that high?

[chenchow]

Really hope that more people will endorse the Press Release by ReCom. Send your name, email address, major and university to Jiin Joo. We want a number of diverse Malaysians to sign up. Thank you.

[aquila]

You can add my name if you want

Sally Ong SHin Yee
Biology / Political Science (Actually undeclared.. see how you want to put it)
Duke University
sally.ong@<hidden>

[USSDefiantNX74205]

What about F6 students? We don't exactly have a uni or major...and do we email jinjoo the information?

[aquila]

Suddenly, I haev this idea: Why not ask uni students to give presentations of college life in secondary schools?

Also. scholarship holders who are abroad can give presentations too when they are back for the summer

Sth to encourage kids to excel in school for...

Jpa might not want its applications to swell but at least we'told everyone abt it

[USSDefiantNX74205]

wonder why the specific reference to chinese independent highs, what about international schools? :)

Sorry, didn't see this earlier :)

We can't really equate independent highs to international schools because international schools are attended by a lot of foreigners. No use forcing them to take the SPM or STPM right? But independent highs are mostly if not all made of Malaysian Chinese students. They don't take the SPM or STPM but instead take the UEC, if I'm not mistaken. But do they have a valid reason for having another completely different system from govt schools? Also, since independent highs are made of Chinese Malaysian students only, don't you think that they lack exposure to other races? This is Malaysia y'know...

[topdog]

hmm...i didn't realize we brought independent chinese schools into the discussion...i think z is right. they are independent schools, they don't take a cent out of taxpayers' money. if we want to touch on chinese independent, why not all private schools? sri garden, stell maries etc?

[USSDefiantNX74205]

All I'm saying is that independent schools do not promote unity. Like I said, they're made up completely of Chinese students and that isn't really good for our nation. Even govt Chinese schools have other races in it, though they only account for a very small number. Anyway, private schools like Sri Garden still follow the Malaysian curriculum and do not have their own examinations like the UEC.

[wawa]

Why not ask uni students to give presentations of college life in secondary schools?


Depends on your school's former students, I guess.
For my school, CHung LIng High School, former students now in uni come back everyyear to give seminars about the local unis.

Quote:
wonder why the specific reference to chinese independent highs, what about international schools? :)


Sorry, didn't see this earlier :)

We can't really equate independent highs to international schools because international schools are attended by a lot of foreigners. No use forcing them to take the SPM or STPM right? But independent highs are mostly if not all made of Malaysian Chinese students. They don't take the SPM or STPM but instead take the UEC, if I'm not mistaken. But do they have a valid reason for having another completely different system from govt schools? Also, since independent highs are made of Chinese Malaysian students only, don't you think that they lack exposure to other races? This is Malaysia y'know...

From my understading, independent schools take in a lot of Indonesian CHinese students also. Yes, they do take the UEC, a system which is very different from SPM or STPM, it was modeled after the Chinese system in China and Taiwan. It's system is very good for the top students, but its pure hell for the poorer students, cause it's quite hard and demands a lot of understanding rather than memorizing. Everything is in CHINESE, including all the scientific and mathematical terms too, so they're English is generally not so good.
If you talk to those Chinese INdependent students, you'll find that many of them are incredibly(unbelievably!) isolated from other races. [/code]

[Ic3b3rg]

perhaps banning any type of school in malaysia is against our country's democratic practice? everyone ( type of people, race, etc) has freedom to do something as long as it does not undermine the freedom of other people or the safety of the country.

[ElansarGelmir]

Depends on your school's former students, I guess.
For my school, CHung LIng High School, former students now in uni come back everyyear to give seminars about the local unis.

Chung Ling Butterworth? Hmm... I have friends in Chung Ling Penang and they speak excellent English . . . Make the banana here a little embarassed by their English . . .

[chenchow]

I think the traditional of alumni going back to alma mater to give a talk on College education has been done, but I think right now, we in ReCom is giving this full time service 24/7 for anyone and it is borderless and irrespective of school. Guess the effects will be even greater right?

Anyway, hope that more will read the press release and endorse. For SPM leavers, you could mention which school you were in SPM and mention you are SPM leavers. The same goes to others who are not yet in uni.

To all, read and endorse the Press Release for Malaysia Education Summit. Thank you.

http://www.stanford.edu/~jiinjoo/ReComPressRelease.doc

Email your name, email, major and uni/school/college to jiinjoo@<hidden>

Thank you. Lets together make a difference in Malaysia Education

[jiinjoo]

What about F6 students? We don't exactly have a uni or major...and do we email jinjoo the information?
Yes USSDefiantNX74205, I'm waiting for your reply coz I couldn't get hold of any of your contact. And others who posted too, do it asap coz the sun is gonna rise in Malaysia and I hope to get it in by the time the editors read this over morning coffee.

Uni/School/Ex-school, or none (doing phd in lepakology) doesn't mater.
Major/Whatever you're "studying" or "working as" now.
E.g.
Abdullah Badawi
Form 6, SMK Cermelang
Putrajaya, Malaysia
badawi@<hidden>

If not, it doesn't mater too, this is just for the document. You can still help us e-mail your favorite editor. Send me e-mail and I'll forward you the PDF.

[jiinjoo]

Btw... sorry if i sound like a wet blanket.... but the press release only outlines the general changes that we want in the education system.....will it make much difference? After all, many of the ideas we gave have already been presented by academicians, politicians, youth organizations, etc...
Yes. Point well accepted. However, the difference is in the act. (Sorry this post has less to do with the subject matter)

1. We want to let everyone know about recom and how we're doing
2. We want to take this opportunity (mes04) to show everyone including the government that we're listening

The content is merely a summary of the forum. The PR carries the thoughts in this forum from this media (Internet) to its peers (newspaper).

ReCom is 1+ years old now, the audience is matured enough now. What it is increasingly lacking a breath of fresh air. Consider it a two pronged approach, on the one hand we have this marketing campaign, on the other, a clear message that something needs to be done, and we need to be heard. The education ministry is not going to let the current students be yet another batch of guinea pig for yet another unwarranted experiment, especially those in the wrong direction. Our feedback is just as valuable as those working deep in the ministry, perhaps more pertinent because most of us are still studying in schools and most of us personally went through their recent experiments. We're even more valuable when we have many active participants here receiving the best education you can get around the world so share in their thoughts. (We're most valuable if our discussion continues to stay civilized like this ^_^)

And if you're still not convinced, then consider this your ego seeking activity :) Since we have so much to say, why not say it to more people, eventhough it is (perhaps) the same thing? or maybe the same thing said by different groups may sound different to the listener?

[topdog]

you know, i've been thinking, it's terribly unfair to expect people to give up vernacular education in the name of national unity. there is much more to it than just language.

i'm thinking of my own experience in form 1. at one point, the state edu dept wanted to relocate my school from its 100+ year spot in downtown melaka to some obscure location. they wanted to build a museum in its place!! they probably thought they could do that because my school had just become an SMK. of course, there was a huge, huge uproar from the christian brothers, old boys assoc, teachers, church community and us students. in the end they ditched the plan.

then there's the case of the school where my mom teaches, convent melaka. a few years back, a malay woman took over as school principal. among the first things she tried to do was take down the cross that has been part of hte school facade for more than a century. again, there was a huge uproar and she gave up eventually.

so there's more to chinese schools (i'm talking about srjk and smjk) than just language. they have a rich heritage, and it's probably too much to ask them to just throw it all away. and then there's the school committee. i can understand how they are afraid of losing their autonomy if the govt takes over completely. personally, i would picket and protest to the end if the govt decides to change the character of my school, say from st francis' to something like hang jebat, although my school is for all intents and purposes already a national school.

i like badawi's way of tackling education. while his predecessor tried to force the vision school concept down people's throats (not to mention calling people names like extremist and chauvinist), and conveniently ignore shortcomings in national schools, badawi instead focused on improving national schools and making it appealing to all. it remains to be seen if words will be put into action, but it's a good start.

[jiinjoo]

88-90% of chinese kids study in chinese schools.

88-90%? Is the number really that high?

Last I heard, it's about the right figure. I think this is the primary school figure. For high schools I'm not sure. Here's some information I found on the web that can't really be verified (it claims 95%) http://www.worldpress.org/Asia/1634.cfm

[ElansarGelmir]

then there's the case of the school where my mom teaches, convent melaka. a few years back, a malay woman took over as school principal. among the first things she tried to do was take down the cross that has been part of hte school facade for more than a century. again, there was a huge uproar and she gave up eventually.

The principal of my sister's school, Convent BM, tore the cross off from the school building despite the huge uproar of parents and old teachers. On top of that, I heard that the school's name is going to be changed into some Citra Puteri (Convent still sound nicer) . . . And recently, there are some jawi words written on the edifices of the school . . . Think of it . . . A convent becoming an almost Islamic school . . . There goes the school which the students once took pride to it . . . I doubt in the near future, missionary schools in Malaysia will diminish in size and quality . . . Same goes to my alma mater... Once a missionary school with a rich colonial herritage - now just an ordinary malay school . . .

[topdog]

this is crazy. nation building does not mean whitewashing our past. if the govt is smart, they would acknowledge the important role played by these former mission schools instead of behaving like xenophobes. what good is transforming proud institutions into nondescript schools with generic names like citra puteri??? bah, humbug!

[__earth]

wow, that makes malaysia sounds like the Nazi.

[budakkerek]

hmm..i'd like to go, but so so busy right now...if not, could ve reported to you guys, bout the event. Any ReCommer going for the thing?

[topdog]

88-90% of chinese kids study in chinese schools.

88-90%? Is the number really that high?

Last I heard, it's about the right figure. I think this is the primary school figure. For high schools I'm not sure. Here's some information I found on the web that can't really be verified (it claims 95%) http://www.worldpress.org/Asia/1634.cfm

from online article: The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, estimates that 95 percent of Chinese students attend private Chinese schools
wait, i'm confused. what's does 'private chinese school' mean here? can't be chinese independents that take uec right? coz where got 95% chinese attend those schools? if they mean vernacular schools, are vernacular schools private? or maybe some less private than others?

[budakkerek]

they should leave school as it is, and try to improve on the silibus. I mean, why lei so many changes in the policies? peningkan my head only....like every year, there'll be a new policy..nxt year, some other new policies...Like there's no consistency in our edu system. And they keep on complaining that our students are so behind bla..bla..bla...

[Ic3b3rg]

jiinjoo wrote:Our feedback is just as valuable as those working deep in the ministry, perhaps more pertinent because most of us are still studying in schools and most of us personally went through their recent experiments. We're even more valuable when we have many active participants here receiving the best education you can get around the world so share in their thoughts. (We're most valuable if our discussion continues to stay civilized like this ^_^)

AGREE!! especially about the "civilized" part :wink:

[gal_flower]

check out yday's the star newspaper...
hishamuddin admits tad the PTK shud not be called penilaian tahap 'kecekapan' but penilaian tahap 'kecemerlangan' as it evaluates not a teacher's 'ability' but a teacher's 'excellence'. it's a good article.. he claims tad most teachers 'pass' by his standards....he also said tad to pass the PTK, a teacher has to obtain 80%...

ptk doesn't reflect a teacher's ability 2 teach. u don't simply tag a teacher as excellent just by looking at his or her outstanding ptk results. 2 me, an excellent teacher is some1 who's able 2 pass on his or her knowledge 2 students effectively, not some1 who passes any penilaian with flying colors but in reality fails to produce quality students.

This step is taken to jaga the face of the teachers . . . Of course you don't want the teachers who fail the PTK labelled as "failed to have the ability to teach"...


he claims tad most teachers 'pass' by his standards....

Does this mean that his expectation from the teachers are pretty low . . .?


elansar, do u realize wad r u implying? u do not seem to understand wad zaitsev, ic3b3rg n i agree...tad teachers need no PTK to evaluate how good a teacher they are. It is not tad dato hishamuddin has a pretty low expectation of our teachers!!! instead, he understands that a teacher's qualification to teach cannot be tested on paper!!! dont u get it? it's got nothing to do wif saving the face of the teachers, for goodness sake!! agree, zaitsev n ic3b3rg?

[ElansarGelmir]

Hmm... Instead of just bombarding me like that, I hope you have read my previous posts . . . I did say that PTK is redundant . . . But my point that Hishamuddin changed the PTK name is to jaga the air muka of the teachers who did not pass the PTK . . . If not why go all the way to change the name of PTK from kecekapan to kecemerlangan . . . ? Why don't he just call the whole thing off . . .?
If he claims that teachers' quality should not be put to test on papers, then how can he know that the teachers pass his standard? Forgive me if I'm not that sharp or blur, you got to understand that not all people share the same frequency level as you :P

[USSDefiantNX74205]

i'm thinking of my own experience in form 1. at one point, the state edu dept wanted to relocate my school from its 100+ year spot in downtown melaka to some obscure location. they wanted to build a museum in its place!! they probably thought they could do that because my school had just become an SMK. of course, there was a huge, huge uproar from the christian brothers, old boys assoc, teachers, church community and us students. in the end they ditched the plan.

and

The principal of my sister's school, Convent BM, tore the cross off from the school building despite the huge uproar of parents and old teachers. On top of that, I heard that the school's name is going to be changed into some Citra Puteri (Convent still sound nicer) . . .

I share your feelings on these issues. It seems all missionary schools nowadays are being victimized by the govt.

But let me relate to you a rather different scenario in my school. Late 2002, the govt wanted to appoint a new headmistress/headmaster to replace the old one who had retired a few months earlier and consulted the Brothers on this. From what I heard, the Brothers were given two choices, a Malay one and a Chinese one and they chose the latter. But it turns out now that the Chinese headmistress they chose is a real pain in the @<hidden>$$. She doesn't care about discipline, sucks up to the PPD guys, and cares about nobody but herself. My school is in a dilapidated condition now and nobody seems to care, not even the Brothers who chose this headmistress.

It is disheartening to say this, but I somehow get the impression that the Brothers care only about schools that are famous and located in big towns and cities, like St John's KL, St Xavier's Penang, St Michael's Ipoh, St Francis' Melaka (no offense, topdog) and St Paul's Seremban. But what happened to St George's Taiping? Do they even remember my school? We're struggling year after year just to raise funds. We don't even have proper facilities to boot, and here's this new headmistress making things even worse by transfering all the most experienced teachers away just because the doesn't click well with them.

So did the brothers make the right choice in choosing this headmistress? I don't know. It could've been better or worse with the Malay one, but nobody will know. It makes me pretty jealous to see the Brothers talking about the more famous La Salle schools and launching their projects and stuff in the newspapers when here is a La Salle school (my school!) rotting. No offense to the Brothers, but I don't think they even know it. How I wish they would pay more attention to small town La Salle schools like mine (and like St Anthony's Teluk Intan or St Andrew's Muar).

[jiinjoo]

The missionary school feedback makes me wonder if the Brothers or Sisters are still playing / should play a big role in the school administration? Maybe the success of the school cannot be solely dependant on their commitment?

For my experience in CHS, even though the Marist Brothers building is still there, and I did have a few nice Brothers as my science teachers, and they do hold the repository of keys to every single door in the school... other than that, their presence isn't really felt. I think the school is built based on the student's spirit (and arguably the headmaster's strings with the menteri...) as well as the eagerness of a small number of teachers.

Every now and then various groups in school wil try to make headlines, just to continue the spiral of boosting morale and making students do even more. The cross at the front door still stands, but I personally was oblivoius to it and only realize that it existed after being in the school for 3 years.

Maybe other students might have a different story?

[littlebigone]

i studied in St. David's High School. Haven't seen a brother ever. Don't even know if there is supposed to be a brother. But I do know that we have some trustee board in NZ or something. We don't have a cross. All we have for a "chapel" is some small room that more resembles a broom closet.

To me school was just school. I was proud of it not for it's history or anything but more for it's current and more recent achievements.

[topdog]

i studied in St. David's High School. Haven't seen a brother ever. Don't even know if there is supposed to be a brother.
i think st. david's was built by anglicans, or other protestants.

i think the brothers now play a largely ceremonial role in the running of la salle schools. i think it's kinda like a game of tug of war - on the one hand, you don't want to be totally controlled by the edu dept, but on the other hand, you know things will never be as they were before. so, yeah, it depends on the character of the principal, and the school board's relationship with the people up there (edu dept).

most of the brothers now are retired. there's still one teaching in my school, not mat salleh, chinese guy. we have a beautiful chapel (http://ahtuck.netfirms.com/cgi-bin/album.cgi?Key=Browse&File=mys_06.jpg&Title=Malaysia&Directory=malaysia).

[ElansarGelmir]

The recent changes in Penang's edu system affect missionary schools drastically.... I believe the first school to deteriorate is my school, BM High School... Fancy simply tear down the colonial buildings (just because they are old), renovate and redesign the school hall, stop singing the school song (coz it's in English), and did everything to change the old missionary school into a Malay school.... yeah, the fence was coloured with the typical Malay schools' bright pink and orange... Wah, even Abdullah Badawi won't recognize the school anymore ...

Penang Free School, PFS did not elude from this fate either... New policies are introduced, new headmaster (don't have to mention what's his race is, it's palpable), new rules and regulations... Perhaps PFS still has its fame and pride in its herritage, but still - it deteriorates.... Same goes to St. Georges Girl School (SGGS), St. Xaviers (SXI), MBS and MGS . . . The golden era of the missionary schools has ended... The vernacular schools now are the top ones in Penang - Penang Chinese Girl School, Chung Ling, Jit Sin ...

[chenchow]

This is from the students' perspective out of Malaysian Education Summit.
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/4/30/nation/7880659&sec=nation

Just came across this news on ST. It is about the leaking of accounting exam in NTU.

http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/singapore/story/0,4386,248450,00.html?

And another issue, there is the opening of Perdana Library.

http://library.perdana.org.my:8000/cgi-bin/gw_43_0/chameleon

There are still a number of non-working links for Perdana Library, but hopefully when it is working, we can access a good number of database online.

This is an issue on Innovation in Science and Technology,
"More funds, strengthening the ?brain gain? programme and updating intellectual property policies are among the steps that will be taken to boost innovation in science and technology, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said. Abdullah will chair a soon-to-be formed National Innovation Council to look into rationalising and strengthening the national innovation system across all technology areas. "

To read more, go to http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/4/30/nation/7881397&sec=nation


Another news is that our education ministry hope to place more emphasis on co-curricular activities. Read more at:-
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/4/30/nation/7886527&sec=nation

[masterof_none]

The paper quoted Universiti Islam Antarabangsa student delegate council member Nurulhusna Mohd Jamal as saying that many Malay students did not want to appear ?snobbish? when using the language, especially among their peers.?


I have couple of dilemmas :
1. let say in the ideal world, everybody in Malaysia are willing to speak English with their peers. It's so widespread that no one speak Malay anymore, then, where's our national language then.. who else want to speak it?

2.I recently spotted the problem, that I just realized I cannot write even a simple email (formal email in Malay anymore. It takes me two times longer that the email the I write in English.
So, this is a really bad sign.. let say, everyone facing the same thing
(I'm sure some of us do). then, slowly, the usage of national language would eventually disappear. What left then? Teh tarik?

3. Now, I'm not sure whether how Malaysian people see this, but for me, I see that Malays usually mixed their Malays and English.
This is also bad. because we neither speak, English, nor speak Malays.
I mean, I could accept the spoken English that I learn at Sunway
(with the 'mah' at the end...actually I like it). But if we say:
"I nak pegi shopping lah.." I mean, for me, that's worse than
"Must go shopping mah". At least it's full english. cut the 'mah' behind, then we're good (actually , that's what I did when I came to US).

I think I want to start what so-called the "Saya" revolution. It works like this:
Suppose you want to treat someone for lunch/dinner,

Instead of saying "Boleh I belanja you makan?", it's better for us to say "Saya nak belanja awak makan lah" or if we want to speak full english, just say "can I buy you something for lunch (or dinner?) "
In fact, this is what Recom forum is all about, remember , we have one forum called 'Bahasa Kita'? we speak 'full' Malays.

I seriously think that, while we're eager to westernize ourselves, we should think of preserving our own national language.I think the best way is to find the compromise between the two,
and at least, if we want to speak English, speak it with "full English".

I think the dilemma of not appear "snobbish" happen all over the place. it's not only among Malays, I believe. But what's left for us is not to think of whether to appear "snobbish" or not, it's just a matter of how we can fully utilized the classroom, and use it to create environment for Students to use english. If not among Malays, maybe we can have the program like "Lawatan Sambil Belajar" where student from various races interact with each other. Maybe put in the same classroom, to avoid them to feel that "I'm not the only Malay who think that 'speaks' English"..

Then I believe ppl won't mind you speak English.
(or...if they say, "fuiyo, kau "speaking" lah, segan lah aku nak cakap dengan kau).. let them be.

[masterof_none]

By the way, I really think that this is the dilemma among the Chinese and Indian community too.

But, again, what's left for us is to find the balance between the two.
I think, it's important for Malaysians to be able to speak their national language properly.

In the ideal Malaysian world, for me ,
everyone would be able to speak in Malays, Chinese, and Indian,
But speaking English among us is a good step to understand each other.

English is not good per se. It's just a lingua franca in todays education.
while the merits is clearly huge, it's not to say that we should abandon our heritage altogether.

I think it happen all over the place. I heard Japan having the same problem too. But it's left for us, young generation to determine the fate of the country's heritage. Because I believe, our country is our identity.

[chenchow]

I agree with Syamsul about the importance of our national language and while I can still speak decently in BM, I think my writing skills in BM have deteriorated and in fact, my writing skills in Mandarin have worsen beyond imagination too.

I fully agree with Syamsul that we should not mix the language around. We will have 100% typing in BM for that Bahasa Kita thread and if we want we can have a few threads for that purpose, but lets not mix the language around.

I would strongly encourage everyone to have a discussion at the Bahasa Kita thread.
http://ams.homelinux.org:8000/~bachok83/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=114#15227

[zAiTsEv]

elansar, do u realize wad r u implying? u do not seem to understand wad zaitsev, ic3b3rg n i agree...tad teachers need no PTK to evaluate how good a teacher they are. It is not tad dato hishamuddin has a pretty low expectation of our teachers!!! instead, he understands that a teacher's qualification to teach cannot be tested on paper!!! dont u get it? it's got nothing to do wif saving the face of the teachers, for goodness sake!! agree, zaitsev n ic3b3rg?

agree!

[gal_flower]

ElansarGelmir said:
Hmm... Instead of just bombarding me like that, I hope you have read my previous posts . . . I did say that PTK is redundant . . . But my point that Hishamuddin changed the PTK name is to jaga the air muka of the teachers who did not pass the PTK . . . If not why go all the way to change the name of PTK from kecekapan to kecemerlangan . . . ? Why don't he just call the whole thing off . . .?
If he claims that teachers' quality should not be put to test on papers, then how can he know that the teachers pass his standard? Forgive me if I'm not that sharp or blur, you got to understand that not all people share the same frequency level as you :Pgal_flower
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
i'm sorry but i was not bombarding u. in case u din read MY post correctly, i said dato hishamuddin said the PTK shud be called kecemerlangan not kecekapan. he did NOT change its name. the PTK was around BEFORE he took the post of minister of education...
i'm DEFINITELY not on the same frequency as U....
zaitsev, don u agree wif me?

[SpRInG]

i agree wif u lor gal_flower
*angkat tangan dan kaki*
kekekekkke

[Ic3b3rg]

'I'm glad the students brought it up. That speaks well of the integrity of our students as they could have just kept quiet,' he added.
http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/singapore/story/0,4386,248450,00.html?

i agree with the professor...

[Ic3b3rg]

?My government is prepared to create more funding avenues, whether they be pre-seed, seed and other types of funding. However, researchers and entrepreneurs need to play their part by ensuring that their ideas are market-driven,? he said
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/4/30/nation/7881397&sec=nation

that sounds good... i hope this means a brighter future for researchers and scientists in malaysia... hopefully we will have more creative ppl in malaysia...

but then again, it all depends on whether we can produce inquisitive youths from an early age...

[zAiTsEv]

i'm sorry but i was not bombarding u. in case u din read MY post correctly, i said dato hishamuddin said the PTK shud be called kecemerlangan not kecekapan. he did NOT change its name. the PTK was around BEFORE he took the post of minister of education...
i'm DEFINITELY not on the same frequency as U....
zaitsev, don u agree wif me?

i'm afraid... i'll have 2 agree wif u. haha...

[ElansarGelmir]

Ok lar gal_flower, sorry for the misunderstanding... :P

[aquila]

i disagree.. i think ranking is impt to foster competition... right now, our local unis are slacking off... must give them a reason to work harder towards a better goal.... even if it's just for ego sake... still will produce some positive effects...

i know that ranking is not scientific and may not be all that accurate.... i mean wharton and stanford refused to release results for mba rankings...

still, u want students to at least make wise choices on where to attend... see which programs are best in which universities... don't tell me you went to your uni without looking at its ranking coz i wont believe it...

on students graduating from the last ranked unis... well, here i would say that perhaps we should just rank top 10... let the others that dominate the bottom not differentiate among themselves... i mean a system of ranking unis is still better than letting 10,000 graduates graduate with no distinctive characteristics that will set them apart for employers...

it will benefit the top half i must admit... and will in the long run produce an elitist society (perhaps)... still i grant it better and preferable to having schools with no-names... or having a degree that means nothing for that matter...

[USSDefiantNX74205]

Agreed, aquila, especially about the ranking part to foster competition. Could've took those words straight from my mouth! :D

[chenchow]

I think in a sense for those who are applying for IPTA. There is sort of ranking, although it is indirectly.

The cutoff point for each program for each university could be gotten from your high school counseling office. So, if you take that as a ranking, based on the quality of students who are applying, you may get a sense of it, although it may not be a true picture.

[jiinjoo]

Finally, ONE published article :)

http://www.malaysiakini.com/letters/200405050036824.php

Thanks guys!

[chenchow]

Thanks Jiin Joo and everyone else who have been working very hard on this press release. Thanks Malaysiakini for its publication. Hopefully, with the publication by Malaysiakini, those ideas put forward could be heard and perhaps debated by fellow Malaysians, who care about the future of education in Malaysia.

Kudos to everyone.

Hope that everyone can continue to keep up the discussions on this topic.

[Schye]

Finally, ONE published article :)

http://www.malaysiakini.com/letters/200405050036824.php

Thanks guys!

Well done to all who has worked hard for it.
"ONE published article" is just a START ...
hope that ideas will keep on flowing in and there maybe 2nd and 3rd published anytime.

article published => more heard about us => more read about this thread => more brain storming => summarization => article publish

GO Recom Go!!

[__earth]

nice work jinjoo.

[topdog]

not to sound like a wet blanket....but it's kinda potong stim that it's only in the letters section...mkini publishes almost every letter it receives...coz i wrote to them couple of times under various pseudonyms...

but good job guys, especially jiinjoo for his initiative and wawa (right?) for actually drafting the press release. as chenchow would say, recom boleh!:)

[chenchow]

Yeah, I agree with topdog and thirdshifter (who mentioned this in the shoutbox), about that it is only in the letter section.

However, take it in a positive note. By getting that press release or should i say article in that section, it at least generates some attention on the view points and idea that ReCom members are coming up with.

Yeah, with this, we should have more and more good opinions, ideas on various issues to share and help our country develop.

[masterof_none]

Thanks to everyone. !

But, let's continue our discussion about Malaysia Education System, Shall we? :)

[jiinjoo]

Yeah - we should. Btw, did anyone notice that the event is actually more publicized in Chinese newspapers? I supposed it is the trend in general - Chinese papers love to talk about education, the major English papers (and the Malay papers, which i sample less...) tend to play it down a little.

And back to the ranking discussion, is there an existing methodology that the ministry of education uses to rank university currently? If so, which is the "best university" according to their rules? (I'm not referring to the one that ranks all Asia universities)

And since we have such a large market of private colleges as well, is there an existing ranking?

[chenchow]

I think as of now, there isn't any formal ranking of university in Malaysia. I think it is high time to establish some form of ranking.

This is an article on education stuff in The Star
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/5/6/nation/7896743&sec=nation

[chenchow]

Just did some Google Search.

Try "Education + Unlearn" , our article ranks 2nd.
Try "Education + Re-learn", our article ranks 7th
Try "Unlearn + malaysia", our article ranks 1st
Try "JPA Scholarship", ReCom is 7th, just behind JPA website.
Try "JPA Scholarships", ReCom is 4th

I found this at EINnews.com , a service for global professionals and our articles were selected as one of the articles of the day.
http://216.239.51.104/search?q=cache:-2LvOYrdlx0J:www.einnews.com/malaysia/newsfeed-MalaysiaEnvironment+Malaysia+%2B+Un-learn&hl=en

Found the concept of "Learn, Unlearn and Relearn" in Foreign Minister's speech in 2003 in Jeddah.
"The single most important thrust undertaken by the Government is the radical improvement of our education system. This would allow us to develop the reservoir of skilled, qualified and adaptable workers who have integrity and moral values that a thriving knowledge-based economy requires. To support this effort, Malaysia embarks on a policy to improve critical thinking skills in maths and science. We consider these to be essential for developing an innovative and creative work-force equipped for high technology. We also boldly decided that we have to enhance the use of English language, which is the de facto global language. We believe it is the best vehicle that will enable us to access knowledge for us to operate better in a globalized environment. At this stage, in order to move forward, we accepted that a culture and infrastructure for lifelong learning is needed. We have to learn, unlearn and relearn to achieve our objective."

http://domino.kln.gov.my/kln/statemen.nsf/0/5a805c169ac1666ac8256cb60007b5a3?OpenDocument

[Jalapeno]

I don't think I caught this conversation when it began, but I simply fail to see the point in universal university qualification. Signaling value goes down with saturation; if we had a tremendous pool of unused talent at the secondary school level awaiting the fertilization of a university education, well and good, but as things stand, all policies w.r.t. increased access have basically boiled down to increasing inflow without maintaing standards, pulling down average quality <which may have an effect in pushing the highly talented elsewhere>. a university degree is not an end in itself; education may well be, but to think that a degree implies education is to think in oddly inverted terms.

[budakkerek]

there was a mention of the Msian Edu Summit in last Friday's YouthQuake. I didnt even know that there was such a thing until i read bout it in recom, and even then..the thing was already on..Like remember bout Syamsul, wanting someone to go n hand in the thing personally to those in charge..i could hv done that..coz i dont hv any noon classes, plus Sunway's not that far..but since i found out bout it too late..sorry, cant do..

So bottom line? Just saying..not many papers had some sort of liputan on that...which sucks, coz we miss out on stuff like this..Anyway, good work everyone!

[chenchow]

Good News~!

The press release by ReCom is posted in The Star today (16th May 2004). Congrats to everyone. It is in the Star Education~!

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/5/16/education/7905449&sec=education

Hopefully that we all can bring in the issues in the article for further discussion, since there will be more people who are aware of this issue.

We hope to hear from those Star readers on their opinion of what that has been suggested in the ReCom.org article! Welcome on board!

[chenchow]

Among the view points mentioned:-

1. Schools should teach students how to acquire skills, not just the skills.
2. Quality education should produce all rounders instead of just products that the industry demands.
3. Innovation in both learning and teaching should be emphasised.
4. Graduates should possess the ability to communicate and think critically, be independent and disciplined, have practical experience, and be aware of current global trends.
5. The present illiterate are those who cannot read and write but the future illiterate will most likely be those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.
6. It is more important to create young minds that have the ability to pick up the necessary skills required when the needs arise than to imbue them with a fixed set of knowledge and skills.
7. Universities can do much to upgrade themselves too: take in better qualified local and international students, ensure that the system is fair and provides for various different communities, and specialise in certain areas.
8. Universities can choose to concentrate in certain disciplines to provide depth and quality, which in turn will attract good students from the region to study those disciplines.
9. Teaching awards, better pay and remuneration schemes, and less non-teaching workload will not only inspire teachers to provide better qualities of education, but also to attract intelligent and talented people to the teaching profession.
10. Courses and seminars will also help many teachers to handle students and to present materials more efficiently.
11. Programmes like ?Teach for America? where fresh graduates are recruited, trained, and then sent around the country to teach for two years will certainly help ease the current shortage of teachers.
12. E-learning provides various ways of learning new stuff and many opportunities to the ambitious. Not much sharing is currently being done in Malaysia, in contrast to some overseas universities which provide their course websites on public domain.
13. The industrial sector can do its part by encouraging employees to further their studies; the govern-ment must cultivate a culture of reading and learning.
14. Universities can also co-operate with the industrial sector in providing a continuous learning environment. For instance, USM, which is situated next to the Bayan Lepas Industrial Area, could provide classes for the professionals to upgrade themselves.
15. As R&D is increasingly being emphasised by the government, certain issues have caused a shortage of quality researchers in Malaysia: the general disinterest and prejudice about research, the lack of undergraduate participation in research and also the lack of funding and grants for various scientific projects. Researchers who are based overseas are often unable to return to Malaysia as funds, equipment and expertise in their lines are sorely lacking.

We believe that with the active participation from the students and teachers, the constant reviewing and monitoring effort by the government, the foresight of our industries and the support of the public, we can continue join hands to improve our Malaysian education system.

Basically this is almost the entire article. To facilitate discussion, please quote the number, if you are discussing on a particular point.

Hopefully with further discussion here, we can have a better set of idea/opinion etc to help improve our Malaysian education system.

If you care about Malaysia education system, we hope to hear from you. Not only about what is not good enough, but how to make it better.

Welcome everyone to join this forum!
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/5/16/education/7905449&sec=education

[chenchow]

This is another article in The Star by Wee Hui Bieh talking about Lifelong Learning and other educational issues.

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/5/16/education/7959414&sec=education

This is an article of a 72-year old Malaysian getting a Bachelor's Science Degree in Computing. Lifelong Learning at play!

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/5/16/education/7947089&sec=education

[misled_youth]

You guys shouldn't call it a press release, because it's not.

ReCom wishlist/letter-to-editor might be better.

There is a standard format for press releases, which was not followed.

Cheers!
________
California Medical Marijuana Dispensary (http://california.dispensaries.org/)

[masterof_none]

You guys shouldn't call it a press release, because it's not.

ReCom wishlist/letter-to-editor might be better.

There is a standard format for press releases, which was not followed.

Cheers!

now we're learning!. mind show it to us?
(check out the 'Press Release' at ReMag (http://remag.recom.org/article.php?content=article4) too)

[chenchow]

I think the main thing is that we get the message across. Hopefully this will bring on more discussions on those issues that were brought up. Hopefully ReComers and our visitors will start discussing on those issues and perhaps other issues that could be brought up for discussions, for the sake of Malaysia education system!

[jiinjoo]

You guys shouldn't call it a press release, because it's not.

ReCom wishlist/letter-to-editor might be better.

There is a standard format for press releases, which was not followed.

Cheers!

Well I did consult a couple of reporters from the Star and Straits Times before I sent it out and they said it was ok... It sounds like a wishlist because I think it is :)

Calling it a press release sounds grand don't you think? :D


btw, this is really a mass effort by everyone, I hardly did anything significant (except spam people's mailboxes). I think we've grown beyond the stage whereby chen chow can just go around and say "come visit this website" and people will come. There needs to be more channels to make us visible, which matches the vision of this website right on too. The press release is definitely something in the right step. Hopefully other parts of this effort gets equal publicity too (e.g. remag, creative corner, etc)


I don't think I caught this conversation when it began, but I simply fail to see the point in universal university qualification.
I don't think I get you either. We need qualifications to get into university precisely because we cannot dilute the quality of the students. But for qualifications to be universal, that pretty much assumes that all universities are of equal resources / capabilities / culture.

There can be a standardization of tests, e.g. SAT scores un the states, SPM back home etc. Different institutions will then interpret the scores differently at different times (to adjust to grade inflation etc). Unless the course you're taking is very specialized, e.g. to be a pilot you need to pass certain medical test, normal standardized test should suffice.


As for the rankings that I asked earlier, my research yields no result too. Well maybe as we continue to saturate the education market in Malaysia, someone will come up with something soon so that schools can differentiate themselves from one another.

[misled_youth]

I can't teach you textbook Press Release. But that, was not a press release. Got to your uni library and pickup a Public relations textbook and learn.

Can't explain here. Too long.

Hint: A good press release can be produced verbatim as a news article.

Star and Mkini considered your "press release" letters. Go figure.

Hope this helps!

Cheers!
________
bondage girl Webcam (http://www.girlcamfriend.com/webcam/fetish/bdsm/)

[gohweihan]

Star and Mkini considered your "press release" letters. Go figure.

Agreed.

[chenchow]

Although it is published as a letter to editor for both Star and Malaysiakini, I think we, ReCom, have moved a great step ahead, to get our opinions heard by general Malaysian audience. There is no benefit in arguing over whether this is a "letter" or "Press Release". Our hope from ReCom is that the opinions can be heard and perhaps could create some awareness on those issues, no matter how small the effect it is, and continue further discussion here~!

I would urge everyone to concentrate on further brainstorming idea on this issue, to come up with concrete discussion on this issue, so that we can together, help to bring up the standard of Malaysia education system, for the sake of our country.

[masterof_none]

Here are some links to get to know about Press Release:

http://www.stetson.edu/~rhansen/prguide.html
http://www.press-release-writing.com/sample-press-release.htm
http://www.lunareclipse.net/pressrelease.htm
http://www.pertinent.com/articles/publicity/nunleyPress3.asp

+ all the books about press release at the library.

Thanks to misled_youth for spotting that. We can improve the Press Release as we move on. Special Thanks to The Star and Malaysiakini.com for publishing it.

By the way, I remember reading somewhere in the letter/press release that we encourage e-learning.

Here at Recom, we already provide some links to open source materials (http://recom.homelinux.org:8000/~recom/modules.php?name=Sections&op=listarticles&secid=2) from school around the world (mostly US colleges), and considered them as "e-learning". Do you think this is what we should call "e-learning" ?. Or do you have any suggestion on how to improve e-learning (or even come up with the idea of what is "e-learning" )
in Malaysia?..

[chenchow]

Universities and colleges will soon have to adopt new standards for degrees and diplomas.

Higher Education Deputy Minister Datuk Fu Ah Kiow said the "Malaysian Qualification Framework" was being drawn up, benchmarked on some of the best universities in Australia and Britain.

http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Monday/National/20040517070802/Article/indexb_html

What do you guys think about this? If we are to devise a standard for tertiary education in Malaysia, what should be in it?

[chenchow]

This is an interesting article by Ranjit Singh Malhi in NST. It is about Learning how to Learn. A good one.

http://nie.nst.com.my/edu/NIE/Days/LearningCurve/20040502121611/Article/

[chenchow]

An update, our founder of ReCom, Syamsul, will be passing our Press Release in The Star to Dato' Fu Ah Kiow, Deputy Minister of Higher Education tonight in Pasadena, California.

Hopefully this will spur us further towards more efforts in helping to develop our beloved nation, Malaysia!

[jiinjoo]

A quick update - Malaysiakini reorganized their links - so if you were looking for it, here it is now:

http://www.malaysiakini.com/letters/27681

To avoid this from happening, I archived it elsewhere too:

http://cgi.stanford.edu/group/smf/cgi-bin/wiki/index.cgi?ToBeAbleToLearnUnlearnAndRelearn

Links are meant to be broken.... hehe. When are we doing another round?

[chenchow]

Just read from The Star. University Malaya would be signing a landmark Memorandum of Understanding with Cambridge University on 15th September.

The MoU would cover exchange and training of students, academic staff, library research programmes and resources apart from general lectures and cultures.

Read more at :-
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2004/9/6/nation/8832758&sec=nation