“A heritage to be celebrated or a hindrance to nation building?” Executive Summary First, there was overall agreement that vernacular schools are not a hindrance to national unity. This is especially so because they teach the same syllabus as national schools and are just as patriotic as national schools in implementing government policies. Second, vernacular schools play an important role in ensuring cultural heritage is preserved through the generations. The Chinese and Tamil languages in these schools don’t just function as a medium of instruction. They also provide a link to the community’s cultural heritage. Hence, they are instrumental in embodying a multi-cultural 1Malaysia. Third, it is the national schools which are becoming more mono-ethnic and with greater Islamisation and the imposition of Malay supremacy, they are the ones hindering national integration. Fourth, vernacular schools feel discriminated against by the state even though the Education Act stipulates that government aid and grants should be disbursed fairly. In fact, the national budget allocation for vernacular schools do not commensurate with the number of students enrolled in them. Fifth, there was general concern over the government’s move to review the Razak Report. Concern was expressed over the composition of the panel as the review panel comprises of people who are not experts in education. Furthermore, because the Razak Report’s stated objective is for Bahasa Malaysia to be the main medium of instruction in all schools in Malaysia with the implications of the demise of vernacular schools in the long term through the term “memperkasakan sekolah kebangsaan”. Sixth, the demarcation between government-aided schools and semi-aided schools was confusing and irrelevant for vernacular schools. And it could be challenged in court because the demarcation is based on an administrative policy and does not draw its power from the Education Act. Seventh, it was suggested that schools could be given more autonomy to run themselves including the hiring and firing of teachers, and that school heads should be professionally, not politically, appointed. The recently introduced Trust Schools concept implemented by Yayasan Amir could serve as a useful model for greater public-private partnership in education. Eighth, there was a strong consensus for the Education Act, and the national school policy to be reviewed and revamped to address issues like the falling quality of education, increasing mono-ethnicity in national schools, the poor quality of remove classes, and the lack of BM facility among students in vernacular schools. Ninth, even though the government states that it will support vernacular schools, there is no specific government unit that coordinates and implements policies and decisions related to vernacular schools. It was felt that the officers in charge of vernacular schools are too junior in rank with little administrative power to enhance the quality of vernacular education. Tenth it was generally agreed that education should not be hijacked by politicians and unless race-based politics was done away with, little would change in the national education system to make our schools more multi-cultural, diverse and better able to unleash our students’ full potential. cpps.org.my/upload/VERNACULAR%20SCHOOLS%20IN%20MALAYSIA%20REPORT%202012.pdf
Posted on: Tue, 21 Oct 2014 05:38:47 +0000
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