KUALA LUMPUR: Children, including those without citizenship who attend school at Sekolah Bimbingan Jalinan Kasih (SBJK), here are given basic vocational education in four key areas, namely cooking, sewing, art and music.
Deputy Education Minister Teo Nie Ching (pix) said it was aimed at enabling them to have the skills that would give them a better chance of getting a job.
“To get a permanent job especially for non-citizens, it’s hard because to find formal employment they need identification documents.
“We are giving priority to these four skills hoping that students, after school, can at least find work in the vicinity of Chow Kit,” he said during the oral question-and-answer session at the Dewan Negara, today.
Teo was responding to Senator Datuk Dr Mohd Nor Monutty’s question on whether efforts have been made to provide formal education to children of homeless families here.
Teo said the Education Ministry took serious efforts to provide education for all and that is why the intake of children without citizenship to government schools has been simplified from 2019.
Parents, however, must make an effort to get official documents so that it will be easier for the children to get jobs in the future.
“This is the mistake of their parents who do not register their marriage because the mother of the child may not be a Malaysian citizen. Secondly, especially in Sabah and Sarawak, probably because they live in the interior, parents do not take the initiative to register their children’s births,” he said.
“The ministry is willing to provide education to these children but when they finish their studies, if they still have no documents, they will have problems getting a job,” he said. — Bernama
