KEY among the sectors which Malay politicians and policymakers have sought to establish dominance is in the educational field. Since independence, the nation’s development plans have invariably stressed on national objectives. But it has been the Malay young population where the country’s policy initiatives and programmes and financial and human resources have been targeted towards.
This is reflected in government expenditure on primary and secondary education as a percentage of GDP which by 1980 was the highest in East Asia. In 2011, the sums spent as a percentage of GDP was twice that of OECD countries average and at par or even higher than that of Singapore, Japan and South Korea. In 2019, educational expenditure will comprise 19.2% of total government expenditure of RM60.2 billion, with staff emolument amounting to over 80% of education’s total.
So what has the country gained from this enormous and continuing financial outlay?
Plus side
At one level the results of this majority community and rural oriented emphasis have been impressive, even outstanding.
In 1970, one-third of the country’s population aged six and over had never attended school; by 2000, the figure dropped to 10%. In 1970, 24% of persons aged six and over had some secondary education and only 1% had attained tertiary education. In 2000, these proportions had increased to 53% and 9% respectively. By 2011, enrolment at the lower secondary and upper secondary level had risen to 87% and 78% respectively. Today we have a primary and secondary schooling population of more than 4.7 million.
Past outcomes are no guarantee of a bright future. Despite these achievements there has been steadily mounting concern as to why this dominance has not translated into greater human capital and economic gains for the community and country as a whole.
This apparent puzzle is more confounding when Malaysia is compared with countries where educational advances have become their foundation stone for progress in the ranks of developed nations and in meeting the challenges of the global economy.
Why this has not happened has been the subject of many policy papers and conferences. But the answers appear to elude policymakers and successive education ministers, including the present one.
Minus side
There are at least six missteps in educational policies at the primary and secondary levels which have handicapped our sekolah kebangsaan schoolchildren especially.
These are:
» the lowering of examination standards especially in mathematics and science
» the failure to ensure English and other language proficiency
» curricula changes especially the emphasis on religious education that have resulted in deficient thinking and problem solving skills
» racially-biased teacher recruitment which has reduced the pool of quality educators
» proliferation of universities at the expense of vocational education
» mindsets and policy decisions that place a premium on racial, religious and class-based outcomes
The consequences of these missteps have been clearly evident for several decades.
International assessments – notably Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) – show that Malaysian student performance has not only been declining in absolute terms. In PISA 2012, we ranked 52 out of 65 countries while, between TIMSS 1999 and 2011, our mathematics and science scores dropped more than in any other country.
It is important to note that these tests measure more than ability in maths and science. They also cover a variety of cognitive skills including reasoning and application. One finding is that our schoolchildren at 15 years of age may be three years or more behind their peer groups from the higher ranked Asian countries.
Observers viewing the results may be forgiven for concluding that Malaysian students have become less smart – or more stupid – during the last 30 years.
On the plus side, the latest PISA and TIMSS results show a slight improvement. However concerns have been expressed that the Malaysian sampling frame may have been massaged by our authorities to ensure a more favourable national outcome.
What will the next round of PISA and TIMSS reveal if untampered with?
Missed opportunities
The negative impact of these missteps have been accentuated by ethno-nationalist forces that dominate the national discourse on education. These forces have successfully diverted the Malay public concern on education to two convenient scapegoats.
The first has been the campaign to ensure Malay language supremacy in the national schooling system by turning back the pleas of advocates of English language for its return as a medium of instruction or minimally, the reversion to its use in key subjects.
This insistence on the primacy of the national language at whatever cost has placed Malay schoolchildren at a great disadvantage in the English language dominated world of knowledge and science and technology, the employment market as well as in business and industry. It is also a key factor in the growing inequality within Malay society as the Malay elite shunt their children to superior schools, especially those outside the national system where the language policy is more liberal.
It is a fight which now appears decisively won by the ethno-nationalist forces with the statement by Education Minister Maszlee Malik that the teaching of science and mathematics in English was “an old policy” which apparently now is irrevocably discarded.
The second is the more intense and prolonged battle to close down Chinese and Tamil language schools that are a part of the national educational system.
Accusing these schools of responsibility for the lack of national unity – there is really no evidence that mother tongue schools, incidentally the school of choice for many Malay and bumiputra students, are an important factor in causing disunity just as there is little or no evidence that schools teaching in Bahasa Malaysia foster a greater sense of national unity – the critics of vernacular language schools and their political supporters must be “congratulated” for successfully deflecting attention away from the priority problems of Malay schoolchildren and the corrective policies necessary to overcome the shortcomings in the sekolah kebangsaan and religious schools streams.
The future
For now judging from public response, especially in the social media, it appears that the Malay and Malaysian community will have to wait for another change in government or new set of leaders before real reform and the promise of educating a younger generation equipped with knowledge, skills and competencies to meet the challenge of the 21st century can be fulfilled.
This is the third in a series on the state of Malay dominance. Comments: letters@thesundaily.com
