WILLING TO CHANGE FOR EDUCATION PROGRESS

By Siti Zubaidah Abdullah

PUTRAJAYA, Aug 17 (Bernama) -- The willingness to change among educationists is the initial step towards achieving progress in the country's education system as mapped out by the National Key Result Areas (NKRA).

The Education NKRA is the platform and initiative to improve the students
performance in schools apart from providing them with the access to better
education quality.

To make the transformation a success, educationists must be willing to make
sacrifices in order to meet challenges in the nation's education sector under
the Tenth Malaysia Plan (10MP).

Education Deputy Director-General (Educational Operations Sector) Noor
Rezan Bapoo Hashim said the educationists' willingness to make changes and
accept new challenges to deal with issues that cropped out in schools would
bring success to all plans mapped out under the 10MP.

"The teachers should be better (in all aspects) than their students. For
example they should not think that after 30 years of teaching the English
Language subject, they need not bother to learn how to use the computers. The
teaching method of today is vastly different from that in the past", she said.


NEW APPROACH

"If previously, we succeeded in educating students with the old approach,
now the method is different, if we do not know how to use the computers, we must
learn. Children today are good in computers and they know more than us",
she told Bernama in her office here.

As such teachers must be prepared to change as the use of Information
and Communication Technology (ICT) helps them to improve classroom teaching,
said Noor Rezan.

"Teachers must be open-minded and be aware that children of today are
well-versed in the Internet and that is why giving notes by writing on the
blackboard can make them feel bored.

"Teachers, particularly those in the secondary schools, should be ahead of
their students as the children have computers at home apart from the existence
of cybercafes where they can surf the Internet. Teachers who still rely on
textbooks will remain in the rut," she said.

According to Noor Rezan, there should not be 'one-way traffic' in the
classroom and teachers should be asking their students questions in order to
find out whether they understood what was being taught.


REWARDS

She also called on the teachers not to be interested only on the rewards but
also to focus in improving the students' performance to produce the High
Performance Schools (SBT) in line with the country's effort to achieve developed
status by the year 2020.

Noor Rezan said the ministry is eyeing to have 30 SBTs next year apart from
focusing its attention on all schools in order to transform those that have yet
to achieve SBT status into high performance schools while that which are already
SBT status would further improve.

Education Minister Muhyiddin Yassin who is also the Deputy Prime Minister
said based on the ministry's Key Performance Index (KPI), there are 20 SBTs and
plus the 30 SBTs next year the total number of SBTs by 2012 nationwide
would be 50.

Muhyiddin also said that the ministry, under its NKRA, is eyeing to have 100
SBTs.

Last January, Muhyiddin announced the 20 SBTs nationwide that include 14
secondary schools and six primary schools. Ten of the secondary schools are
boarding schools while the rest are day schools.


LINUS PROGRAMME

On incentives for headmasters and teachers, Noor Rezan said it is to spur
them to achieve better performance for their schools.

"The success of a school does not only depends on its teachers but also from
support from parents. Teachers who are committed in dispensing their tasks
will be rewarded with incentives.

"Apart from the outstanding teacher's award, there are others such as that
for innovative teacher and scholarships for further studies abroad as well as
promotions for teachers who shine in their performance".

On the Literacy and Numeracy (LINUS) programme, Noor Rezan said the
programme is geared towards ensuring all Malaysian children without learning
disabilities would be able to read and write Bahasa Malaysia, and do basic
mathematics by Year Four.

Beginning this year, all Year One pupils will be screened three times a year
- in March, June and September - to identify those who do not meet the required
reading, writing and counting standards.

The ministry has set aside an allocation of RM400 million (US$125.79
million) for the LINUS programme for 2010-2012.

"So far we have trained 15,500 facilitators and rehabilitation teachers for
the programme," she added.
-- BERNAMA