BY: GRACE NG

Malaysia’s consistent poor performance in the annual Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) is a clear example of how failure to acknowledge weaknesses in the education system has made their students become the worst in Asean.

While Malaysians students fare quite well in most subjects it is their results in Science, Mathematics and English that is appalling for which the education ministry needs to sharpen its blueprint for education if it is to make any headway.

For decades, the rot in education has been growing and stakeholders in education have been calling upon Malaysia’s ministry of education to reform and transform school-based teaching for the benefit of all students.

While in local examinations and school tests students seemingly produce excellent results, it is in international assessments like Pisa where they are found to be substandard in their studies and lag behind students from many other countries.

How on earth can the education ministry claim that the system of education in place now is of world class comparable to Singapore and Japan when they fail the real test on the world stage to be considered as ‘jaguh kampungs’ only or champions in villages?

Instead of adopting the ‘katak dibawah tempurung’ or ‘frog under a coconut shell’ mentality, educationists and other stakeholders in the country must not be unfair and biased and prejudiced but open up to wider and greater possibilities for all Malaysian schoolchildren.

-THE MALAYSIA VOICE

** The views expressed on this opinion is of the writer and not the publisher