MCA: “What exactly are the plans to improve Malaysia’s waning quality of education?”

MCA: “What exactly are the plans to improve Malaysia’s waning quality of education?”





MCA has taken Deputy Education Minister Wong Kah Woh to task over his statement at the Dewan Rakyat on Wednesday (March 6) that steps are being taken to address and improve the quality of Malaysian students’ achievements at global evaluations.

Wong’s comment came in the wake of reports that Malaysia had recorded a drastic decline in its Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) standing at the end of year 2022.

He also told the lower House that his Ministry will review and evaluate the contents in the national curriculum, with a greater focus on the need for focused and in-depth contents to ensure active learning.

He also went on to say that much will be done to increase the uptake of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects to achieve their target of 60% with the setting up of a task force for STEM development by the Education Ministry.

Calling Wong’s remarks “oxymoronic”, MCA deputy secretary-general Datuk Dr Pamela Yong noted that the former had failed to realise that his Ministry has been “pussyfooting” on its commitment to the Dual Language Programme on the teaching of Mathematics and Science in English.

“Surely Wong (is aware) that the global language medium of Maths and Science is English,” Yong said in a statement today (March 8).

“Hence, this begs the question: Does Deputy Minister Wong actually and indeed have a clear, holistic and comprehensive plan to seriously push our students forward competitively on a global level, or is he and his Ministry merely dragging all our students backwards while bouncing off fanciful words in Parliament just to sound smart and efficient?”

It was previously reported that the country’s performance in PISA 2022 had tremendously dropped despite showing an improvement since its participation in 2009.

According to Wong, who is also the Taiping MP said that based on the 2022 findings, Malaysia has fallen behind Singapore, Vietnam and Brunei in all three assessed literacy domains – mathematics, science and reading.

A total of eight Southeast Asian countries participated in PISA 2022 out of 81 countries.

The findings revealed that while Malaysia have fallen behind Singapore, Vietnam and Brunei, the country has outperformed Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and Cambodia in all three literacy domains. – March 8, 2024