Tuesday, April 03, 2012

Muhyiddin Says Our Education Outperforms US, UK & Germany!

It completely defies belief that our Minister of Education of pronounce Malaysia as having better quality of education than United States (US), Britain and Germany.

Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, who is also our Deputy Prime Minister, based his statement on one partial study in the World Competitiveness Report by World Economic Forum (WEF) on quality of education. In that specific study, Malaysia was ranked 14th as opposed to Germany (17th), Britain (20th) and United States (26th).

However as an Education Minister, he must surely have found out how the above "rankings" were arrived at. In essence the survey asked 87 local businessmen "How well does the educational system in your country meet the needs of a competitive economy?" by rating it between a scale of 1 to 7.

Two agencies were entrusted to do the survey by WEF - government-linked Institute Strategic & International Studies (ISIS) and government-owned Malaysia Productivity Corporation (MPC).

Surely such a tiny survey with such "surprising" outcomes must be benchmarked against other credible international studies before it is accepted at face value. And surely, as the Education Minister, he would have seen many objective studies on the quality of our education and students.

In the latest Programme for International Students Assessment (PISA) 2009+ released late last year showed Malaysian 15 year olds being far behind the rest of the developed world. The PISA study reviewed the literacy, mathematics and scientific understanding of 522,000 students across 74 countries, with nearly 4,999 students coming from Malaysia.

Malaysian students were ranked well below the Organisation of Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD) average, and specifically against the US, UK and Germany in all 3 tested areas.

In terms of reading literacy, we were ranked a poor 55th out of 74 countries.  In Mathematics literacy, it was 57th and faring only marginally better in Science at 52nd.

The conclusion of the report on Malaysia was even more damaging when it was reported that “56% of students are estimated to have a proficiency in reading literacy that is at or above the baseline level needed to participate effectively and productively in life.”

For Mathematics, only “41% of students are proficient in mathematics at least to the baseline level at which they begin to demonstrate the kind of skills that enable them to use mathematics in ways considered fundamental for their future development.”  And for Science, “57% of students are proficient in science at least to the baseline level at which they begin to demonstrate the science competencies that will enable them to participate actively in life situations related to science and technology.”

Why did Muhyiddin not cite the PISA 2009+ study which he is fully aware of which is objective in its study across countries by using standardised tests?  PISA 2009+ was also conducted with the cooperation of the Ministry of Education. Instead Muhyiddin decided to endorse and boast of a survey of 87 local businessman on a single subjective question.

The Deputy Prime Minister appears to be suffering from the “jaguh kampung” syndrome where we only measure ourselves based on criteria which will make ourselves look good but fail to be objective in evaluating our performance and achievements which have been lacking and declining in the recent decades.

5 comments:

najib manaukau said...

If the DPM is not , as usual, talking cock is for the deceitful and corrupted Umno scumbags and parasites to keep sending NEP students to theses countries. Instead of keeping them back in our varsities with better standard of education according to him, than these varsities ? What an illusion !
Or is that one of the reasons why Malaysia is out traveling around the world with Talent Corp. begging for the two million immigrated non Malay professionals who are ex Malaysians to return to Malaysia to serve and I might add that, with all sorts of incentives ? Why do so, when they were here in the first place ?
They are professionals for nothing and needless to say they will not fall for the 'incentives' offered to them to become once again the pendatang. Most of all to serve under an uncooked, on tongkat and wheel chaired bound Datuk or Tan Sri ! Incidentally how many of these uncooked chiefs are not Datuks or Tan Sri ? Throw a stone and you can bet your life that it will land on one of them.

Anonymous said...

Public must demand a Bill to be passed in Parliment for all politicians' kids to be educated in M'sian public school till SPM - Malathi Vasudevan.

Brilliant idea MV. Since, our education is as good as our dear DPM has suggested, it is only fair that the children of all politician must partake what they serve to the Rakyat. May I propose that a bill be table to make it compulsory for :

[1] children of all politician to attend primary and secondary at regular Sekolah Kebangsaan. Children of politician should neither attend international school nor should they study overseas.

[2] Children of politician must attend local universities for their first degree.

We like to see children of politician share enjoy the same good quality education with the rest of the Rakyat. Better than Britain, US and Germany mah.

What I said may sound sarcastic but I am not joking. The rationale is if the education of their own children are at stake then perhaps they will pay more attention to the quality our education.

Tsng

Donplaypuks® said...

DPM is politicking, but gives the impression of being a fool.

Check out my take on DPM's stupid declaration on education at http://donplaypuks.blogspot.com/2012/04/dpm-madd-talks-glocal-scale-jibberish.html

Dpp
we are all of 1 Race, the Human Race

Anonymous said...

Dear Sir,

My godson has just experienced burns to 35 % of his body. He is now in KLGH and is critical.
This happened in school during his boy scout activities.= SMK SRI HARTAMAS. (4/412)

The teacher poured Turpentine onto an open flame.No proper first aid was administered, no fire extinguisher was available at the scene.

She was a lady scout master who has no training in the field. The ministry of education ( to add insult to injury ) offered the Father an ang pow of 50 rm - at the hospital.

What else does that say about our Educators and Ministry of education.

Anonymous said...

Outperforms US, UK and Germany!...what is the measurement scale Muhyiddin is using to conclude his claim? but then again we Malaysian cannot expect much from a graduate of Politeknik Engku Omar which is a proof that he is obviously not a scholarship material...Malaysian should choose wisely in the next coming general election.