THE Government recently pledged to ensure that no student in the country is denied a proper education, including aboriginal and indigenous students, Special Needs Students (MBK) and undocumented children.
Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said that his administration will also focus on reducing the dropout rate and ensure that this group also gets education like other students.
But is this really doable, or simply just fancy talk?
The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on the education landscape in Malaysia. In 2020, Malaysian students’ learning was disrupted twice (in March and October), when physical classes were cancelled to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 cases.
In the months-long absence of face-to-face learning, online ‘teaching and learning from home’ (pengajaran dan pembelajaran dari rumah, or PdPR) was conducted to continue the education of primary and secondary level students nationwide.
Even now, the challenges to PdPR are aplenty, especially for students from the B40 income group and not to mention, aboriginal and indigenous students, MBK and undocumented children in rural areas.
PdPR is mostly dependent on internet access, which is severely lacking in rural areas. Based on data from the Education Ministry (MOE), out of 10,000 schools in Malaysia, 671 schools are located in rural areas, the majority being in Sabah (285) and Sarawak (330).
Another survey conducted by MOE last year further revealed that 40% of about 900,000 students affected by school closures could not follow lessons as they did not have the necessary gadgets and home internet with unlimited data.
However, the lack of proper devices and access to internet with a steady connection are far from being the only problems when it comes to online learning in Malaysia, but that’s a story for another day.
One thing that’s for sure is that there is much to be done to make sure that no student is truly being left behind, or denied a proper education.
In this case, the Government must act fast to address the limitations and challenges to online learning before the situation gets worse, and we are confronted with the irreversible catastrophe that is a lost generation of students in the country.
For now, we can only hope that the Government will do everything in their power to honour their pledge. – May 22, 2021
