Meeting basic requirement

by Salena Pail, reporters@theborneopost.com. Posted on September 19, 2012, Wednesday

Sabah and S’wak to start science lab, living skills workshop pilot projects for schools

Dr Habibah Abdul Rahim

PUTRAJAYA: All schools in Sabah and Sarawak will have their own science laboratories and living skills workshops to meet a set of minimum school infrastructure requirements by 2015, as part of the nation’s education transformation.

Education Ministry’s education performance and direction project manager Dr Habibah Abdul Rahim said this was one of the measures outlined under the preliminary Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013-2025 which was launched recently.

“The Ministry of Education wants to ensure 100 per cent of schools meet basic infrastructure requirements by 2015, starting with Sabah and Sarawak, regardless of location, size or type of school.

“The two states, Sabah and Sarawak currently face the greatest infrastructure challenges and will start the pilot project,” she said at a media briefing at the ministry’s headquarters in Putrajaya, yesterday.

The minimum infrastructure requirements under the pilot project are access to clean and treated water, at least 12-hours of electricity per day, sufficient toilets, classrooms, tables, and chairs in proportion to student and teacher population.

“Once all schools have met basic infrastructure standards, the ministry will proceed to invest in another wave of upgrades to meet baseline requirements for delivering the curriculum effectively, particularly Science laboratories and Living Skills workshops,” Habibah said.

In a related development, she said MOE would undertake an initiative to expand the School Improvement Specialist Coach (SISC) programme to guide students and School Improvement Partners (SiPartner) programme for school headmasters and principals, with Sabah and Kedah becoming pioneer states for the project.

SISC and SiPartner are part of MOE’s approach to realise the country’s aspiration to achieve 50 per cent reduction in achievement gaps (rural-urban, socioeconomic and gender) by 2020.

“A total of 461 full-time SISC and SiPartner coaches will be sent to Sabah and Kedah to provide teachers and principals in Band 5,6 and 7 schools with tailored and on-the-ground training,” she revealed, saying Band 5 referred to average schools while Band 6 and 7 were poor schools.

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