Rural and Regional Development Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal (left) handing over a mock cheque to MARA Poly-Tech College chairman Mohd Azis Jamman. Looking on are the secretary general of the Rural and Regional Development Ministry, Datuk Seri Ibrahim Muhamad (second left), MARA Education Foundation chairman Datuk Yussof Dohab and the college’s chief executive officer, Professor Dr Azali bin Mohamed (second right).
SEMPORNA: Majlis Amanah Rakyat (MARA) has been allocated RM50 million to implement Technical, Vocational Education and Training (TVET) programmes next year, Rural and Regional Development Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal said yesterday.
He said the allocation was aimed at empowering the Malay and bumiputera agenda, as well as technical and vocational education.
The government, he said, had also agreed to set aside a huge allocation to the Education Ministry for the placement of 10,000 students at technical and vocational colleges nationwide next year.
This allocation is apt as the country is still 46 per cent short of workers with technical and vocational skills, he said at a gathering of Distinguished Young Generation organised by the Malaysian Education Foundation (YPM) here.
He also announced an allocation of RM1.5 million for the YPM HELP Tuition programme.
Shafie said the big allocation for education in the 2015 National Budget showed that the government is responsible and does not neglect education.
With the allocation, he said MARA would give its best effort to ensure the rural community would not be left behind in education.
“MARA has also helped to reduce 30 per cent unemployment among graduates by providing workforce to various markets,”he said.
“Indirectly, this proves that the programs sponsored by MARA and its education institutions have attracted the students’attention,”he said.
He added the program had also helped to produce thousands of students from among the Malays and Bumiputeras to as high as a doctorate (PhD) level.
Shafie said apart from all this, the MARA Education Foundation (YPM), through its HELP program, also gives second opportunity to youths who did not achieve excellence to continue learning at higher institutions.
“Up till September 2014, 2,000 from primary and secondary schools have received RM2.16 million aid through the YPM Adopted Children Scheme,”he said.
He said under the school aid scheme, YPM had allocated RM5.7 million in 2014 for the whole nation and RM500,000 distributed this year to 5,679 eligible recipients in Sabah.
At the function yesterday, Shafie handed examination kit worth RM70 to 500 SPM 2014 students, school aid worth RM100 to 300 students, RM4,000 mock cheques to five schools for YPM Tuition Class Program, RM384,000 mock cheque for YPM HELP Tuition Program and RM222,000 mock cheque to MARA Poly-Tech College in Semporna to finance 74 students, with each student getting RM3,000 each.