State to use own funds to repair rundown schools, improve teaching facilities to solve poor performance of rural students
Tan Sri Datuk Amar Dr James Masing (File Photo)
KUCHING: Abject facilities, poor living conditions in boarding schools and de-motivated teachers have been identified by the federal Education Ministry as the reasons for the overall poor performance of rural schools in the state.
This was disclosed recently to The Borneo Post by Deputy Chief Minister Tan Sri Datuk Amar Dr James Masing, who is also the chairman of the State Cabinet Council on Rural Schools.
He added that the state government is aware of the reasons given by the federal ministry and is concerned that the situation has dragged on for so long and thus, has decided to take a proactive approach in tackling the problem.
“We will ‘take the bull by its horns’ in solving the poor overall standard of education in the state by using state funds to repair the dilapidated schools and improve the facilities in schools.”
The minister pointed out that science subjects are especially difficult to teach in many schools, many of which do not even have any science laboratory.
He added that state government would utilise the huge increment of funds collected from timber cess payments after it was increased from 80 sen per tonne to RM50 per tonne.
“The collection jumped from RM9 million channelled to the Sarawak Foundation to RM300 million annually.
“We will build and repair the schools using the state funds first and bill the federal government later. We cannot afford to wait for the federal funds to solve this problem.”
However on teachers from Peninsular Malaysia who find it difficult to adapt to conditions in rural schools – leaving them stressed out and de-motivated in their work – Masing said the situation is more complex.
He said the obvious solution is to employ local teachers in the state but at the moment, there are just not enough trained ones from the state.
“It is a fact that we do not have enough teachers from Sarawak to teach in our schools – the reason is that there are just not enough trainee teachers from the state.
“I used to think that there was discrimination against Sarawakians who applied to enter teachers training colleges but (now) I have to accept the ‘bitter truth’ – that we do not have enough applicants who are qualified to enter the teachers college.”
Masing added that the state needs to produce enough local teachers to raise the standard of education and to do that, the facilities in schools across the state must be improved.