KUALA LUMPUR: The Education Ministry has set a new condition for pupils from poor families to score 3As and 2Bs in the Ujian Peperiksaan Sekolah Rendah (UPSR) and 4As and 1B for rural pupils in order to enter Form One in fully residential schools, beginning next year.
Its minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said the new condition was to facilitate the entry of the two categories of students into fully residential schools and receive a more complete education.
“The goal is for them to excel at the highest level and be able to give their families a better life in future,” he said in a statement yesterday.
Among the criteria for entry into fully residential schools before this were scoring 5As in the UPSR and being active in co-curricular activities.
Muhyiddin who is also deputy prime minister, said the ministry was aware that many poor students and those from rural areas lagged behind in their studies and unable to get extra help in the form of paid additional classes, while some could not fully concentrate on their studies due to poverty.
“The ministry has also found that their exposure to education in general and to the outside world is limited due to the locations of their homes and schools, and their families’ plight,” he said.
Muhyiddin said the ministry was always thinking about and undertaking measures to help poor and rural students receive better education.
The statement said poor students were categorised based on their family income that was measured against the set poverty line — RM720 monthly household income in Peninsular Malaysia, RM960 in Sabah and Labuan, and RM830 in Sarawak.
According to the ministry’s data, 4,319 primary schools in the country are categorised as located in rural areas and 830 in the interior areas. — Bernama