Mah (third left) presents the IB MYP recognition to the principal of SMK Sungai Tapang Bekon Jenet as others look on.
KUCHING: SMK Sungai Tapang is the first public school to be awarded the International Baccalaureate (IB) World School Authorisation offering IB Middle Years Programme in Malaysia.
Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Mah Siew Kong congratulated the teachers and students of the school for the achievement because the school was one of 10 candidates under Agensi Inovasi Malaysia (AIM) and the Ministry of Education’s IB Middle Years Programme (MYP) initiative which was started in 2013.
With the certification, the school now joined a community of nearly 1,149 schools in 101 countries offering MYP to students aged 11 to 16 years (13-17 in Malaysia), he said yesterday.
The IB MYP establishes public schools in IB MYP centres of excellences and supports best global practices and methodologies in education to broaden the impact on wider education reform in Malaysia. The main goal of any education system in the world is to produce future generations that are holistic, life-long learners and are equipped with the skills and competencies of innovation for the 21st century.
“Skills such as critical thinking, creative thinking, problem solving, entrepreneurial skills, skills for collaboration, reflection, global awareness, and the ability to adapt will help our country in the development of human capital that is competitive at the international level.
“Therefore, we need to develop a profile of students of the 21st century and equip them with transferable skills, and who are able to adapt to a variety of responsibilities in the real world.”
He said in an effort to develop such a profile, the Education Ministry and AIM had identified IB MYP as an educational model that supports one of the core strategies of innovation.
“IB MYP promotes understanding and mutual respect between cultures and helps students develop the intellectual, personal, emotional and social skills to live, learn and work in a world that is constantly changing. The programme focuses on inquiry-based learning and questioning techniques and the ability of students to think at higher levels can be developed to enable them to see the relationship between different disciplines.”
Meanwhile, AIM chief executive officer Mark Rozario commended the school for its hard work and three years of detailed planning to refine the school’s teaching, learning organisation structure and education strategic action plan to qualify for the IB MYP certification.
“We are taking continuous steps to enhance our educational system to upskill our young talents and AIM is committed to support candidate schools in their effort to gain IB authorisation, placing international education in our schools.”
The broad and balanced IB programme is recognised around the world for its progressive approach to learning, which emphasises academic rigor and skills beyond the classroom such as skills for communication, inter-cultural understanding and global-mindedness, to prepare students for life in the 21st century, he said.
To understand what students have learned and to monitor their progress, teachers use a range of assessment strategies in IB programmes. The constant feedback enables students to understand ideas, explore innovations and make connections between these to apply in new contexts, he said.
He added that in the increasingly inter-connected globalised world, the IB MYP unique approach allowed students to participate in an international perspective of learning while teachers worked with an international network of experts leading the field in education to facilitate learning that would encourage a holistic education experience for students.