Manyin (second left) presents certificate and trophy to a student while Mary (left), School Management Sector head of Sarawak Education Dept Omar Mahli (third left), Archbishop Simon Poh (right) and others look on.
KUCHING: Inculcating critical thinking culture among students is crucial to increase the productivity of the workforce and spur the country’s economy, says Minister of Education, Science and Technological Research Dato Sri Michael Manyin.
“Don’t chase paper qualifications but chase quality education,” said Manyin at the presentation of SMK St Teresa’s ‘Teresian Excellence Ceremony 2018’ at ACCPC St Joseph Pastoral Centre, here yesterday.
Chua holds the Teresian Excellence 2018 Award and Mata Merit Award.
“We should prepare, right from the classroom, to create a critical thinking culture so as to be creative, innovative and capable of working with robots.
“Your future is not going to be determined by chance but by choice,” he told the students.
He also said that school programmes had to be continuously updated in order to assist the school in achieving greater success.
To the teachers, he reminded them to employ new teaching techniques in educating their students.
Taking Singapore’s education system as an example, he said their teachers were asked to teach less so that the students could learn more.
“Students need to be seen and heard,” he added.
The school’s principal Mary John, meanwhile, said the cost of building the two new building blocks would be RM8.2 million, of which RM3.2 million had been raised. The Sarawak government came up with RM1.5 million.
The fire on Oct 29, 2016 totally destroyed one of the school buildings that housed the teachers’ room, staff room, library, and multipurpose hall.
Mary said a fund-raising dinner on Nov16 would see the attendance of Chief Minister Datuk Patingi Abang Johari Tun Openg.
Meanwhile, Teresian Co-curriculum Excellence 2018 Award, Teresian Academic Excellence 2018 Award, and Teresian Excellence 2018 Award were given to the outstanding students yesterday.
Farah Nabilla Maddarus received the Teresian Co-curriculum Excellence 2018 Award, Nur Izzah Athirah Abdul Samat (Teresian Academic Excellence 2018 Award) and Celine Chua Hui Yue (Teresian Excellence 2018 Award).