SERIAN: Dato Sri Roland Sagah Wee Inn says he has yet to know the outcome of the Malaysia Agreement 1963 (MA63) Technical Committee meeting on Sarawak’s request to use English as a medium of instruction.
The Education, Innovation and Talent Development Minister believed the matter must have been discussed but said he had not received the official decision.
“There are many things to be discussed on this particular matter (use of English). The most important one is that we want to continue using English as a medium of instruction for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM).
“In Sarawak, we already have Science and Mathematics being taught in English, and we want to continue this until the upper secondary school level,” he told reporters after officiating at the state-level Early Schooling Aid (BAP) programme for Form Six students at SMK Tun Abdul Razak here on Friday (Aug 22).
Sagah said Sarawak already uses English as the medium of instruction for Science and Mathematics from Primary One to Primary Six, later extending it to Form Three.
“But we want it to continue among pure science students up to Form Six.
“If it stops after Form Three, it is not fair to students who have studied the subjects in English for nine years to eventually end up doing them in Bahasa Melayu.
“Those are the things I think we want to resolve most. That is just one of them. There are many other things to resolve, but it’s still a secret.”
The request was supposed to be deliberated at the MA63 Technical Committee meeting in Kuala Lumpur on 18 August, as revealed recently by Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Fadillah Yusof.
On another matter, Sagah said his ministry is ready to conduct a Cambridge-standard assessment test for Year Six students in Sarawak.
He said the assessment, covering Science, Mathematics and English, will be held on Oct 15 and 16.
“We are working with the Ministry of Education and the Malaysian Examinations Board. Teachers involved in the assessment have also been briefed on its implementation.
“The test will be supervised by Cambridge University because we want to see how it is independently assessed.
“The actual work will be done by our teachers here, but under Cambridge supervision. The papers will be marked locally by teachers from other schools, not by the students’ own teachers.”
On the timing of the official results announcement, he said the date has yet to be determined but confirmed that enough personnel have been engaged for the marking process.
He added that the ministry was not working alone and was being supervised by the State Education Department.
Also known as the Ujian Penilaian–Dual Language Programme (UP-DLP), the assessment aims to prepare students to be proficient in English, provide them with internationally recognised qualifications, and at the same time give due emphasis to Bahasa Melayu as the national language.
On applications for the state’s Special Financial Assistance (BKK), Sagah said he did not have the data on hand.
“The data is kept by our implementing agency, Yayasan Sarawak, so I can’t give the actual number of applications.
“But we have received a lot of applications already. This aid is for every student, regardless of their family background. As long as they are in university, they are eligible.”
The state government is offering RM1,200 annually to every Sarawakian student pursuing higher education at public and private institutions across Malaysia.
