Reports by MARTIN CARVALHO, HEMANANTHANI SIVANANDAM, RAHIMY RAHIM and TARRENCE TAN
TV Pendidikan educational programmes chalked up some 6.3 million views since this April, the House was told.
Education Minister Dr Mohd Radzi Md Jidin revealed that a cumulative total of 1.8 million views were recorded since TV Okey was aired on April 6, while a total of 4.5 million views were recorded since it began airing on Astro on May 4.
Replying to Teo Nie Ching (PH-Kulai), he said the ministry had carried out a survey on the effectiveness of TV Pendidikan involving 600 schools in eight states including Sabah and Sarawak.
He said the survey, conducted between April 14 and 17, saw feedback from 12,506 students, 17,665 teachers as well as 14,786 parents and guardians.
“A total of 96.4% students wanted an increase in TV Pendidikan slots, ” he said, adding that 98.7% students, 98% teachers as well as 96% of parents and guardians surveyed agreed that educational TV programmes should be extended even after the movement control order ended.
Radzi added that 96% of teachers also found that the contents of educational TV programmes were similar to that found in textbooks.
He said 89% of parents and guardians agreed that educational TV programmes could help with their children’s studies.
The minister said slots for TV Pendidikan had been increased to a total of nine hours since first being aired in April.
He said TV Okey began with two hours followed by four hours on Tutor TV Astro and three hours on NTV7.
Meanwhile, the minister also rejected an allegation that a project worth RM1.92mil to produce 800 educational TV programmes was awarded via direct tender, clarifying that the project went through proper processes via an open tender.“The company has produced and aired a total of 25 educational video episodes while 63 more are waiting to be aired.
“The rest of 712 episodes are still in various stages of production, ” he said in winding-up the debate on Budget 2021.
Radzi said restrictions and implementation of the movement control order affected the production of the educational videos.
“As such, the contract has been extended from Nov 3,2020, to March 31,2021, ” he added.
During the debate, Dr Maszlee Malik (Ind-Simpang Renggam) had asked the ministry to explain the status of what he claimed was a direct award contract to produce the educational TV programmes by the end of October.
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