Chinese schools likely to face teacher shortage

Compiled by C. ARUNO, JUNAID IBRAHIM and R. ARAVINTHAN

CHINESE vernacular schools in the peninsula are expected to face a shortage of over 1,000 teachers next year, reported Sin Chew Daily.

According to National Union of Heads of Schools acting president Chua Lay Kah, as of Dec 16, the schools are said to be short of 1,087 teachers.

The problem is especially serious in Selangor, Johor, Penang and Perak, he said in an interview with the daily.

The situation will only worsen next year as a total of 448 teachers are set to retire.

As for non-teaching staff such as headmasters, deputy headmasters, school counsellors and librarians, there is a shortage of 303 personnel at present.

Chua added that school operations would be severely disrupted if no new teachers are assigned when school starts on Jan 20.

He urged the education ministry to assign recent graduates from the Bachelor’s Degree in Teaching (PISMP) programme as well as hire new interim teachers to address the issue.

Deputy Education Minister Datuk Dr Mah Hang Soon had reportedly said two weeks ago that schools in Kuala Lumpur and Selangor are expected to face a shortage of 600 teachers when the new semester starts next year.

The daily had also reported that the 680 newly-qualified teachers from the PISMP programme in June this year have not been interviewed by the Education Service Commission to teach.

According to Dr Mah, the Education Ministry opened up 647 vacant positions for interim teachers this year but only 204 candidates had applied out of which only 21 passed the interview.

> The Federation of Chinese Associations Malaysia (Huazong) will be converting the Huazong-Carlsberg education loan fund into a bursary fund, the same daily reported.

Its president Tan Sri Goh Tian Chuan said Huazong had voted to do so during its general assembly on Sunday.

A total of RM1mil is expected to be disbursed to 333 underprivileged students soon, with each receiving RM3,000.

The move, he said, was due to a lack of allocation from the government for Independent Chinese schools and three other non-profit university colleges in Budget 2021.

The year before, a total of RM21mil was set aside for these institutions.

The above articles are compiled from the vernacular newspapers (Bahasa Malaysia, Chinese and Tamil dailies). As such, stories are grouped according to the respective language/medium. Where a paragraph begins with a >, it denotes a separate news item.