Teaching the ‘soldiers of nationhood’

YET again the Malaysian education system throws up a “conversion controversy”: Last week it was reported that a teacher told an Indian pupil he should become a Muslim to boost his chances of becoming a national footballer.

In the last 20 years, I can list so many incidents of teachers not according dignity and respect to those not of their race or faith.

Let’s see now, there was the head teacher who told Chinese pupils to “balik China”, then there was the whole making-pupils-eat-in-the-toilet thing so they wouldn’t bother the pupils who were fasting; after that there was the “gelas haram and gelas halal” issue in a canteen, and there was also the time some teachers didn’t let students wear a sari or cheongsam for a national day celebration.

Interestingly, that cultural dress example was repeated when those dresses were banned at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia’s convocation recently, at least until a storm of protest put paid to the unpopular dress code.

What is happening in this country? Even teachers and professors don’t know how to respect people! To them, it is a “moral-religious issue” and there are no two ways about it.

We always talk about revamping our education curriculum – and it does indeed require overhauling – but I believe it is just as important to revamp the teachers’ curriculum. Because, apparently, their training does not seem to include important lessons in public relations, and cultural communication, and according dignity to others.

Of the country’s 450,000 teachers, I think a good 80% of them would need to undergo a course on how to treat those of different races and faiths with respect and dignity.

This is not only right socially and politically, but it is also right spiritually. Being a part of any faith means not belittling and disrespecting other faiths.

When I attended St Mark’s Primary School in Butterworth, Penang, all my teachers were non-Malays and non-Muslims. I went through six years of primary school education without any teacher trying to convert me to another religion.

There was no dividing of classes or glasses because of any haram-halal issue. No one told me to balik Patani where my ancestors supposedly hail from. There was no special Malay class or special Indian class or special Chinese class. We all sat in the same classroom, played football in the same field, and bought the 10 sen mee goreng and five sen syrup drink at the canteen. No issues.

When I went through Form Two to Lower Six at SMJK Hua Lian in Taiping, Perak, 95% of my teachers were again non-Malays and non-Muslims. And in all that time, I never felt discriminated against or isolated in any way.

Okay, I never ate at the canteen but only because I could not afford much with my 50 sen pocket money. My mother, bless her soul, would wake up early and prepare my nasi bungkus every schoolday of those five years.

Throughout my time at Hua Lian, the teachers paid attention to all the students, and they would all respond if I had any questions.

Once, a debate team comprising all Malay boys from Taiping’s King Edward VII School came for a competition; when they saw me, a lone Melayu in a sea of Chinese, their first question was “Eh, Tajuddin, dia orang kacau you tak?” At that time I thought, “What a stupid question!”

That was in 1978. Now it is 2023 and, sadly, that question asked of minorities in Malaysia is not at all stupid.

Two things we Malaysians must do post-haste. We need to look at the curriculum of teaching teachers at colleges and universities. Not only that, we need to assess the competence and attitudes of the professors and academicians who teach our children’s teachers. I suspect that all those incidents I mentioned started with the attitudes of academicians who influenced the teachers they were teaching.

There is even an entire university that is dedicated to teaching our children’s teachers. It is in Perak. Researchers should use the participant observation methodology to sit in on the classes there and examine the assignments given to the teacher-candidates attending the institute.

I don’t believe in interview surveys because when it comes to issues such as these, respondents tend to be evasive. The best and most revealing data would, of course, be the Facebook pages of all these academicians and teacher-candidates – but that would encroach upon their privacy, I suppose.

The second thing to do is to send teachers for courses offered by NGOs like Architects of Diversity, Merdeka Center or Harmony Works. Don’t send teacher-candidates for courses at Malaysian public universities, please. That’s where all our problems begin, I suspect. Remember Kongress Maruah Melayu that was endorsed by some academicians? I rest my case.

Our teachers are the frontliners in this nation’s democracy and multicultural existence. If these “soldiers of nationhood” fail to accord dignity to all children not of their own race and faith, our country is lost. How can you expect a sense of nationhood to develop when one of the most important figures in young people’s lives don’t respect them?

Prof Dr Mohd Tajuddin Mohd Rasdi is Professor of Architecture at the Tan Sri Omar Centre for Science, Technology and Innovation Policy Studies at UCSI University. The views expressed here are entirely the writer’s own.