LETTER | M'sians need more affordable post-secondary education options now

LETTER | It is urgent that education authorities initiate an urgent review of higher education. Malaysian education has deteriorated to such a low point in the country that our elected representatives are now openly sending their young tots abroad for education.

Many families and parents work themselves into a panic trying to find the “best” schools, whether it be government schools or exorbitant private schools with more gloss than is believable. Meanwhile, employers continually lament the quality of young graduates.

In the latter situation, post-secondary education is the most obvious problem. But current post-secondary options are still predominantly tertiary options, even though many entering tertiary institutions may have neither aptitude nor adequate capabilities to manage the sort of intellectual pursuit that is the very nature of such an option.

In consequence, we have institutions offering dumbed down and watered-down versions of a university course of study in an attempt to push as many candidates as possible through the system in a conveyer belt system of education and the country is poorer for this.

At the last count, the country apparently has 20 public universities and 47 private universities. These figures themselves reveal the skewed nature of education where businesses influence the shaping of the nation’s hearts and minds. But the more urgent problem is where these huge numbers of graduates are going to be placed upon graduation in a small country with a struggling economy like ours.

In recent days, an economist has highlighted that 68 percent of the 3.3 million jobs promised by the 10th Malaysia Plan do not require university degrees (as reportedly by Free Malaysia Today, Sept 18, 2021). In other words, we are lying to our young people about the value of a degree in the current Malaysian job context.

This urgency is compounded by the pandemic. Malaysian youths need an affordable education, but there are not enough spaces in the public university system to accommodate them – an abysmal result of politics and pragmatism.

This situation is partly because of the public divestment in education in favour of billion-dollar white elephants, divisive propaganda agencies and failed sovereign fund ventures. And partly, it is because of an existing system of preferential policies and discrimination which appears to have denied some young Malaysians their right to adequate public education.

A recent survey on discrimination in schools places this abhorrent reality squarely in the public eye. The question is whether authorities care that this is their legacy to the nation.

The public university system has also become the site of a mad scramble for limited spaces in some universities. For instance, there is a perception that public institutions of higher education on the west coast are favoured more in the job market over those on the east coast.

In such a case, there is a need to independently verify the basis of such claims and then address the issues in education to ensure fairness to all students.

But degree-awarding institutions and their proliferation as seen in the private sector is itself a sign of the train wreck that is Malaysian higher education. The privatisation projects of the 70s have had a dismal impact on education as a money-spinner, and less as a means of developing the nation and its people.

Being a money-spinner means appearing attractive in the marketplace, regardless of quality; it also means astronomical fee structures that require students to depend on crippling loans – loans that they are burdened with the moment they begin earning their first paycheque in a low-paying job.

Many institutions also offer superficial degrees that have little relevance to the Malaysian marketplace and students with such degrees end up no better than those with vocational and diploma level qualifications. So then, why bother with the degree?

A re-envisioning of post-secondary education is long overdue. And the public sector needs to lead this for the sake of affordability as well as for the fact that it is a state responsibility. There is a need to distinguish between a trade skill type knowledge and university-level knowledge – chief among this distinction being that people “read” for a degree, not depend on manuals for their knowledge.

The country also needs good workers who are properly qualified in diploma levels of education of good standing. In much of the fields that constitute STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), there is a need for such knowledge.

Currently, we have youths completing onerous three-year degree courses and then finding jobs that only require a diploma level of entry at the workplace. The time, money and energy could be better employed if education opportunities are made available for such types of jobs. And in times like this when the budget is limited, families would be grateful for such opportunities that will lead to better outcomes for them and for the nation.

So, there is always a need for young people with skills in accounting, therapy, counselling, culinary arts, technical fields, agricultural studies, trade skills, web developers, graphic design, firefighting and fire prevention, technologists’ fields, theatre, legal services, health sectors.

These are technical skills that do not constitute university-level education. Relevant ministries need to step up and make such skills-based diploma education available to all Malaysians seeking a post-secondary education which is not the university pathway.

This will bring wider benefits to job seekers and supply much-needed skills in crucial areas in the nation. At a time when people are reeling from the effects of the pandemic, such skills may prove to be the lifeline that the people and the nation need.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.