School ranking system biased

SHAH ALAM - The National Parents and Teachers Association (NPTA) has urged the Education Ministry to withdraw the school ranking system which became the performance indicator.

NPTA president Associate Professor Datuk Dr Mohamad Ali Hasan said it was feared that the system might damage and destroy the quality of learning in the country.

He said the school assessment method including the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) results was based on the school-based assessments (PBS).

"Assessments will be made at the respective schools, there are no external examiners. The school teachers themselves will mark the examination papers.

"That is why there is some weaknesses. These assessments are likely to be biased as all teachers pursue to achieve high grades for their subjects. We are also worried that there will be students who will get marks that they should not be getting,” he told Sinar Harian on Sunday.

On Saturday, Malaysian Inclusive Development & Advancement Institute, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) (MINDA-UKM) director Professor Tan Sri Dr Noor Azlan Ghazali urged the Education Ministry to abolish the assessment system based on rankings as a measure of performance in schools.

Noor Azlan said the system was a big mistake and the ministry needed to focus on the task to educate students.

Commenting further, Mohamad Ali said the ranking system could cause students to become stressful as their teachers insisted that they get the best grades.

However, he suggested that the ministry establish a body to monitor schools if they insisted on implementing the ranking system.

"The established body must be accepted nationwide without any hesitation. If PBS was implemented, the integrity would be doubted which would then affect the quality of education.

"I fully support the recommendation to abolish the ranking system, unless the assessment system is reviewed and updated," he said.