Flip-flopping of DLP guidelines leaves for more confusion, says MCA Youth

The Star

The Dual Language Programme (DLP) is once again in the spotlight, following the launch of an online petition to maintain the status quo on its existing guidelines by MCA Youth on Monday (Dec 18).  MCA Youth secretary-general Saw Yee Fung said the unofficial announcement of the new DLP guidelines raises more questions and confusion among those affected by the abrupt change.  Read more at https://shorturl.at/dhRS3  WATCH MORE: https://thestartv.com/c/news SUBSCRIBE: https://cutt.ly/TheStar LIKE: https://fb.com/TheStarOnline

Transcript

00:00 So today we are calling a press conference regarding the dual language programme issues

00:09 DLP which it was brought to our attention and also concern about the recent few issues

00:15 on the implementations of the DLP programme.

00:18 The parents of schools going children who are already and joining the DLP classes have

00:24 been told to switch to a non-DLP in January 2024 under the US.

00:30 The second issue is the schools have been forced to open a non-DLP class in a full DLP

00:37 school in the new academic years.

00:39 As it is, there are already a very few DLP schools that have met all the criteria now.

00:44 So this was a newly added criteria which wasn't being stated in the current guidelines issued

00:50 in 2016 which there was only four clear guidelines stated by then.

00:55 So the third is the principals are not objective in abiding by the DLP guidelines but instead

01:01 interpret them to suit their understandings of verbose instructions given to them by JPN

01:06 and MOE.

01:07 But now with the new implementation of guidelines, so the parental consent and choices was not

01:12 taking into consideration but then it was forced to the non-DLP class even the parents

01:17 choose to send their kids into a DLP class.

01:20 We urge the Ministry of Education to withdraw its directive that all schools including those

01:27 which have fully implemented the DLP for all its mathematics and science classes to mandatorily

01:33 commence at least one non-DLP class for the teachings of mathematics and science.

01:38 And instead, we urge the Ministry of Education to retain the current practice for DLP in

01:44 the existing guidelines.

01:45 Since its inception, schools must meet four criteria to enable the implementation of the

01:50 DLP which is the first is to have sufficient teaching resources, the second is appropriation

01:57 by the principals and teachers, the third is the parental requirements and consent and

02:02 last is the school performance in the Bahasa Melayu subject to meet the national adverse

02:06 standard.

02:07 So it's clearly in the guidelines that there is no such criteria where a non-DLP class

02:12 has to be a compulsory criteria in all the DLP schools.

02:16 So abruptly compels the opening of one non-DLP class would translate to the victimization

02:22 of the school going child.

02:23 The selection criteria to be placed at the BM class has not been made clear.

02:28 So what criteria would the school deploy to select which student will switch to learning

02:31 mathematics and science in BM?

02:33 The parents have reported that they were given a "take it or leave it" scenario which means

02:39 that if they insist their child continues the DLP in English, they have no option but

02:44 to transfer their child out of the school.

02:46 So at this juncture, we see there is no concrete need to impose a new additional guidelines

02:52 on the compulsory at least one non-DLP class in all current DLP schools.

02:58 Besides, there are no clear guidelines issued by the Ministry pertaining to this nor any

03:03 communication or telephone being carried out before listening to the parents and students'

03:07 opinions of implementation of these new guidelines.

03:10 Moreover, the Ministry of Education should not mix up the uphold BM policies with the

03:16 current DLP.

03:17 Students who appear to be weak in BM should be immersed in programs under the uphold BM

03:22 policies instead of making them study STEM subjects under BM.

03:27 Let those students whose parents have opted for them to do DLP continue pursue their education

03:32 in PIS.

03:33 So we can see that there is a very major flip-flop in just a few months' time.

03:38 So we didn't see what is the clear guidelines the Ministry is upholding now.

03:42 So there are issues.

03:43 Probably if you ask about is there a confusion, I think it's a yes.

03:46 Not just to us, to the parents, to the students, to the school, to the principals.

03:49 What are they going to do?

03:50 Are they going to face the same issues of the five schools?

03:53 That the books being called back in one day, overnight, they say "Okay, now today, we'll

03:57 go back tomorrow, go back BM."

04:00 We don't want this thing, right, because this is education and we don't expect, even adult

04:04 companies, I say "Tomorrow you just shift to a company, you're not going to do that."

04:07 But you're doing this to like 10-year-old kids.

04:09 Can you imagine that?

04:10 So we don't think this is what a Ministry of Education should handle issue professionally.

04:16 So that's why we call for a clear guideline.

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