KLANG: Fifth former N. Kavisha fervently hopes this year’s schooling will not be like last year’s.
The Science stream student said 2022 was a nightmare due to a shortage of teachers for Biology and History for Form Four students.
“Because of this, almost the entire class, including me, failed both subjects throughout the year,” said Kavisha, who attends a prominent girls’ school here.
She said the teachers designated to fill in as Biology and History teachers were not familiar with the subjects and ended up not being able to teach accordingly.
“It was supposed to be a temporary arrangement but they ended up teaching the subjects for the whole year as no one was sent to fill the vacancies for Biology and History teachers to teach Form Four,’’ she said.
Kavisha is not sure how things will be this year as the school term only started for three weeks and most teachers were still busy with administrative work and did not come to class.
A Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia candidate who wished to be known only as Aniq, 17, said his school in Melaka was having a shortage of Visual Arts Education teachers.
Aniq, who has chosen the subject as an elective for SPM, said all students in his form who were taking the subject were being taught by the same teacher.
“There are over 40 of us and only one teacher to teach us theory and look at our coursework.
“This is not counting the Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia students, who are also taught by the same teacher,” he said.
“She doesn’t have time to go into detail with each student about their coursework due to her workload, so I feel concerned about whether I can score well.”
Aniq added that he watched YouTube videos to gain more information and tips on the Visual Arts Education subject.
Mother of two YS Low, who lives in Seremban, said her family faced many problems when her younger son Ken, who was in Form Two last year, had difficulty understanding his Science and Mathematics teachers.
“We had opted for both subjects to be taught in English but there was a shortage of teachers qualified to teach Maths and Science in English at the school,” said Low.
To fill the void, teachers who were familiar with Maths and Science, but not proficient in English, were assigned to teach the subjects.
Claris Ng, 45, whose two children sat for their SPM last year, said her kids’ school had only one Principles of Accounting teacher.
“The teacher had to teach Forms Four and Five as well as kids from the Science stream who wanted to take accounting as an extra subject. That teacher ended up teaching my kids’ class after school hours,” said Ng.
