Be flexible with 1Murid 1Sukan

Be flexible with 1Murid 1Sukan

By Stephen Ng

As a parent-stakeholder, of course, I want the best for my children’s education, not only academically but also in all aspects of their personal development.

In fact, I believe I am speaking on behalf of thousands of parents, especially in urban cities, who send their children to all sorts of extra-curricular activities outside the school.

For example, kids go for music classes, swimming lessons, ballet, singing, public speaking, speech and drama, debates, tennis, golfing, archery, or even their preferred martial arts, which are not offered in schools.

This allows them to pursue and develop their area of interest, while at the same time help to develop their character, self-confidence and leadership skills.

For my family, the weekends are the busiest time of the week, as my wife and I have to ferry them around. I am sure many other parents do the same for their children.

Not every activity offered by the schools is beneficial. A lot has to do with the teachers and the number of children in each class.

For example, I compare my son’s previous attendance at his school’s paid robotics class and what he is learning now at a robotics centre outside the school, which he himself said is far more advanced than what he was able to learn in his school. For this reason, we are willing to pay for his robotics classes.

Both my children also attend a church-based uniformed group outside the school, which helps them with their personal development. At the time of writing, my son is attending a leadership camp where at a young age, the children are groomed in being independent.

When my family and I were down with dengue for a whole week, their commanders visited them in the hospital. I doubt if I can say the same thing of any teachers running other uniformed groups in school.

My disappointment is that their involvement in the uniformed group outside the school is not counted as part of the 1Murid, 1Sukan.

In fact, even if they are already learning music, robotics, ballet, swimming, taekwando and archery outside the school, under the 1Murid, 1Sukan policy, these activities do not contribute any points; technically, they are required to still attend one uniformed group, one sports and one club in the school.

The inflexibility shown by ministry officials ire parents like us, whose children are already pursuing so many areas of interest on their own; our kids also complain that they cannot cope.

I have personally followed up for nearly a year now with the Minister of Education, Dr Maszlee Malik, for example, to give exemption to children who are already attending uniformed groups outside the school, but till now, a simple but important issue like this has not been solved.

The minister is hardly interested in listening to the grouses by parents, and the inflexibility on the part of the ministry is just shocking. I wish that the minister pays more attention to the real issues affecting the children’s wellbeing, instead of proposing ideas that have received so much criticism from parents, teachers and other stakeholders.

To berate my point further, in some schools, the children participating in scouts activities do not even wear scouts t-shirts or uniforms. How effective is the ministry’s supervision over such performance of some schools in running their uniformed groups?

The ministry and the schools should therefore be flexible more on its 1Murid, 1Sukan policy and allow children to accumulate their points by their involvement in other extra-curricular activities outside the school.