Govt to aid students with poor SPM results

PUTRAJAYA: The Education Ministry and the Human Resources Ministry will discuss how best to assist students who failed or scored poorly in their Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) examination last year, Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said.

Muhyiddin, who is the education minister, said the ministry and related agencies would find ways to help these students obtain the necessary skills so that they could continue to pursue education and career.

"The Education Ministry will not sideline schools which obtained less than encouraging results.

"We will continue to narrow the gap in the average grade achievement especially between urban and rural schools," he said at the 2009 SPM Excellence Awards here on Friday.

At the event, Muhyiddin presented certificates of appreciation to 10 schools for scoring excellent results in the 2009 SPM as well as to 16 students, including four with special needs and two from sports school, who excelled in their SPM.

Muhyiddin said the 10 schools were chosen based on the average grades they achieved in the SPM.

This year, he said school achievements were categorised as excellent, good, satisfactory and having potential based on their respective average grades.

"This is to enable school principals to know the position of their schools so that they can work on increasing their average grades," he said.

The deputy prime minister also praised the special students for having shown fortitude and determination by scoring excellent results despite their physical disabilities.

"The same goes to sports students. Although they spent most of their time in sports activities, they still managed to score excellent academic results. This shows that involvement in sports is not a barrier to academic excellence," he said.

In the event, Muhyiddin announced a special capital assistance of RM100,000 to repair Sekolah Jenis Kebangsaan Cina San Yuk in Rawang, Selangor which was damaged in a fire during a robbery last month.

In the incident, robbers set the school's administration office and a printing cabin on fire and injuried two security guards.

"The education ministry sympathised with the school, teachers and students," Muhyiddin said. - BERNAMA