NOR AMELIA ADILA BT MAHADI

2012726361

Teacher Education and Licencing

Education in Malaysia is overseen by the Ministry of Education (Kementerian

Pendidikan). Although education is the responsibility of the federal government, each state
and federal territory has an Education Department to co-ordinate educational matters in its
territory. The main legislation governing education is the Education Act of 1996. The
education system is divided into preschool education, primary education, secondary
education, post-secondary education and tertiary education. Education may be obtained from
the multilingual public school system, which provides free education for all Malaysians, or
private schools, or through home schooling. By law, primary education is compulsory. As in
many Asia-Pacific countries such as the Republic of Korea, Singapore and Japan,
standardised tests are a common feature. Currently, there are 37 private universities, 20
private university colleges, seven foreign university branch campuses and 414 private
colleges in Malaysia.

Teacher education refers to the policies and procedures designed to equip prospective
teachers with the knowledge, attitudes, behaviors and skills they require to perform their
tasks effectively in the classroom, school and wider community. Although ideally it should be
conceived of, and organised as, a seamless continuum, teacher education is often divided into
these stages Which is below initial teacher training / education (a pre-service course before
entering the classroom as a fully responsible teacher); induction (the process of providing
training and support during the first few years of teaching or the first year in a particular
school); teacher development or continuing professional development (CPD) (an in-service
process for practicing teachers). There is a longstanding and on-going debate about the most
appropriate term to describe these activities. The term 'teacher training' (which may give the
impression that the activity involves training staff to undertake relatively routine tasks) seems
to be losing ground, at least in the U.S., to 'teacher education' (with its connotation of
preparing staff for a professional role as a reflective practitioner).

Teacher Training Institutions in Malaysia

Malaysia has a long tradition in teacher training. The first teacher training college was
the Sultan Idris Training College (SITC), established in 1922. In 1957, its name was changed
to Maktab Perguruan Sultan Idris based on the recommendations of the Razak Report. The
college broke tradition and opened it gates to women students for the first time in 1975. It
was then upgraded to an institute and renamed Institute Perguruan Sultan Idris in 1987. Ten
years later, the institution was further upgraded and given university status and came to be
called Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI) and its sole focus continues to be in teacher
education. With the increasing demands for education for the growing young Malaysian
population and to meet the need for trained teachers in both primary and secondary schools,
the Ministry of Education Malaysia set up teacher training colleges throughout the country.
Every state had at least one teacher training college, except Perlis where there has been none.
As in the case of Maktab Perguruan Sultan Idris, these teacher training colleges also
underwent various similar transformations and in 2009, the 27 existing teacher training
colleges were upgraded into degree-awarding institutions and were renamed Institut
Pendidikan Guru Malaysia (Institute of Teacher Education Malaysia). Teacher training
colleges which had initially conferred certificates and then diplomas were finally allowed
confer their own degrees. Besides, the teacher training colleges, faculties of education in
public universities, provide teacher training for teachers to be absorbed in government
schools. Initially, teacher training colleges undertook the training of teachers for primary
schools while the universities were responsible for secondary schools. This too has changed
over the years and now both Institutes of Teacher Education (ITE) and universities train
teachers for primary and secondary schools. The Malaysian government initiated the
Economic Transformation Program in 2010 with the aim of transforming Malaysia into a
high-income by 2020. In this program, teacher training remains a priority area for the
Malaysian government; however, the government has gone as far as to open teacher training
to the private sector as the public sector is unable to meet the growing demands for qualified
teachers in Malaysian primary and secondary schools. The Economic Transformation
Program states teacher training is now one of the segments in Malaysian private education
sector. Within the Economic Transformation Program, in the National Key Economic Area
(NKEA), expanding private teacher training appears as an Entry Point Project (EPP) and is
described as a Rapid Scale-Up Initiative. The Economic Transformation Program goes as far
as to state, We will allow private providers to provide pre-service and in-service training for
primary and secondary school teachers. Private providers will be responsible for determining
the subject areas, as well as what business model they use (e.g. face to face, e-learning, or
blended models). (Performance Management and Delivery Unit, Prime Ministers
Department (PEMANDU), 2010, p. 487). This recent development is a major shift in the
government stance towards teacher education and has opened the doors for teacher educators
of various qualifications and teaching experience to enter the teacher educator profession.
There has also been a further development in the mode of delivery of the teacher training
programs. Traditionally, teacher training had been very much a face to face activity and
teacher trainees were required to be on campus for their training. From the early 1990s, with
the setting up of Open University Malaysia and its offering of in-service teacher training,
open distance learning which incorporated a blended mode of face to face and on-line
learning became yet another mode of teacher training. Today, both Open Universities and
some public universities conduct teacher training in the blended mode of face to face and on-
line learning. All these developments suggest that more and more people are going into the
teacher training profession. The qualifications, training and preparation of the people who
assume the role of teacher educators needs to be researched on. This preliminary study will
help raise awareness of the current situation in a small way which could lead to a large-scale
study on this area.

Teaching Permit

The Malaysian Private Higher Educational Institutions Act 1996 (Act 555) & Regulations
requires any person who teach in a private higher educational institution to possess a valid
permit to teach.

Under Clause 5.1 of the Act:

"A person shall obtain a permit to teach issued by the Registrar General before he may be
allowed to teach in any private higher educational institution."

Clause 81(e) of the Act states that:

"Where a person teaches in a private higher educational institution without a permit to teach,
a person will be guilty of an offence and shall, on conviction, be liable to a fine not exceeding
Ten Thousand Ringgit or imprisonment for a term not exceeding one month or both."

Application of Teaching Permit

Newly joined academic staff members who do not possess a valid Teaching Permit are
required to apply for the Teaching Permit via MOHE Teaching Permit Application at
https://ifms.mohe.gov.my/ifms/tplog/index.
The staff is required to submit all the documents for the teaching permit application WITHIN
ONE (1) WEEK from his date of joining the private education.

Human Resource (HR) will arrange to submit the duly completed Teaching Permit
Application Form (Borang A) to the Ministry of Higher Education (MoHE) when all
documents listed in the checklist is submitted by the staff concerned to HR.

The original copy of the teaching permit will be forwarded to the academic staff member for
his safe-keeping and the University may request the staff member to produce the original
copy for sighting by the MQA accreditation panel members or as and when required.

Figure 1: Teaching Permit