Complex causes of poor education levels in Sarawak

COMMENT Given some of the challenges faced by the rural areas in Sarawak highlighted in the previous articles in this series, it is not surprising that the education indicators also show a serious urban-rural divide in this state.

While there are almost universal completion rates at the primary level across all states, the situation is less uniform for secondary school completion rates. According to the UNDP’s Millennium Development Goals 2015 report for Malaysia, Sarawak has the lowest secondary school completion rate at 83.4 percent compared to 89.3 percent for Selangor and 92.4 percent for Pahang.

With about 50,000 secondary schools students in every cohort in Sarawak, this means that approximately 8,500 students from every cohort fail to complete their education up to the SPM level. Over time, these dropouts will add to the number of lowly-educated members of the Sarawak workforce.

Already, the figures are quite stark. According to the 2014 Labour Force Survey, 15.4 percent of the urban workforce in Sarawak has a primary school education and below which is not that much higher than Negri Sembilan (14.9 percent) and Perak (13.0 percent).

But the situation is very different in the rural areas. 41.2 percent of the rural workforce in Sarawak have a primary or below education level which is 8.8 percent higher than in Pahang (32.4 percent) and 18.1 percent higher than Kelantan (23.1 percent), the most rural state in Malaysia.

Indeed, at 25.7 percent, Sarawak has a largest urban-rural divide among all the states in Malaysia, larger than even Sabah, which is at 21.2 percent.

Not surprisingly, a high percentage of the rural workforce with low education qualifications has led a low percentage of the rural workforce with post-SPM qualifications. Twenty-two percent of the urban workforce in Sarawak has post-SPM qualifications (either a certificate, diploma or degree), which is higher than Johor (20.8 percent) and Perak (20.8 percent). But in rural Sarawak, only 7.5 percent of the workforce has post-SPM qualifications compared to 13.0 percent for Johor and 11.5 percent for Perak.

Forced to work

Since Sarawak is roughly 40 percent rural and has the fourth highest population (after Selangor, Sabah and Johor), this means there are a greater absolute number of low skilled workers in Sarawak compared to the states in peninsular Malaysia.

The causes of the poor education levels in Sarawak are multifaceted and complex. Because of low household incomes, some children are forced to leave school and join the workforce in order to supplement the family’s income. Some children feel discriminated against in the secondary school hostels where they live because of their poor backgrounds. Some lose interest in schooling because the education syllabus does not seem relevant to them.

But what is clear is that business as usual cannot go on if the economic futures of those in rural Sarawak are to be improved significantly. Education reform must be given priority and at the moment, there is nothing to indicate that either the state or federal government is doing anything different in order to improve educational outcomes in the rural areas in Sarawak.

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ONG KIAN MING is the DAP Member of Parliament for Serdang. He can be reached at im.ok.man@gmail.com -Mkini