Allowances for trainee teachers scrapped

From June next year, they won't get the RM430 monthly living expense allowance and travel allowance of RM500 per year.

PETALING JAYA: In a shocking move, the education ministry will stop giving allowances for teachers undergoing training, The Star Online reported.

The news portal said the new move will be implemented from June next year.

Deputy Education Minister Chong Sin Woon told the portal that existing trainees would continue to receive the RM430 monthly living expense allowance and travel allowance not exceeding RM500 per year until they graduate.

The affected trainee teachers will now have to apply to the National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN) for a loan to help with their living expenses, he said.

However, the education ministry will continue funding their undergraduate degree in Education (PISMP), Chong said.

He said the total cost of the four-year PISMP fee is RM27,831.

To be a teacher in Malaysia, trainees enrol in the Institute of Teacher Education’s foundation course.

Upon completing their one-year pre-undergraduate degree in Education (PPISMP), trainees go on to do the PISMP, the daily said.

The foundation course allowances, and the fees, totalling RM8,163, would continue to be paid by the government.

National Union of the Teaching Profession (NUTP) secretary-general Harry Tan told the daily the short notice given for the announcement was unfair to parents and trainees.

Former NUTP secretary-general Lok Yim Pheng, now a Malaysian Human Rights Commission (Suhakam) commissioner, urged the ministry to reconsider the decision.

She said she knew at least 30% of trainees’ parents are 1Malaysia People’s Aid (BRIM) recipients at one of the training institutes.

“What is the situation like in other institutes? How will the poor cope?”

She said the ruling would cause many trainee teachers to get into debt. -FMT