Teachers need 5 years training for making English compulsory pass in SPM

• 5,000 English teachers have already been trained
• 9,000 more language teachers needed

Here is a follow up on last week's announcement on Government's plan to make English a compulsory pass subject in Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM).

To prepare for this, teachers would have to be trained which may take at least five years to prepare them for this. Late last year, the Education Ministry planned to receive more English teachers from India to teach Malaysian students. Presently, 5,000 teachers have already been trained and another 9,000 teachers will be hired.

Results of the recentCambridge Placement Test showed that two-thirds of the 70,000 English teachers in Malaysia failed to reach a proficient English level. Moreover, two in three students fail to meet the basics in English proficiency. This was based on a comparative survey of 13,000 students' results in SPM English and Cambridge 1119 standards.

In 2011, Jobstreet.com shared some findings of its English Language Assessment (ELA) test that measure English competency. The results show that Malaysian employees ranked third behind Singapore and Philippines at all levels from non-executive to fresh graduates, junior executives, managers and senior managers.

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Compulsory to Pass English

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