IPOH: The Education Ministry is in the midst of reviewing plans to facilitate the move by schools to allow students to use their personal electronic devices in the classroom for the purpose of learning and doing school work.
Its minister, Dr Maszlee Malik said the ministry was investigating the need for students to bring electronic devices to school, adding that several criteria needed to be highlighted such as safety and facility before a decision could be made.
“We are still investigating this matter as we want to see the safety as well as the facility issue. We do not want to have a gadget but the software is incomplete or the internet bandwidth is low.
“This factor will create a technology unfriendly teaching and learning process in the classroom,” he said at a press conference after attending a get together at Politeknik Ungku Omar (PUO) here today.
Present were Polytechnic and Community College Education director-general Prof Datuk Dr Mohd Ismail Abd Aziz and PUO deputy director (academic), Muhammad Zubir Mohd Hanifah.
Maszlee said it was crucial to ensure that these criteria could be fulfilled before the students could bring their own electronic gadgets to schools.
“If we only stress on the gadget concept only, the contractor will gain the profit while the students get nothing. Whatever we do, we must be doing it holistically and comprehensively,” he added.
It was reported that former Education Minister, Datuk Seri Mahdzir Khalid said students in the country’s 10,000 schools would be allowed to bring certain mobile devices to class as it will help schools encourage teaching and learning via electronic gadgets.
On a separate note, asked on the MCA deputy president, Datuk Seri Dr Wee Ka Siong who offered his help to the ministry to ensure the construction of eight Chinese primary schools (SJKC) can proceed without increase in cost, Maszlee said the door is always open to those who wish to assist.
“I will open my hands to everybody who wants to help for a better nation,” he said.
It was reported that Wee said he could find experts such as engineers and architects who were willing to do the work without payment to help build the schools.