KUALA LUMPUR: Two Malaysian schools have been named in the World's Best School Prizes Top 10 shortlists, and are in the running for a share of US$250,000 (RM1,098,375).
The two Malaysian Trust Schools - SK Kempadang in Kuantan, Pahang and SMK Kampong Jawa in Klang, Selangor - had been named in the Top 10 shortlist for World's Best School Prize for Innovation and Overcoming Adversity respectively.
T4 Education (T4) in a statement today, said the five World's Best School Prizes celebrated schools for the pivotal role they play in developing the next generation of learners, and for their enormous contribution to society's progress especially in the wake of Covid-19.
The World's Best School Prizes were launched this year by T4 Education in partnership with Yayasan Hasanah, Templeton World Charity Foundation, Accenture and American Express.
In 2021, SK Kempadang faced twin challenges when it had to contend with teaching and tracking student progress in the midst of a pandemic, and when they were unable to access real-time student learning data when the Education Ministry scrapped the Ujian Pencapaian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR), replacing it with ongoing school-based assessment.
"The experience and learnings from the Trust Schools Programme enabled the schools to innovate and find suitable solutions for their context.
"So the school's innovative solution was to create Smartzoom, a fully-automated tracking system that follows students' progress in their studies."
T4 said Smartzoom used data input on Google Sheets and Google Chrome, as all Malaysian teachers had a designated Google account linked to the Education Ministry.
Using that data, staff were able to devise concrete and detailed lesson plans tailored to their specific class, with supporting teachers as well as panel heads being given training material in the form of YouTube videos and workshops that helped them with the transition.
Meanwhile, once in the bottom two out of 38 schools in Klang for its academic results, SMK Kampong Jawa had since seen its scores improve by 20 per cent, and was given an award for the highest online attendance during the pandemic.
The school was also once associated with urban poverty and poor attendance, losing the trust of the local community.
T4 said in the past, classrooms in SMK Kampong Jawa were marked by vandalism, and was commonplace for theft with vulnerable students often groomed into local gangs.
In August 2020, the appointment of a new principal helped redirect the school policies to align with his vision for change, through the implementation of the Trust School Programme.
"Under his helm, SMK Kampong Jawa embarked on an intensive data-driven approach to attendance and made over 500 phone calls to parents to learn more about students and their home environments.
"For those that still didn't attend the class, school counsellors would make home visits themselves," added T4.
Through intensive research, SMK Kampong Jawa designed online classes that experimented with breakout rooms and collaborative learning structures that offered close peer-to-peer support and ensured that small group sessions were productive and engaging.
Since then, online attendance and academic results had started to improve, with the school focusing on the challenges that some of its students were facing and began networking with local charities to help those who were struggling financially.
Yayasan Hasanah founding trustee and managing director, Datuk Shahira Ahmed Bazari said they were honoured to be one of the sponsors for the inaugural global prize, adding it was a valuable initiative that recognises and promotes bottom-up transformation.
"Our finalists are wonderful examples of strong schools with inspiring stories of success. We are especially proud that two Malaysian Trust Schools are amongst them, proof that our public schools are capable of being among the world's best."
T4 Education Founder Vikas Pota said with
over 1.5 billion learners impacted by school and university closures, Covid-19 had greatly exacerbated a global education crisis in which, even before the pandemic, the United Nations had already warned that progress was too slow to achieve universal quality education by 2030.
"We have launched the World's Best Schools Prizes as a grassroots solution to help build the systemic change needed.
"By telling the stories of inspirational schools that are transforming the lives of their students and making a real difference to their communities, schools can share their best practice and have their voices heard at the top table to help transform education.
"I want to congratulate SK Kempadang and SMK Kampong Jawa for making the Top 10 shortlists. Educators all over the world will now be able to learn from the examples of these outstanding Malaysian schools," he said.
The top three finalists for each of the five World's Best School Prizes - Community Collaboration, Environmental Action, Innovation, Overcoming Adversity, and Supporting Health Lives - would be announced later this year.
After a public advisory vote, the winner of each prize will be chosen based on rigorous criteria by a judging academy comprising distinguished leaders all across the globe including academics, educators, non-governmental organisations, social entrepreneurs, government, civil society, and the private sector.
The winners would be announced in October this year at World Education Week. The prize of US$250,000 would be equally shared among winners of the five prizes, with each receiving an award of US$50,000 (RM219,675).
All 50 shortlisted schools across the five prizes would share their best practices through toolkits that showcase their "secret sauce" to innovative approaches and step-by-step instructions on how others can replicate their methods to help improve education everywhere.