(Kuala Lumpur, 22nd) Deputy Minister of Education Wong Kah Woh emphasized that all teachers assigned to Chinese primary schools (SJKCs) are graduates from the Teacher Training Institute’s Chinese Stream, and not unqualified teachers.
According to a directive effective from January 1st, 2011: Firstly, Bahasa Malaysia teachers for Year 1 and 2 in Chinese and Tamil primary schools must be bilingual and possess the SPM (Malaysian Education Certificate) Bahasa Malaysia qualification; for Year 3 to 6, Bahasa Malaysia teachers must have majored in the subject; and for micro Chinese and Tamil primary schools, Bahasa Malaysia teachers must have teaching experience, be bilingual, and possess the SPM Bahasa Malaysia qualification.
The United Chinese School Teachers’ Association (Jiao Zong), in its 2025 SJKC Issues Review Report released last year, pointed out that such teacher deployment issues happened in 2024 and 2025, and that in the past two years, about 1,000 Bahasa Malaysia teachers, many not proficient in Chinese, were assigned to SJKCs.
Wong Kah Woh emphasized that most of the teachers deployed to SJKCs are students from the Teacher Training Institute’s Chinese Stream, with a small portion appointed by the Education Service Commission.
He said it takes five years to train a Chinese Stream teacher in the Teacher Training Institute, and he rhetorically asked, “If this arrangement is wrong, let me ask Mah Hang Soon today: Those Bahasa Malaysia subject teachers graduating from the Chinese Stream in 2025, which year did they enter the Teacher Training Institute? It was in 2020, when Mah Hang Soon was the Deputy Minister of Education.”
“Could it be that Mah Hang Soon didn’t know what he was doing? Was he not aware of the situation? Did he not know the entire student intake and teacher deployment process? Or is he just playing politics? Pretending not to know? Or is he completely unaware of what happened back then? If so, I feel sorry for him.”
Wong Kah Woh said, “This is not a Wong Kah Woh directive, but rather a 2010 directive. But everyone, don’t think I blame the previous government. Wong Kah Woh never blames the previous government; I am just stating facts and reason.”
He said the 2010 directive states that Bahasa Malaysia teachers for Years 3 to 6 must have majored in the subject, but there was no mention of bilingual teaching or requiring excellent grades in SPM Chinese. In other words, since 2010, among Bahasa Malaysia subject teachers in the Chinese Stream, there have been some who are proficient in Chinese and qualified with SPM Chinese, and some who are not and do not have SPM Chinese qualifications.
Deputy Minister of Education Wong Kah Woh earnestly said that to safeguard Chinese primary schools and improve the development of Chinese education, having sufficient teacher resources is essential. He called on the Chinese community to mobilize efforts to instill the importance of becoming a teacher among Chinese youths.
“This is a cycle. To safeguard and improve Chinese primary schools, there must be enough teachers. To ensure the continued existence of Chinese independent and secondary schools, there must be enough teachers for them too, to teach students to achieve excellent SPM Chinese results, so that people can go on to become teachers in Chinese primary schools.”
He admitted that if any part of this cycle is not well managed, problems will ensue.
He mentioned that the willingness to become teachers differs greatly between the Chinese and Malay communities. He shared that during an STPM top achiever scholarship event last year, he asked 15 Malay and 7 Chinese awardees about their aspirations: 13 Malay students wanted to become teachers, while each Chinese student had different aspirations, such as becoming an accountant, electrical engineer, etc.
He said that to instill the desire to teach among Chinese students earlier, Dong Jiao Zong’s “I Want To Be A Teacher” campaign, which was previously limited to Form 5 graduates, had since last year begun including Form 3 and Form 4 students.
Wong Kah Woh also shared a heartwarming story: late last year, his wife told him that their daughter, who was in Year 4 at the time, said she wanted to become a teacher. Upon hearing this, he felt a warm surge inside, joking, “Maybe in 20 years, there’ll be one more teacher.”
He said typically, the trend of becoming a teacher among Chinese families stems from having parents who are teachers or principals, so it will require a long-term and society-wide effort to instill the importance of teaching as a career among Chinese youths.
He also said that based on his observation, the efforts of the past two or three years have increased awareness and interest in teaching among Chinese students, as evidenced by the number of applicants to the Teacher Training Institute: 3,300 in 2023, 4,311 in 2024, and 6,328 in 2025.
Wong Kah Woh believes that the psychological test for the bachelor’s degree in education program must be retained and stated that the ministry will not compromise standards by accepting unqualified applicants just to fill the quota.
He said that although the United Chinese School Teachers’ Association feels the psychological test is unnecessary and believes it inhibits intake for Chinese school teachers, for him (Wong Kah Woh) and Minister Fadhlina, it must be retained, as they have received emails and messages from teachers over the past two years highlighting pressures faced in the job.
Wong Kah Woh said he has personally reviewed the questions of the psychological test and explained that there are no fixed answers; the authorities only use the answers to gauge the psychological state of the candidates.
He continued, saying that in fact, the passing rate for the psychological test has significantly improved compared to before.
“Therefore, Education Director-General Datuk Azman and I uphold the same standards and bottom line: we will not compromise standards and let in those who are not qualified, just to fill the quota—absolutely not! But we will be more flexible and adaptable with some decisions.”