KUALA LUMPUR, March 21 — The Dewan Negara was told today that the Education Ministry had submitted a draft proposal to the Attorney-General’s Chambers to make secondary education compulsory.
Education Minister Fadhlina Sidek said the move was the ministry’s commitment to ensure no student dropouts at both primary and secondary levels.
“At present, the Education Policy states that under the 1996 Education Act, education is only compulsory up to Primary Six only. But the ministry is committed and we have raised and publicised (this matter),” she said in her response during the question and answer session.
She was replying to a supplementary question from Senator Datuk R. Nelson who wanted to know when will the Ministry make secondary education compulsory to ensure that no student drops out after completing primary school.
Section 29A(2) of the 1996 Education Act states that parents must send their children to attend primary school lessons for six years, failure which the parents could be fined not more than RM5,000 or jailed not exceeding six months or both.
Fadhlina said at the moment, her ministry is implementing the Comprehensive Special Model School K9 and K11 programme.
She said the K9 programme is to ensure that children do not drop out from Standard 1 until Form 3 while K11 is to ensure that children continue to be in school from Standard 1 until Form 5.
— Bernama
