National Union of Teaching Professionals (NUTP) president Hashim Adnan today questioned the reported ‘delay' in placement of graduate teachers from teaching colleges and universities to schools.

Yesterday, Upsikini a student operated news blog covering issues concerning the teaching profession ran a news report quoting Universiti Perguruan Sultan Ismail (UPSI) deputy vice chancellor academics and international affairs, Zakaria Kasa, as saying "All placements of UPSI graduates to schools will be frozen from 2010 onwards".

According to Upsikini, during his speech to students at a symposium on the future of physics education in Malaysia, the UPSI vice chancellor also added that this freeze will affect all graduates from institutions that trains teachers.

In a follow up, Upsikini this morning reported that Zakaria later revised his statement from ‘frozen' to ‘delayed'. He was speaking to to UPSI Student Representative Council academic and career exco, Nur Aqilah Hanis at a meeting in his office.

However, UPSI quoted Zakaria as reiterating his earlier statement that the issue is caused by "financial considerations being faced by the Malaysian government administration."

‘Investment, not cost'

"Even if finances are tight, the government should look for ways to find funds," said NUTP president Hashim when contacted by Malaysiakini over the matter.

"This is an investment [in our future], not a cost.

"We cannot agree that because of financial problems, teachers and future educators have to pay for it," added Hashim.

Admitting that this is the first time he is hearing of the issue, Hashim said that the NUTP will talk to the government to find a solution to the problem, if it exists.

The NUTP president explained that while there are 380,000 teachers in Malaysia, the shortage of teachers is still a "constant problem" which includes teachers who are sick or have retired.

"Those teachers must be replaced," he added.

Malaysiakini also contacted the Education Ministry's Teacher's Training Division over the issue.

An officer at the ministry said that not all graduate teachers will be selected to be placed in schools.

This, she said, is because the ministry has a set of criteria which has to be met by the graduates first before they can be considered for posting.

However, she said that a more detailed answer would be given to Malaysiakini 's later.

The shortage of teachers has been a sore point in the Malaysian education system with retired teachers being recruited on a contract basis as a stopgap measure.

This new ‘delay' in the posting of new teachers, if true, may worsen the problem.