Unfair Handing Out of Scholarships

There are many deserving yet deprived students today who need scholarships to pursue their tertiary education. Quite a number of my schoolmates who are brilliant students who were also active in cocuricular activities did not get scholarships. I have seen this for myself since I finished my form 5.

There are a few problems I see in this issue. One of them is because of the unfair and barely transparent way of handing out scholarships...especially by government organisations such as the PSD (Public Service Department) a.k.a. JPA. Students , parents nor the public are fully informed about the assessment process during the interviews or the exact criteria’s that need to be fulfilled.

It’s very common to hear stories like student who get 3A's out of 10 subjects with hardly any cocuricular activities to get a scholarship while a straight A student who is active in cocuricular activities does not get one. Unfair isn't it..Which one of those two students do you think will be able to make a greater contribution to the nation ?

I feel that the core of this problem is the standards of the SPM examination. The questions are sometimes too simple and the marking standards are very low. That is why it’s no longer a surprise to hear thousands of students getting straight A’s and some even getting 15 to 20 A’s…all for the hope of getting a scholarship. This is competition in a wrong way.

The standards of SPM should be increased along with the marking standards. Only then will a student’s true potential stand out. This is the only way to see who are the real bright students of our nation and who really deserves a scholarship.

Another reason is race-based politics. Politicians like to set quota’s of scholarships to Malay and non-Malay students. They use the excuse of Malay special rights in their argument which I think is lame. It’s basic human rights that every human being has a right to an education or scholarship regardless of race , religion , gender or nationality.

For example, recently Datuk Tajuddin Abdul Rahman (BN-Pasir Salak) argued with Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz that the ratio of government scholarships to non-Malays should not be decreased to protect the rights of the Malays as said in Article 153 of the Federal Constitution..but it’s not stated anywhere in the constitution about any form of ratio on rights and privileges in the case of scholarships that should be given to Bumi’s or non-Bumi’s.

Previously the percentage ratio of scholarships to Malays and non-Malays was 80:20. Now the government has increased it to 55:45 which is much more fair. What does race have to do with scholarships ?..it’s irrelevant. Datuk Tajuddin is just depriving the basic human rights of non-Malays. When it comes to education , everything should be equal.

Another problem lies in the interview. For this part, I have interviewed a friend of mine who went for the JPA interview. Firstly, the application form asks irrelevant things like race and religion. Irrelevant questions are also asked during the interview. Students are asked to explain their school life, how they would portray Malaysia overseas, and which parts of Malaysia the students would take foreigners to visit. What sort of questions are those ?!...their students..not tour guides.

To give out scholarships, the assessment and criteria should be based on meritocracy, academic excellence and cocurricular activities ..and not by race. This is what counts in a student…not his tour-guiding skills.

I mentioned earlier that no one should be deprived of scholarships…but in my opinion , in today’s competitive world, rich kids should not be given scholarships…here me out first . It’s common to see rich students regardless of their academic results or other criteria’s getting scholarships…especially children of ministers in the government.

I have a very trustworthy source who informed me about two kids of two ministers in the government who got scholarships because their parents just made a phone call to the JPA guys…but I will not mention their names. I feel that scholarships should be given to students who can’t afford their tertiary education…not to students who have parents who can afford to sponsor the education of five other students. Help should be given to those who really need it.

Malaysia is facing a serious brain-drain problem due to all this. This is where all the smart one’s go overseas to study and work. It happens because they get scholarships from universities overseas. Some students get scholarships from private companies here such as Shell and Honda and they study in better private universities locally or abroad. So Malaysia is losing many of their smart students to foreign countries. Universities abroad don’t care about your race, they just want your skills and they pay you very well for it.

I hope this problem will be fixed as soon as possible. Many things have to be solved in the handing out of scholarships. Only then will Malaysia be able to compete with the world.