Compiled by FATIMAH ZAINAL, C. ARUNO and R. ARAVINTHAN
PARENTS are worried that SJK (T) Ladang Behrang River may lose 30% of its teachers due to low number of pupils, Malaysia Nanban reported.
The rural school in Bandar Behrang near Tanjung Malim, Perak, has 10 teachers but only 23 students are studying there.
Based on the latest guidelines issued by the Education Ministry in December, schools with less than 30 pupils are required to combine classes.
Years Two and Three will combine their classes as well as those in Years Four and Five, while Years One and Six will continue their classes as usual.
Schools with combined classes can only have a maximum of seven teachers, including the headmaster.
Several schools have already seen these changes implemented with the excess teachers transferred to other schools, parents told the daily.
The future of many Tamil schools was already a concern for the Indian community with a new curriculum expected to take effect in March.
Among the concerns are changes to the Tamil subject in terms of evaluation, transfers among Tamil school headmasters and the continuing decline in student enrolment.
For SJK (T) Ladang Behrang River, the parents said urgent action was needed to prevent combined classes being imposed and that losing three teachers would further erode trust in the school.
The above articles are compiled from the vernacular newspapers (Bahasa Malaysia, Chinese and Tamil dailies). As such, stories are grouped according to the respective language/medium. Where a paragraph begins with a >, it denotes a separate news item.