A look at our community colleges

I've wanted to blog about this particular issue for some time but haven't found an opportunity until now. This post is prompted by a recent article in the Star which reported the Education Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein as saying that "the Government will try to absorb all unemployed graduates with teaching qualifications and place them in new schools, community colleges and polytechnics". (italics mine)

I have been suspicious of the role of community colleges in the Malaysian context ever since they were proposed a few years back. The original plan was to have one community college in each parliamentary constituency (I don't think this has changed but it will take a long time before this target can be reached). This alone smacks of 'pork barrel' type politics whereby the location of these colleges is dictated by political reasons (which political leaders' constituencies get chosen, punishing opposition constituencies) rather than academic demand.

The purpose of community colleges is to confer certificates and diplomas to students who might not be very academically inclined and have failed to gain entry into the local universities or other institutions of higher learning. They offer courses which are more hands-on and practical in nature. The ratio or 'nisbah' of practical ('amali) to theoretical ('teori') training is 75%:25%. Examples of such courses include automotive studies, fashion, electrical technician, computer support, hotel catering, food processing and quality control, just to name a few.

Aren't some of these courses more suitable to be taught in vocational institutes? Can't vocational institutions be upgraded so that they can offer certificates as well as diplomas? Or couldn't polytechnics offer some of these courses instead of establishing these community colleges?

Those arguing on behalf of the community colleges would stress that community colleges stress more on the practical whereas polytechnics stress more on the theoretical aspects. My response would be this - how likely is it that polytechnics would end up training potential mechanics who can then apply their 'theoretical' knowledge as a designer in a car manufacturer? In other words, are polytechnic diplomas really as 'theoretical' as they make it out to be?

The other argument for community colleges is that they service the needs of the local community, hence the name. This argument probably has greater merit. Some potential students might not be able to afford to live away from home to attend a private or public institution of higher learning. Private colleges probably won't want to be located in relatively rural areas which is where most of these community colleges can be found. They can also cater to specific community needs which is why hotel catering is taught in the community colleges in Kuantan and Melaka but not the one in Jitra, Kedah.

The question is, do we really need a community college in every single parliamentary constituency (there are currently 219 parliamentary constituencies, not including new ones recently created in Sarawak)? I doubt it. There are currently 34 community colleges in Malaysia across all the states. A list of them can be found here.

Incidentally, those who are interested in more information on community colleges can visit the website here. Ironically, it has a fancy flash intro but I couldn't get consistent access to the content.

This brings me full circle to the Star article. The fact that these community colleges are going to be staffed by recent university graduates whom nobody else wants to employ is worrying. How many university graduates are trained in the field of fashion design or automotive studies? Will they be asked to teach practical courses which they don't have much knowledge in? I suspect that this is likely to occur. So what we'll end up having are poorly resourced community colleges (and you thought our public universities had poor facilities) with graduates that couldn't get jobs anywhere else and don't have the necessary skills to teach the required courses attended students who couldn't get into public universities or polytechnics.

This sounds more like social welfare policy to me rather than post-secondary education.