Posted on by Kit

RM20 million for education blueprint is reasonable, says Muhyiddin

by Diyana Ibrahim
The Malaysian Insider
September 25, 2013

Education Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin (pic) stood by Putrajaya’s decision to pay RM20 million to consulting firm McKinsey and Co for the National Education Blueprint.

He said the sum was reasonable as it was a two-year-project involving large scale processes and input from international experts.

“I believe it was a reasonable sum as we needed assistance from experts. It was not something we could have done on our own,” said Muhyiddin who is also the Deputy Prime Minister.

Yesterday, DAP lawmakers demanded the Education Ministry to explain why it spent RM20 million in hiring a private consultant to prepare the National Education Blueprint when it could have been done by “capable personnel” within the government.

Describing the sum paid as a complete waste of taxpayers’ money, Serdang Member of Parliament Ong Kian Ming and Bukit Bendera MP Zairil Khir Johari said the management consultant should not have been hired as the company was a general management consultant and did not specialise in education. – September 25,

29 Replies to “RM20 million for education blueprint is reasonable, says Muhyiddin”

  3. I would like to know whether the governments of progressive and independent countries like say, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong SAR, South Korea etc rely so much on ‘external consultants’.

    Our government seems to lack talent on every front and most of our projects are always farmed out to ‘consultants’. So what is our annual ‘consultation fees’ paid out to all these ‘experts’? Are these frequent ‘consultations’ a new form of ‘Ali Baba’ , say ‘Ali Asing’?

    But I forget. All our talents are now living and working overseas. We have local talents left. Like Mahathir similarly said today: ‘Umno leaders who remain too long in their positions will leave behind members who are more stupid than them.’ It must be due to deteriorating genes.

  4. Sorry, “We have NO local talents left’.

    I would like to know whether the governments of progressive and independent countries like say, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong SAR, South Korea etc rely so much on ‘external consultants’.

    Our government seems to lack talent on every front and most of our projects are always farmed out to ‘consultants’. So what is our annual ‘consultation fees’ paid out to all these ‘experts’? Are these frequent ‘consultations’ a new form of ‘Ali Baba’ , say ‘Ali Asing’?

    But I forget. All our talents are now living and working overseas. We have NO local talents left. Like Mahathir similarly said today: ‘Umno leaders who remain too long in their positions will leave behind members who are more stupid than them.’ It must be due to deteriorating genes.

  7. This One Mammak had fooled us for 22years of his sh*t ‘govern’ and even till now, so don’t get fool further. What he really meant was for his clones ( and botak son ), his Perkaka macai 2, etc to take over Bumno ultimately; knowing that will lead to taking over the Nation and ALL the MONIES !!! .
    AND, RM20M not much ! mine foot ! when is not his money and when we already have the answers to the dilemmas being created by Bumno in the first place. Just a Moo really.

  9. Yes, I believe this Consultant was called before they did a report on PISA some time ago; since Malaysia had been trapped in the bottom quadrant of this competition, maybe pressto, by asking them to do this report, Malaysia would be lifted to the top 5 positions! This has been the mindset, MOE has been practicing at the local schools where all the so-called well known schools are filled up with students from a single community; as if the walls of these schools will like a waive of a magic wand will transform the students into Class A graduates! So this approach should not surprise; as besides, any wrongs could be blamed on this very report in the near future! Through our own false pride we just could not accept that the LITTLE DOT that we threw out had learned enough tricks to out race not only us but many more advanced nations all over the world! Even the proud Americans had sent their educators to Singapore to see the magic they had conjured. Basically, would such report of any use when the fundamental issues of quality teachers are not addressed; or maybe after all these years, they can use the report to decide that some of those teachers were not fit to continue?? This will not happen and in which case, nothing else will happen! And the $20.4 Million report will gather dust in the MOE!

  10. Mahathir turned the English language tap off in the70’s thinking that it would give the Malays a head started over all the other races but the dire consequences are for all to taste today. And we need a foreign company to tell us what our education blueprint should be.
    Once again, we have just made Malaysia an international laughing stock!!!!!

  13. I would have seriously hoped that the long-time contributors and commentators on this blog were astute enough to understand the sandiwari going on here!?

    Like the abolishing of quota in higher education (“everyone is admitted to university based on his / her merits”), this is a really clever draw to appease the politically-correct outside of Malaysia. With merits, miraculously, the students of Malay ethnicity obtain larger shares of the places. And the world outside is happy.

    You don’t think that MoE is going to implement whatever McSomething or so will propose. They will follow in their old, well vested streak of racially oriented education, based on the 3Rs, and whatnot. And they don’t even mind shortchanging the students. In the end, MoE will state that the input given by the international consultants simply didn’t cut it. But then, and that’s the difference and the intention of the government of Malaysia, nobody can point fingers at them and shout:”See!! Lokals cannot-lah!”. Because even the Mat Salleh cannot. At least, the next debacle that already forms on the horizon unavoidably, can be attributed to the lack of competence of the consultant company.

  16. Do we really need the expertise of these international experts to produce the Education Blueprint? I think our local experts can do this job for less than 10% of the amount paid to the foreigners. We are not submitting the Blueprint to the UN for vetting are we? Does the Education Ministry need another orang putih Education Minister to advise us on our education policies? Well, if his advice can catapult our universities’ rankings to the forefront of the world then even if he draws an annual salary of RM 20 million, it is worth every sen.

  17. Why Mc Kinsey?
    (A) our policy makers lack the brains to sort this out…
    (B) the state of our education system is just so messed up they need to find a potential scapegoat!
    (C) there’s a pot of gold to be had from this deal
    (D) all the above

    If education continues to be politicized, even $200 Million will not get us anywhere!

    1. It is the grassroot level that actually knows what is going on. But there is a big gap between the grassroot level and the ones with the power, influence, money. The grassroot level must find a way, a connection with the powerful, influential, rich people in order to get the real message across and to get things done as they should be and not because of a cosmetic makeover only

  19. Is it about the money alone?

    We must remember that the Education Ministry is one super-duper ministry which used to be two Ministries. It has high-level Ministers and several deputy ministers and a humongous staff complement.

    We have so many, over 30 public universities, and many, many ‘professors’ and ‘educators’ galore. Yet we still do not have the capability or ability to come out with our own national education plan but need outside, foreign ‘consultants’. Something stinks in this Ministry and in the government.

  20. Why the hell we need an “Education Ministry” for when they have to pay 20 million in hiring a private consultant to prepare the National Education Blueprint?

    The DPM/Education Minister was right about one thing though – “It was not something we could have done on our own”. In other words, they had no ideas what they were doing over the past decades and gambled away with the future of our children.

  22. So american know Malaysia’s education better than Malaysian ??
    simply unbelievable !!
    So ministry of educ admit they are just useless , a blue print like this also cannot do? where are all the Malaysian professors, academic experts, educationist ?? were they ever consulted??
    next time will they hire foreign expert on how to plant or tap rubber??

  23. Please see the McKinsey&Company report on:
    How the world’s most improved school systems keep getting better.
    The executive summary ends with a short paragraph (http://mckinseyonsociety.com/downloads/reports/Education/Education_Intro_Standalone_Nov%2026.pdf)

    “The fundamental challenge school system leaders face is how to shepherd their system through a journey to higher student outcomes. This journey is all the more complex because system starting
    points are different, contextual realities vary, and system leaders face multiple choices and combinations of what to do along the way – a single misplaced step can result in system leaders inadvertently taking a path that cannot get them to their desired destination. While there is no single path to improving school system performance, the experiences of all the 20 improving school
    systems we studied show that strong commonalities exist in the nature of their journeys. This report outlines the aspects of these
    journeys that are universal, those that are context-specific, and how the two interact. We hope these experiences benefit school systems around the world in navigating their own path to improvement.”

    Critical to Malaysia is an understanding and appreciation of the multiple types of schools in Malaysia before 1974, including English-medium schools. We had excellent schools then VI, PFS, Chung Ling, MCKK, the mission schools, etc. Yet, MoE had destroyed excellence in the name of nationalism. And the new blueprint worth 20 million recommends further destruction of some of the remaining excellent schools, all for and in the name of national schools and the national language.

    Interestingly, McKinsey&Co themselves recognise that “there is no single path to improving ….”, yet the 20mil recommends a very rigid blueprint. And surely in their own words “a single misplaced step…” will not succeed.

    They end by saying school systems around the world should navigate their own path to improvement.

    Yet they have colluded (for 20mil) with the racial UMNO baru MoE to set a blueprint for Malaysia that will further destroy whatever excellence there is left of education in Malaysia.

    The issues that need remedy and political will to overcome are clear as daylight to everyone in Malaysia. Just to list a few.
    1. We need quality Malaysian teachers for schools, quality Malaysian lecturers for universities and colleges, irregardless of cultural background, and quality education officers in the various departments of MoE. No more ketuanan in education.
    2. We need to allow more affordable independent English-medium schools so they are not monopolised by just the rich folks. They could be encouraged to also run classes that follow the national school curriculum in Bahasa Malaysia for students who cannot afford to pay fees for the English medium classes. All students can choose to learn additional languages such as Mandarin, Tamil, etc. There are many advantages to be gained by both groups of students, parents and teachers through common school activities.
    3. We need a more balanced and equitable budget (with subsidies) for all types of schools, including nursery and preschool classes. Rural and inner city schools need more assistance.
    4. MARA schools, colleges and universities must open their doors to all Malaysians who qualify for admission.
    The list goes on. Let’s not just talk and make use of the McKinsey&Co blueprint for political advantage. The people deserve and demand a responsible MoE and quality education from nursery to tertiary. The future of Malaysia depends on it. Let’s embark on the journey to excellence.

  24. I can do that for 1 million. Here is a few tips.

    1. Get rid of umno decision makers. They are all crap.
    2. Get rid of umno decision makers. They are all stooges.
    3. Get rid of umno decision makers. They are all super under qualified.

  25. We have whole lot of PhD holders graduated from our prestigious Universities! Our educational system ranks the best in the world as self-proclaimed by UMNO suckers!!!! And such and such…

    Why we need to spend RM$20millions for consulting our educational blueprint???? Why the old fox sucker sucked up our educational system during his 22 years of premiership to transform to nowhere…

Leave a Reply