Education Minister Fadhlina Sidek assures the new assessment system will not rank schools or create unhealthy competition, focusing instead on student support.
PETALING JAYA: Education Minister Fadhlina Sidek said the Malaysia Learning Matrix system for Year Four and Form Three students will not bring back school ranking practices that could place undue pressure on students and teachers.
At yesterday’s Dewan Negara sitting, she emphasised that the ministry’s focus is on assessment integrity and targeted intervention, in line with the School-Based Assessment domain under the National Education Assessment System.
“The implementation of the learning matrix is not intended to create school rankings or unhealthy competition, but to help identify students’ mastery levels for early support and intervention.”
She was responding to a supplementary question from Senator Che Alias Hamid, who sought government assurance that the new system would not be misused.
Fadhlina said the assessment outcomes would be used to strengthen students’ literacy, numeracy and scientific skills while ensuring a more holistic evaluation approach.
To maintain consistency, the Year Four learning matrix would be centrally administered by the Examinations Board, which would prepare assessment instruments, scoring guidelines and result slips. Teachers would not be required to develop test instruments for the system or end-of-academic-session assessments.
“After the assessment process is completed, the result slip will be issued by the Examinations Board, while schools will print and distribute the slips to pupils.
“The assessment papers will also be returned to pupils after recording is completed for intervention purposes.”
She added that the system would also help teachers and schools design focused remedial programmes without compromising the prescribed syllabus.
“We are safeguarding the integrity of the assessment to ensure it truly measures students’ mastery and does not become a tool that creates stigma or pressure.”
The Year Four matrix will cover core subjects: Bahasa Malaysia, English, Science and Mathematics, while pupils in national-type schools (SJKC and SJKT) would also be assessed in their respective mother-tongue languages.
The Year Four learning matrix is scheduled for implementation from October this year, with the Form Three rollout set for 2027, in line with the National Education Blueprint 2026-2035.
The Sun Malaysia
