Some people lament that in Cronesia, the rich are getting richer while the poor are getting poorer. The same could be said of the country's students: the smart ones are getting smarter while the mediocre are becoming more so.

Let's look at the cream of the crop first. Today's top scorers are knocking down A's like bowling pins. These students cut across race but the record holder must surely be the Chinese girl from Kuala Lumpur who bagged an astounding 16 distinctions in the 2002 SPM examination.

This year, 1,774 top scorers in the STPM and matriculation examinations netted the maximum cumulative grade point average (CGPA) of 4.0, and are vying for places in local public universities. Of them, 922 are Chinese and 790 are bumiputeras.

What the figures show is that Chinese top scorers outnumber bumiputera even though in absolute numbers, the Chinese students are overall a much smaller fraction; the race ratio is 6:3:1 (Malay-Chinese-Indian) if we take the National Service (NS) quota as a guide.

The shocking fact gleaned from the chart is that only one bumiputera top scorer sat the STPM examination compared to 503 Chinese. (See chart)

There were 789 bumiputera top scorers in the matriculation examination. Another shocking fact is that there were 419 Chinese top scorers, more than half the total of matriculation high achievers even though a mere 10% of places are allocated to non-bumiputeras. (The matriculation programme had accepted non-bumiputeras for thefirst time for the 2003/4 session.)

These numbers reflect the skewed disparity in the level of academic achievement among the races, something which the New Economic Policy (NEP) discrimination policies had been valiantly attempting to rectify over the past decades, without complete success.

2 pangolins = 1 penguin?

In 2003, so-called 'meritocracy' was pioneered for intake to all faculties and the quota system was abolished, at least on paper. Since then, the Education Ministry has tried earnestly to convince all and sundry that the two entry exams - STPM and matriculation - are comparable.

The STPM is an 18-month programme while the matriculation course takes a year to complete.

STPM candidates sit for all their papers at one go in an end-of-year, standardised finals marked by external examiners. Matriculation students take internal semester tests and accumulate marks throughout the year from tutorials and quizzes by their own lecturers.

Yet the ministry insists that a direct comparison (like comparing a pangolin to a penguin, perhaps?) can be made between grades obtained under these two differing sets of circumstances and consequently, say that a fair selection process is carried out.

The ministry's claim to 'merit' entry is not borne out by a Universiti Utara Malaysia study (Bidin Yatim, Sharipah Syed Yahaya and Nor Azilah Ngah, 1997) cited in The Star (May 19, 2002), which found that matriculation holders in the first year of university could not compete with their STPM counterparts. Nor could they maintain their high CGPA after their first semester.

Another unconvincing claim by the ministry is its convoluted conversion formula to put both the STPM and matriculation at parity.

In a report entitled 'Ministry reveals formula on grades' (May 15, 2002), The Star quoted Higher Education Department (HED) director Hassan Said as disclosing that "a matriculation student with a grade B would obtain the same points (3) as an STPM candidate with a C".

There is a major flaw if the formula is to be believed. Should the matriculation grade be genuinely assigned a lower value, there is no way that the highest matriculation grade can match the A in STPM. Taking the argument to its logical conclusion, the top scorer in matriculation will never be at par, in terms of points, with a 5A's scorer in the STPM.

Yet as the chart seems to indicate, the matriculation top scorers share the same 4.0 CGPA with the STPM top scorers. This scenario belies the HED's formula proclaimed earlier.

Utusan Malaysia on its front page (May 28, 2004) lauded the achievement of Malay students who this year comprise between 56.4% and 72.8% of the intake to the medical, dentistry, accountancy, and chemical and electrical engineering faculties in local public universities.

As predictably as the annual monsoonal floods, anguished appeals from STPM top scorers denied critical faculties of their choice have surfaced in the media the past couple of days. The ministry will be unable to dismiss allegations that its purported 'merit' system is not simply a moving of the goalposts as long as the dual systems remain in place.

If the STPM distinction carries more weight than the matriculation, can the government spin doctors please tell us why the mnistry bothers with the exam format of lower standard? Or alternatively, why not let everyone choose whether to do matriculation or STPM?

However, it's not only the goalposts that are shifted; the rules of the game are constantly at risk of being tweaked as well. Only early this year, then Education Minister Musa Mohamad was reported as saying the government would review the system of bumiputera admissions should the number drop below 55%.

Quota at work

The 55% refers to places reserved for bumiputeras under the university quota system that was partly dismantled in 2002. Last May, HED's Hassan created a furore when he announced that there were not enough qualified bumiputera candidates to fill the quota for the 2001 public university places.

According to the 55:35:10 ratio for bumiputera, Chinese and Indian respectively, there had to be a minimum of 55 bumiputera undergraduates in every batch of 100. As I understand it, if that year only 40 bumiputeras met the minimum standard for varsity entry, the absolute number of the intake would need to be reduced so as to keep the bumiputera's 55% ratio as the base.

Predicated on the number of 40 bumiputeras I gave as an example, a reduced intake meant that instead of 100 first-degree varsity places available that year, only a total of 72 places could be offered altogether for the bumiputeras and non-bumiputeras combined.

The Chinese naturally cried foul. The bumiputera's under-achievement would have directly impacted on the Chinese's number of university places, i.e. 35 seats (35% of 100); and caused a decrease to 25 seats (35% out of 72). In other words, because there were not enough bumiputeras who qualified for the 55% quota that year, excess non-bumiputera candidates who qualified would still be denied the vacant places.

It was a sorry case of education being held hostage to race politics.

Not surprisingly, Hassan back-pedalled. In the immortal words of a report in The Star (May 9, 2001) the Education Ministry produced new statistics (emphasis added) yesterday to show that all available places in public local universities have been filled "

Stressing that "the issue of not enough bumiputera candidates to fill the quota does not arise", he said he had inadvertently left out two groups of matriculation students enrolled earlier.

Amidst the confusion, it was revealed that of the 39,197 fresh undergraduates that year, more than one-third of them were pumped in from the 20-over matriculation feeder centres. It's three years down the road, and nothing much has changed.

Students sitting the STPM examination far outnumber those taking matriculation, yet matriculation holders still hog the best as well as the most varsity places. For the 2004/5 academic session, the bumiputera intake is 63.8% (May 28, Utusan Malaysia), although if we again look at the chart, out of the 1,774 top scorers, 922 were Chinese and 790 were bumiputera. This 63.8% figure bucks the trend or ratio indicated if we extrapolate the numbers of bumiputera vs Chinese high achievers.

However, as the top scorers with a 4.0 CGPA comprise less than 5% of the total intake, we can safely deduce that the bulk of the not-so-top scorers who make it to local public universities comprise bumiputeras.

Another trivial fact that cropped up during the hue and cry that ensued following Hassan's initial (and un-vetted, perhaps?) set of statistics was the small matter of restricted access.

Some 10,650 university places are reserved for bumiputeras only. These comprise the intake to the degree programmes of Universiti Teknologi Mara (6,000 seats last year), International Islamic University (IIU) Malaysia (3,500), and Islamic courses in Universiti Malaya (350), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (400) and Kolej Universiti Islam Malaysia (400).

The figure of 10,000-plus quoted above is not factored into the annual intake of 35,000-40,000 students to local public universities. If they were, the ratio of varsity places for non-bumiputeras would be far less. (It should be noted however that the IIU is not considered a local public university).

Doors slammed in face

Contrary to the fallacious stereotyping prevalent in Cronesia, not all Chinese youngsters are scions of tauke families. For the vast majority of the Chinese who come from average households, higher education represents the main means of upward mobility, hence the hard work put into acquiring that string of A's.

If the National Service (NS) were tomorrow to be made an examination subject as Moral Studies is at SPM level doubtless the Chinese would excel in it too.

Yet even superlative achievement is no guarantee that Cronesian doors in the sphere of education would be open to you if you're a non-bumiputera. The anguished appeals over university admissions are testimony to this.

Then there are also the impassioned pleas fromparents, whether through the letters forum in vernacular newspapers or the MCA complaints bureau: "My daughter scored straight A's; is that not good enough for a JPA (Public Services Department) scholarship?"

The answer, Ma'am, is: Apparently, not. Just accept it, that's the way things are in Cronesia."

Undeniably, the STPM candidates have had to progressively put in more effort, and at the same time lower their expectations. Currently this year's sixth formers with 5A's under their belt are being told, "Sorry, even a perfect score is no guarantee of anything."

Expanding the medical faculties post-haste is only an ad hoc solution which will not address long-term discontent with the non-transparent system. Since the STPM top scorers can't work any harder or do any better than 5A's, perhaps its past time we examined whether the two different points-of-entry in varsity admission is inimical to justice and fair-play.

Bearing in mind that until last year, 100% of matriculation students were bumiputeras and it's the rare Malay who sits the STPM, let's for a moment imagine the implications of this separation of races on the morale of the un-special ones getting the short end of the stick.

Taking different routes

Race pervades mainstream education and that cabinet portfolio itself is a highly politicised appointment.

Witness the line-up of heavyweights who have graced the hot seat: Deputy premier Najib Abdul Razak (Education Minister from 1995 to 1999), Najib's late father Abdul Razak Hussein, Mahathir Mohamad, Musa Hitam and the erstwhile Umno prodigy Anwar Ibrahim. Interestingly, the current Education Minister is Najib's cousin Hishammuddin Hussein (photo) whose own late father, Hussein Onn, was Education Minister from 1969 to 1973. Quite a family franchise there.

Fostering racial integration, patriotism and discipline are among the avowed objectives of the NS programme. Nonetheless, the 18-year-old trainees are well aware that after the NS training ends, they will be absorbed into the two different education systems discussed earlier, and segregated largely along racial lines. The non-bumiputeras take the STPM route to the 17 local public universities, while the bumiputeras enjoy the easier matriculation gateway.

Outside the national system entirely are students from the 60-plus independent Chinese secondary schools which are filled to the brim, according to the Chinese educationists. These youngsters hold the Unified Examination Certificate, accepted as a pre-university requirement by local private institutions of higher learning (like MCA's new kid on the block Utar) but not recognised for entry to local public universities.

Before the contentious quota system was ostensibly discontinued, the cut-off point for varsity places was pegged higher for the Chinese. To implement this NEP streaming, there had been three files for the applicants, each for the bumiputera, Chinese and Indian candidates.

Race is obviously a marker you can't get away from in Cronesia as every official document you fill up has that category to be ticked. Education department director-general Abdul Rafie Mahat clarified on Dec 24, 2001 that exam slips indeed contained information pertaining to a candidate's race and religion. This was for the purpose of ascertaining whether a candidate is eligible to sit for the Islamic knowledge paper, he stated.

It must be extremely demoralising for Chinese and Indian STPM candidates to come to terms with the knowledge that despite their superhuman efforts, the rug can be pulled out from under their feet at any time in Cronesia's slippery, shadowy system.

The challenge of tertiary education is one of the first milestones on the road to adulthood. Yet in Cronesia, this journey is with fraught with deliberate roadblocks for the non-bumiputera students en route.

It is only the very optimistic BolehMan who believes that three months of rah-rah propaganda during the NS 'internment' can effect a seismic shift in the outlook of these school leavers.

If the youngsters are intelligent enough to ace their public exams, they have the smarts to see through the Barisan Nasional's charade, and realise that the publicised aims of NS do not square with their frame of reference.


Tomorrow: The impact of a racially divided education system on young Malaysians

Z SUNDAY is a Joe Public who reads the local print media for its unfunny and unintentional imitation of black and gallows humour. The truth may be out there but he doesn''t expect to extract it from the Malaysia Boleh chaff in local newspapers.

1) Although he has used the term 'non-bumiputera' in this article because it is an inescapable fact of life in Cronesia, he believes that to be classified a 'non' anything is an affront to a citizen's dignity. It's like calling a woman a 'non-man' or in the apartheid era, a black a 'non-white'. Alternatively, can a Malay-Muslim ever imagine himself to be categorised in all his official documents as a 'non-Chinese-cum-non-Hindu'?

2) For the sake of expediency and to streamline his arguments, he has neglected to mention the Indian and other smaller communities which are equally marginalised. He tenders his apologies for this omission.