KUALA LUMPUR: The primary school teacher graduate's programme (PGSR) which started in 2008 failed to achieve the target set by the Education Ministry, its deputy minister, Dr Puad Zarkashi said.

He said the ministry had targetted at least 50 percent of teachers to graduate under the programme, but only 28.7 percent of the first batch of 3,554 teachers did so.

He added that the programme also failed because of financial factor. "For example, for the 2009 intake, we were targetting to take about 3,000 teachers, but the allocation that we had was only enough for 600 teachers," he said in response to supplementary question by Senator Ng Fook Heng in the Dewan Negara yesterday.

Ng wanted to know whether the government would continue with the programme, despite the financial constraints. Meanwhile, in response to and original question from Ng, Dr Puad said the main criteria used in the selection of teachers for the PGSR programme was that they should pass the Malaysian English University Test (MUET)

In response to a supplementary question by Senator Fatimah Hamat on measures taken by tge government to reduce teachers' workload, Dr Puad said a special committee, chaired by Education director Tan Sri Alimuddin Mohd Dom, had been formed to look into the matter. - Bernama

Taken from : Borneo Post.