Maszlee urges hotels to offer use of pools to students

KUALA LUMPUR: The private sector, especially hotels with swimming pools, were urged to offer the facilities to schools for student swimming activities.

Education Minister Dr Maszlee Malik said discussions on the matter would be held with the hotels so they could work with the schools and treat the move as a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

"We also hope that the hotels will be proactive in taking its own initiative after this announcement," he told a news conference after launching the 2018 Life Saving Skills programme and the Water Rescue and Safety Awareness Module here yesterday.

Maszlee reported that the learning to swim co-curriculum activities would be introduced to school children in the ministry's efforts to prepare them with that skill, thus addressing the drowning incident.

However, he insisted that the suggestion that hotel offered their premises was only as the ministry's effort to make more swimming pools available to schools.

"Initial plan was to bring them to sports centres and public pools. We are calling the hotels to enable them to perform their CSR," he said, adding that not all schools were equipped or were near swimming pools.

Asked whether the learning to swim activities would be a compulsory co-curriculum, he said the government had plans to make it a mandatory syllabus from pre-school to secondary school, but it would take a long time, as there are about 10,000 schools nationwide.

Earlier in his speech, Maszlee said, for now, swimming activities were conducted through clubs and associations as co-curriculum activities with students taught based on modules by agencies registered with the ministry using the implementation guidelines of existing co-curricular activities.

Meanwhile, he said the module which was launched today was the first and most significant event besides being timely to show the ministry's commitment in spreading awareness on the importance of water safety and rescue.