Student enrolment in Sabah IPTS halved – association

KOTA KINABALU: Private Higher Learning Institutions (IPTS) are struggling financially due to the drastic drop in student enrolment by more than 50 percent.

Sabah Association of Institution of Higher Learning (PIPTSS) president Datuk Seri Panglima Wong Khen Thau said prospective students were deferring their studies due to Covid19.

He said private colleges and higher learning institutions were struggling to survive as their student enrolments had dropped by more than 50 percent.

“Some IPTS are seeing a 60 percent or even 90 percent drop in student enrolment.

“It is not easy for any colleges to recruit students online.”

Nonetheless, Wong said no IPTS in Sabah had closed down yet.

The Penang Institute’s Covid19 Impact on the Tertiary Sector report has stated that prospective students could defer their studies due to parents’ financial difficulties, as some might not be able to afford tuition fees for their children.

In addition, Wong said many parents in Sabah were not receptive to the idea of online teaching and learning.

Parents also believed that online courses offered by

IPTS should be cheaper, he said.

While parents could save money for not having to pay for their children’s accommodation, food and transport for enrolling in online courses, he said IPTS still had to maintain their operational costs, if not more.

These include the salary for lecturers and staff and investments in online teaching.

“Colleges and learning institutions need to invest in upgrading our Internet system to provide online teaching.

“Our costs have not gone down. In fact, our costs are higher.

“I can foresee that the operational costs for IPTS will not decrease in the next one to two years.”

Nevertheless, Wong assured that IPTS would lower tuition fees when the operational costs had reduced.

As for the measures taken by IPTS to recruit students, he said members of PIPTSS were working closely together in promoting online courses among parents and students, mainly on social media as well as newspaper advertisement.

“We cannot go to schools to give talks, so we do whatever we can online.

“Students who have enquiries or wish to have detailed discussion can visit colleges on appointment basis.”

Wong also strongly advised parents not to waste time in deferring their children’s education.

“Time is precious. New changes are happening.

“My suggestion is to enroll in higher learning institution as soon as possible instead of waiting for Covid19 to pass.”

He said parents and students should accept the new norms and new changes because nothing was the same again after the Covid-19 pandemic.

Wong said online courses, which required no physical attendance, offered a more relaxed learning environment as students could study at their own time.

“Waiting for the ban on face-toface lesson to be lifted will lead to a lot of disappointments in the future.”

On the other hand, Wong also appealed to the government to provide funds to IPTS, as well as sponsoring students to colleges and institutions, including funding retrenched workers for retraining or upskilling programmes.

He added that the education sector in Malaysia should transform as the future would likely demand human capital with Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET).

He said people would need to be retrained and upskilled to avoid being obsolete.

“Education plays a major role in training students and people of a country.

“The government’s investment in the education sector is vital to retrain human capital.

“Investment in human capital will never be a waste of money.”

PIPTSS represents 15 private higher learning institutions in Sabah.