Mah: Ministry aware some teachers unhappy over drop in holidays

SEREMBAN: The new 2020 school academic calendar was planned to allow the teaching and learning process to continue after the authorities managed to stem the spread of Covid-19, says the Education Ministry.

Deputy Education Minister Datuk Dr Mah Hang Soon said he was aware some teachers were upset with the new calendar, but he expressed hope they would understand why the decision was made.

“There are bound to be problems in every situation. Our responsibility is to see how best we can tackle these issues.

“Now that we have been successful in checking the spread of Covid19, we need to ensure the teaching and learning process is continued.

“I am aware some teachers are unhappy and I will surely bring this to the minister’s attention,” he said after a visit to the Kolej Vokasional Ampangan here yesterday.

Dr Mah said the ministry was prepared to hear them out.

Teachers have expressed their unhappiness over the reduced number of holidays in the new calendar and questioned why the ministry came up with a new one after saying earlier there would be no change despite the Covid-19 outbreak.

There are also those who have bought flight tickets for the coming Hari Raya Haji holidays which falls on July 31, which coincidentally was a week-long school holiday under the original calendar.

Under the new academic calendar released yesterday, the mid-semester and year-end school holidays have been shortened.

The mid-semester school holidays for Semester Two will now be from Aug 20-28 while the year-end school holidays will be from Dec 18-31, depending on the state.

This is a four-day reduction for the mid-semester break from nine days to five days.

The year-end holidays for schools in Johor, Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu have been reduced from 42 days to 14 days, while schools in Melaka, Negri Sembilan, Pahang, Perak, Perlis, Penang, Sabah, Sarawak, Selangor, Kuala Lumpur, Labuan and Putrajaya will have a 13-day holiday.