PPSMI

Pengajaran dan Pembelajaran Sains dan Matematik Dalam Bahasa Inggeris (PPSMI) is a Malaysian Government education policy at primary and secondary schools in Malaysia to improve English fluency among Malaysian pupils.

Regardless the issues stirred up by some politicians and those narrow-minded followers, I do agree PPSMI might be an unpatrotic way to strengthen "Semangat Cintakan Bahasa Kebangsaan" among rakyat. I also think that by enforcing this policy on school children, it might also create multiple identity crisis among them as language is supposed to unite rakyat as one.

• As I am a non PPSMI product, of course I'd say learning in Bahasa would be easier and more convenient. I would also totally understand why the leftists fight for the purity of Bahasa Malaysia in this country from being ignored. And I also agree for everybody in Malaysia should embrace it as is the only language they could understand in the entire world. To stress out how successful the Germans, Japanese, Italians, Russians, English, Americans or even in PR of China (to name some) for cultivating their language since the very beginning in their education system, I believe by educating school children to master at least 2 languages won't destroy our ego. First, we have to accept that at this point, the world of S&T is ruled by the English language. I still remember when Tun Mahathir mentioned various advantages if we are able to master multiple languages.
• As I am a non PPSMI product, based on my personal experience, my college life was the real challenge of transition as English was needed almost in every single hearbeat. I was not a A+++ student at school who could catch up those theoritical terms at a single moment. At one point, I realized why didn't I at least were good in English which then would be easier for me to understand all the lectures and the references? As I enrolled a German university, I always told myself that " this is Germany and German should be the language", surprisingly, English always appeared in books, scripts even in daily conversations. There are also movements in Germany that promote students should be able to master at least another langauge besides Deutsch to move forward and they even support students to go abroad by learning a 2nd language (mainly in English since it is not easy to master a different language in 1-2years after you are 18years old). If we oppose PPSMI without further considerations, in this case, majority of Malay "kampung" students and other small groups would be again the real victims. You analyze it yourself. But yet, who am I to force you do so, as those politicians themselves exploiting their positions for owns sake!

It is not easy to satisfy everybody in this world. It has to be a win-win situation in order to sustain the good communication and understanding between different groups. Personally, I know PPSMI has flaws (not as the way the politicians conveyed it is), but I believe there is a way to find a good solution. As 2008's SPM results were revealed, I realized EST should be a compulsary subject and even the traditional Bahasa Inggeris and 1119 Paper have to be restructured if those self-proclaimed "Pejuang Bahasa" using their nonsense political movements who still want their "rights" to abolish PPSMI (or just to woo the voters).

Ohne gute Voraussetzung einer Sprache, man kann vergessen, um das Leben weiter zu verbessern.