MMI... Memelihara Masa Instruksional

The fact that we needed to come out with this one, I guess, in a way points to another failure in our school system. Apparently our instructional time is under siege. And I suspect the 'enemy' is from within. MMI goes to great lengths to spell out the need to protect the instructional time at school. So much so that we hear of all kinds of measures. And we also get circulars from the departments spelling out what can or cannot be done at school.

One program which fell victim was the Teacher's Day celebration. The school is no longer allowed to spend the day celebrating the Teacher's Day. Instead teachers had to go back to class and teach for half the day - on that one day set aside to appreciate teachers. Lol!

But on many other days, when it suits the school... and I am not blaming school administrators cos their hands are rather tied too. After all, we only have 24 hours a day..... other programs which affect the instructional time are carried out. For example, I remember one program, some Purple Walk event where students were taken out from school and had to waste the whole morning sitting around the stadium. There wasn't much educational benefit from that event... Yet when the orders came from above to find numbers to make up the crowd, the MMI was overlooked.

Our education system is not in the best of health now. But instead of treating it with the right medicine, we keep calling for unnecessary tests... hoping that those tests would show us a magical cure. I think everywhere in the world, the same problem plagues the educational system. We keep discarding the old because we feel that the new is better. But unfortunate for us, in this era where the sense of entitlement is high and the willingness to work hard is low, things continue to slide. Most of us see the slide but we seem so unable to stem it.

MMI... sadly one of those things that mean well but highlight even more our failures and shortcomings. And the result - a generation unable to seemingly think analytically or critically. For we often seem to keep trying to come up with slogans and acronyms without really looking inwardly to ourselves and see what ought to be rectified within first.