More teachers to be recruited in one-off intake exercise

The education ministry will increase the one-off intake of teachers for placement next year through the subject cluster method, Education Minister Radzi Jidin said today.

He estimated that the intake would exceed the usual figure of 4,000 graduates recruited yearly, which is a common practice at the ministry.

"Prior to Covid-19, around 4,000 to 5,000 graduates were recruited each year to fill the vacancies. When the cluster system was introduced, it gave us the opportunity to increase the teacher intake.

"So now we are trying to increase the figure and this effort is being done by the Education Services Commission (SPP)," he told reporters after a programme with the Orang Asli community in Sungai Siput today.

It was reported that 18,702 Grade DG41 education service officers had been recruited on a one-off basis in a special recruitment drive to fill teaching vacancies in government schools under the SPP.
 
Radzi said the subject cluster method had also helped address problems such as backlogs and mismatches in the recruitment of teachers.

"The backlog issue has been going on for many years because of a supply shortage, while the mismatch problem was addressed when graduates with certain areas of specialisation were allowed to fill vacancies in other subjects categorised under the same cluster," he said.