Focus on ASEAN education sector achievements

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Minister of Education Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Hamzah bin Haji Sulaiman attended the ministerial event on ‘Recover Learning and Rebuild Education in the ASEAN region’ and ASEAN Education Ministers Meeting (ASED) Chairmanship ceremonial turnover ceremony virtually yesterday.

The event saw ASED chairmanship turnover ceremony of the Philippines to Vietnam, where the achievements of the ASEAN education sector from 2020 to 2021 were highlighted by a representative from the Philippines, and updates were shared by the representative of the incoming ASED Chair Vietnam for ongoing initiatives.

It was followed by the ministerial panel discussions attended by education ministers from Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines and Thailand while Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam were represented by their deputy ministers.

The event was jointly organised by the Cambridge Partnership for Education with the ASEAN Secretariat and the Ministry of Education and Training Vietnam aiming to provide opportunities for ASEAN leaders with a platform to discuss and share experiences in overcoming pandemic challenges at the economic, educational and social levels, themed ‘Recover Learning and Rebuild Education in the ASEAN region’ among others.

The Ministerial Panel Discussion is the first ministerial event under the Chairmanship of Vietnam in the education sector.

During the panel discussions, the ministers and deputy ministers shared knowledge gained from lessons learnt, presented outcomes of past and current interventions, as well as forming cross-region partnerships which will benefit the region as a whole, focussing on topics that covered Learning Loss and Accelerated Learning, Access to Education and Building Education System Resilience.

In his remark, Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Hamzah shared the Sultanate’s key initiatives tackling the issue of ‘Access to Education’ during the pandemic including: the Ministry of Education’s (MoE) collaboration with other government agencies and telecommunications companies in addressing immediate needs for hardware and Internet connection for students and teachers when education was shifted to online; creating a Framework to Discovery to address students’ learning deficit; provision of training for online teaching for teachers; and also sharing MoE’s ‘Digital Transformation Plan’ efforts to improve teachers’ and students’ digital learning experiences by giving them access to emerging and future technologies to create a more engaging and successful educational process and to improve access to education for children.

Permanent Secretary (Core Education) at the MoE Dr Shamsiah Zuraini Kanchanawati binti Haji Tajuddin and MoE officials were also present.

Minister of Education Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Hamzah bin Haji Sulaiman at the virtual meet. PHOTO: MINISTRY OF EDUCATION