Deputy Education Minister Datuk Chong Sin Woon said the government was building more vocational colleges to provide more places for students interested in taking up technical and vocational courses.

He said that since the Vocational Education Transformation Plan was introduced in 2012, some 81 vocational colleges went into operation throughout the country and five more were under construction.

“The provision of new places for vocational training does not depend on racial quota as it is open to all students who want to acquire the skills,” he said during Question Time in the Dewan Rakyat.

He was replying to a supplementary question from M. Kulasegaran (DAP-Ipoh Barat) who wanted to know the efforts of the government in assisting minority groups such as the Indian community to obtain places in vocational colleges.

When replying to the original question from Kulasegaran on the number of students who succeeded in obtaining the Sijil Kemahiran Malaysia (Malaysia Skills Certificate), Chong said that to date, 2,273 graduates in the 2016 first cohort from 15 vocational colleges received the Vocational College Diplomas.

He said 12,997 graduates in the second cohort obtained similar diplomas in August this year.

“A total of 90.58 per cent of the 2,273 first cohort graduates had gained employment while 55.49 per cent of the 12,997 students in the second cohort were offered jobs even before completing their studies,” he said. — Bernama

Comment: It’s the awareness & perhaps language & culture barrier that limits the number of non Malay students in these vocational colleges (basically any public institutions). Therefore, it’s very important that non Malay students have a better command of the Malay language and this must start from primary schools, otherwise they would shun these public institutions.