https://www.malaysiakini.com/columns/665052
* From Kirkby to Kota Bharu to Anwar *
by Dr Zalina Ismail
Published: May 14, 2023 8:58 AM
On the hot and humid night of May 12, 2023, my family and I were part of the crowd at Sultan Muhammad IV Stadium, Kota Bharu, waiting for the arrival of Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and his team.
We didn’t expect to see or talk to him. We just wanted to be a part of history and to feel the moment.
As it was, we were excited just to be able to see his songkok amidst resounding cries of “reformasi” and numerous photos of others taking photos of crowds holding up handphones.
One could be forgiven if it was thought that a rock star was about to arrive.
While waiting, my mind wandered back more than 70 years to another important point in history.
In December 1951, the SS Chusan, a British ocean liner, and cruise ship, carried the first batch of Malayan student teachers to England to begin their training at Kirkby College in Lancashire.
The journey started in Hong Kong, picked up the student teachers in Singapore and Penang on Dec 12, and arrived in London on New Year's Day, 1952.
My parents were on the SS Chusan. They were part of a unique educational experiment between 1952 and 1962, to overcome the acute shortage of teachers for English-medium primary and secondary schools in Malaya.
It was a highly successful move and one calculated to prepare Malaya for its eventual independence as a nation.
For many years after independence, these 1,900 Kirkby-trained Malays, Indians, Chinese, and Eurasians became the core of our education system.
They learned the true value of friendship that transcended the artificial barriers of race and religion. They were everywhere: taking up positions as teachers and lecturers in towns, villages, and in the far-flung parts of Malaya preparing the country for the day when independence was declared on Aug 31, 1957.
They then moved forward and shaped the kind of education system that enabled me to become a doctor and a lawyer with a doctorate in neuroscience. They made me think that nothing was impossible.
LOSING OUR WAY
But... as I made my way along the path as an academician, I came to realise that something was not quite right with the education system.
I was beginning to question the system that nurtured me and my siblings. I began to question the criteria-based system that had gradually seeped into our educational values.
As impressive as it was on paper, with emphasis on knowledge and understanding, application, and high-order thinking skills (HOTS), it was far from that in reality.
The product that was eventually produced by our universities was generic students giving generic answers. What happened to the idealism of that 1,900-strong team of Kirby-trained teachers?
My father used to tell me of his enjoyment of being a lecturer. I watched as my mum was surrounded by her students, laughing and joking with someone we called “the tigress”.
My lecturer friends now are too busy counting the points that would allow them up a notch on the academic ladder. They have no time to enjoy being a lecturer.
I began to question the definition of success, which along the way became a narrow set of criteria-based definitions that did not allow for differences of opinion, a system that was reactive rather than proactive.
I was beginning to question the system where even PhD studies were cookie-cutter projects in a template-based system, where quantity was emphasised at the expense of quality, where the number of students “graduating on time” was more important than the quality of the research.
Lecturers were now using students as a mill to generate papers in an impossible situation where funds were lacking but criteria kept rising to impossible heights. Yet, as lecturers floundered amongst this morass of bureaucracy, some managed to rise higher without the benefit of these very strict criteria.
I was beginning to lose hope, until tonight.
A ray of hope
I am not the kind who likes crowds, not the kind who shops on crowded weekends or waits in long lines at the mall.
Yet, on May 12, 2023, I was part of the 15,000-strong crowd who watched as Anwar came to visit Kota Bharu. It was a strangely exhilarating moment when cries of “reformasi!” echoed throughout the stadium grounds.
It was a highly defining moment when the sounds of “NegaraKu” filled the night air.
Living for more than 40 years in the PAS stronghold that is Kota Bharu, I have seen many colleagues, Muslims and non-Muslims, who came for a conference but stayed an extra day so they could visit the home of the late PAS spiritual leader Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat in Pulau Melaka.
Nowadays, they come so that they can see his grave across the river from my home. His was a kinder, gentler, but highly persuasive Islam. He loved all but stayed strong on Islamic principles. He appealed to non-Muslims without compromising Islam.
Tonight, I see that this vision of Islam is returning in the shape of Anwar and his team.
How could one man inspire such emotion and hope in so many people? Dare I say, Anwar, that you have chutzpah, and I admire the fact that you are neither afraid nor embarrassed to do or say things that shock, surprise, or annoy other people in your quest for doing what’s best for Malaysians.
Thank you, Anwar. Last night, at the Sultan Muhammad IV Stadium in Kota Bharu, I renewed my belief that this government has given us another chance to do what’s right for the country.
A long time ago, my parents were part of an idealistic group that brought education to all Malaysians. Now, more than 70 years later, that same spirit of inclusivity has been reborn in Anwar and his team.
Give them a chance to affect positive change. Tonight, I reaffirmed my belief in Malaysia and Malaysians. I am proud of being a Malaysian.
DR ZALINA ISMAIL is a former professor in Neurophysiology at the School of Health Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia and Fellow of the Foundation for Advancement of International Medical Education and Research
