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3-27<br />

Higher spending has translated to better<br />

student outcomes in terms of access, but<br />

not necessarily in terms of quality<br />

In order to determine how to best utilise the Ministry’s resources, it is<br />

important to examine the return on investment (ROI) in the current<br />

education system, particularly in relation to other countries. As a<br />

developing country, Malaysia has invested significant resources into<br />

building additional infrastructure, particularly in rural areas and the<br />

interior of Sabah and Sarawak, and increasing the size of the teaching<br />

force to enable the expansion of access to education. This spending has<br />

successfully translated to almost universal access to primary education,<br />

and significant improvement in access to secondary education. However,<br />

there remain large areas for improvement in moving forward, particularly<br />

with regard to quality. Higher levels of spending are not necessarily<br />

correlated with better outcomes (Exhibit 3-16). The United States of<br />

America, for example, spends more than USD10,000 per student, but<br />

EXHIBIT 3-35<br />

Correlation between wealth and student performance on PISA 2009+<br />

Average result against GDP for participant countries PISA 2009+<br />

PISA reading 2009+<br />

Average score<br />

550<br />

525<br />

500<br />

475<br />

450<br />

425<br />

400<br />

Indonesia<br />

0 5<br />

Thailand<br />

10<br />

Australia<br />

New Zealand Belgium<br />

Iceland Netherlands<br />

Poland Estonia France Germany<br />

US<br />

Norway<br />

Ireland<br />

Hungary<br />

Taiwan UK Sweden<br />

Portugal Slovenia<br />

Italy<br />

Denmark Switzerland<br />

Slovak Republic<br />

Greece<br />

Austria<br />

Luxembourg<br />

Turkey<br />

Israel Spain<br />

Czech Republic<br />

Chile<br />

Countries in this region<br />

perform worse than<br />

expected, given GDP<br />

Mexico<br />

Malaysia 1<br />

1 GDP per capita PPP-adjusted (2005 constant prices) based on 2010 data<br />

SOURCE: PISA 2009+; Global Insight<br />

15<br />

20<br />

25<br />

Korea<br />

performs almost two bands lower than a system like Shanghai which<br />

only spends between USD4,000-5,000 per student.<br />

Malaysia’s performance lags behind other countries making similar<br />

or lower levels of expenditure. Education systems that are making<br />

lower investments per pupil, such as those of Thailand and Chile, are<br />

nonetheless achieving student outcomes that are either comparable<br />

to or better than Malaysia’s. This suggests that while a certain<br />

threshold of spending is required, it is more important that money is<br />

put towards the right factors in order to ensure success.<br />

Additionally, given the country’s wealth, Malaysia’s performance<br />

is lower than expected. International evidence indicates that there<br />

is a strong positive correlation between a country’s GDP per capita<br />

and PISA scores (Exhibit 3-35). However, Malaysia appears to be<br />

underperforming when compared against other countries with a<br />

similar GDP per capita.<br />

30<br />

Finland<br />

Japan<br />

Canada<br />

Countries in this region<br />

perform better than<br />

expected, given GDP<br />

Hong Kong<br />

Singapore<br />

35 40 45 50<br />

85<br />

GDP per capita<br />

Equivalent Thousands USD converted using PPPs

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