Pembaziran Kerajaan Terengganu Dalam Program E-book

Projek e-Book: Terengganu bazir hampir RM90 juta

Setelah beberapa bulan berlalu, Menteri Besar Terengganu Ahmad Said kembali mendapat liputan media online sejak akhir-akhir ini ekoran perbelanjaan yang tinggi melibatkan pembelian e-Book untuk kanak-kanak sekolah rendah.

"Kerajaan negeri memperuntukan RM30 juta untuk membeli e-book untuk 25,000 pelajar tetapi secara tiba-tiba jumlahnya telah meningkat menjadi RM87.95 juta, hampir tiga kali ganda," kata Ahli Dewan Undangan Negeri (Adun) Batu Buruk Dr Syed Azman Syed Ahmad.

Beliau berkata, "Jabatan Audit Negara Terengganu melaporkan sebuah syarikat Top IT Industries Sdn Bhd yang membekalkan e-book amat memeranjatkan kerana terdapat beberapa isu ekoran dari projek e-book ini."

Menurut beliau, tidak ada perjanjian dibuat antara syarikat pembekal itu dengan kerajaan negeri dan antara syarikat dengan pembekal perkakasan dan perisian, berlaku kelewatan penghantarannya, kadar jumlah murid yang membawa e-Book ke sekolah adalah rendah dan berlaku kecuaian memilih pembekal sistem kerosakan e-Book.

Lebih memalukan lagi kata beliau, apabila laporan audit ini mendapati semakan audit di kilang mendapati pada tahun 2009 sebanyak 1,857 unit e-Book dan bagi tempuh Januari hingga Mac 2010 sebanyak 1,532 e-Book yang diberikan kepada murid-murid telah rosak dan dihantar ke kilang untuk dibaiki.

Dari jumlah tersebut, seramai 609 murid dikehendaki membayar di antara RM69 hingga RM200 kerana kerosakan tersebut kerana tidak termasuk dalam jaminan kerosakan selama setahun.

Beliau berkata, "kadar kerosakan ialah 14% berbanding dengan jumlah e-Book yang dibekalkan kepada murid-murid berjumlah 24,431 e-Book.

"Amat mengejutkan lagi kerosakan ini berlaku dalam tempuh kurang satu tahun dan kadar kerosakan 14% adalah kadar yang amat tinggi. Ini memberi gambaran kepada kualiti e-Book yang dikeluarkan tidak bermutu," tambahnya.

Syed Azman mengakui sekumpulan Pemuda PAS telah membuat laporan kepada Suruhanjaya Pencegahan Rasuah Malaysia Sabtu lalu berhubung perkara ini. -FMT

Laptops for Terengganu students - Good or Bad?

Recently, I came to learn that all Year 5 students in Terengganu will be given laptops under the state’s e-book program. That translates to RM30 million, with some 25,000 pupils involved.

With broadband connection, it is claimed that the pupils would gain access to lots of vital resources.

But I doubt the laptops will be useful academically. Mesti semua sibuk download movies, songs, porn, etc. Tak pun layan chat, friendster, facebook, etc. So I did a simple search, and I found that numerous studies have shown that there is no correlation between laptop usage and academic performance:

The US Department of Education recently released a study showing no difference in academic achievement between students who used educational software programs for math and reading and those who did not.

Mark Warschauer, a professor at the University of California also found no evidence that laptops increased test scores in a study of 10 schools in California and Maine from 2003 to 2005.

The Texas Center for Educational Research, a nonprofit group, has so far found no overall difference on test scores between 21 schools where students received laptops, and 21 schools where they did not.

Interestingly, I also found that hundreds of schools across the globe have started abandoning their laptop programs. Here just a few reasons why:

Underutilized by Students. Matoaca High School began eliminating its five-year-old laptop program after concluding that students had failed to show any academic gains. A survey found that one-fifth of their students rarely or never used their laptops for learning.

Underutilized by Teachers. Everett Rea Elementary School in Califronia gave away 30 new laptops to another school in 2005 after a class that was trying them out changed to new teachers who simply did not do as much with the technology.

High Training Costs. Northfield Mount Hermon School in Massachusetts eliminated its five-year-old laptop program in 2002 after it found that more effort was being expended on training teachers to teach with laptops.

High Maintenance Cost. In Liverpool Highschool in Syracuse, parents have long criticized the cost of the laptop program: about $300,000 a year from the state, plus individual student leases of $25 a month.

High Repair Costs. School officials in Broward County in Florida paid $7.2 million to lease 6,000 laptops at four schools, and was spending more than $100,000 a year for repairs to screens and keyboards that are not covered by warranties.

Yes, I know that Terengganu is cash-rich. Still, is the laptop program a wise move? What do you think?