Review of Teachers' Workloads

21 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for Education (a) what are the results on the Ministry’s most recent review of teachers’ workloads; and (b) if a review has not been done recently, when will one be carried out.

The Second Minister for Education (Dr Mohamad Maliki Bin Osman) (for the Minister for Education): Mr Speaker, as a caring employer, the Ministry of Education (MOE) continually monitors teachers' workloads through surveys and a variety of staff engagements, and adjusts our policies and programmes as necessary. This is done as an ongoing priority, especially before introducing any new initiatives. The work hours reported by our teachers have remained stable in the past few years.

Mr Speaker: Mr Ng.

Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang (Nee Soon): Thank you, Sir. I thank Minister for the reply. Could I just ask whether for the number of hours that teachers have spent on administrative work, are we seeing a decreasing trend in terms of that? Second, whether MOE is considering reducing the amount of, again, non-administrative work for teachers, in terms of adding on work for counselling work for the students and even being well-being ambassadors for fellow teachers.

Dr Mohamad Maliki Bin Osman: Sir, I thank Mr Louis Ng again for the supplementary question. My records show that Mr Ng has asked this question many times: in February 2022, in March 2022, in July 2022 and September 2022.

I want to assure Mr Ng, as with the previous replies we have given, we have been cutting down the administrative work of our teachers, spreading them out, giving them guidelines, giving the superintendent and schools guidelines in terms of the workload for teachers. We use technology to reduce the administrative workload of teachers. Teachers are given different responsibilities. Not all teachers are expected to do deep counselling work, although they are trained in basic counselling so that they can identify students with immediate indications of challenges that might need help. And subsequently, if the students require other forms of support, other groups of teachers provide the support. The workload of teachers are spread out, based on the responsibilities that they hold at that particular point in time.

Mr Speaker: Mr Ng, last supplementary question.

Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang: Thank you, Sir. I think I have been asking this repeatedly because in this House, we keep saying that we are reducing the workload of teachers, but then again, on the other hand, I hear that we are now asking them to do the counselling work, to help the school counsellors because there is a shortage of school counsellors. And then now, we are asking them to be wellness ambassadors as well to help provide a listening ear to their fellow colleagues.

So, I sincerely hope again, we can make sure that teachers can focus on teaching rather than adding on additional workload to our teachers.

Dr Mohamad Maliki Bin Osman: Sir, I hope Mr Ng looks at the teaching work and the role of a teacher holistically. It is not just teaching in the classroom. Counselling, befriending, mentoring is really part of teaching because we want to teach life skills to our students. So, it is not just in the classroom.

The role that the teachers take on, when we say basic counsellors, it is not that they are doing counselling. When a child has a problem, the teacher cannot say, "Sorry, this is not my work, because I only need to teach you." But this is really, "I want to be there for you."

So, I hope that Mr Louis Ng will look at it in this larger perspective, that the teacher is one who is there to guide the student, go through the education journey holistically, so that the students also understand that the teacher is available at any point in time. And not look at the load of teachers just purely by teaching in the classroom. Any work that the teacher does, whether it is as a teacher in overseeing a CCA group, it is all about teaching and guiding our students.