Teach For Malaysia

Teach For Malaysia offers you the unique opportunity to simultaneously make a real difference by addressing one of the most urgent challenges in Malaysia - that a child's origin often determines the quality of his or her education, and therefore his or her life outcomes - and launch your career in any field. By directly engaging with one of the most difficult issues of our nation - and of your life - the Teach For Malaysia Fellowship will help develop you into an exceptional leader in any field. Once you leave the Fellowship, you will be a part of the Teach For Malaysia Ambassador movement, a gathering of our alumni that would advocate for a future in Malaysia in which all children have the opportunity to attain an excellent education. Equipped with significant leadership skills and experiences, you will join a pool of exceptional talent, highly sought-after by both the public and private sectors. If you are a scholar, please refer to Q6 (What if I have a scholarship or an employment bond with another organisation? Am I still eligible to apply?) in Admissions & Applications FAQ for further information. 2. What does the Teach For Malaysia Fellowship entail? The Teach For Malaysia Fellowship is a full-time, two-year programme. Our Fellows are placed as teachers in high-need schools with a mandate to transform the education outcomes of their students by significantly improving their achievements and aspirations. Fellows are also expected to invest in understanding the root causes of their students' challenges through the implementation of a school-based or community project. 3. Why does the Teach For Malaysia Fellowship last for two years? Is it possible for me to teach for 6 months or one year? Teach For Malaysia Fellows must commit to teach full-time for two years in high-need schools. Teach For Malaysia believes that the two-year duration and commitment is necessary for our Fellows to make the necessary impact we seek to have on the students. The two years is also important for our Fellows to develop a deep understanding of the challenges that underlie education inequity in Malaysia, as well as to develop the conviction and insight necessary to become life-long leaders in the pursuit of education opportunity for all. 4. How does my teaching experience help me develop personally and professionally? Fellows will have an extremely rewarding opportunity for self-development and growth, both personally and professionally, through their experience in the Fellowship. They innovate in challenging situations. They learn about conflict resolution first-hand. They are prepared to be leaders and advocates for educational opportunity regardless of where their future career path may take them. Teach For Malaysia believes that excellent teachers, especially those in challenging contexts, employ the same skills and principles as excellent leaders in any field. Fellows will develop essential workplace skills such as leadership, organisation and communication that top employers significantly value. The leadership skills you will learn, build and sharpen throughout the Fellowship will allow you to lead, manage and bring 40 individuals from diverse and challenging backgrounds towards success. Amongst others, your Fellowship experience will enable you to explain complex concepts effectively to others, present confidently, learn how to successfully pick yourself up when faced with failure, manage difficult and challenging stakeholders and situations with resourcefulness, resilience, and respect, and gain the maturity and perspective to be a leader in any challenging situation. Fellows are essentially the leader in the classroom and have huge amounts of early responsibility and accountability - they are tasked with transforming the academic achievements, aspirations and outcomes of underperforming students. These skills help lay a strong professional foundation for whatever Fellows choose to do after the Fellowship and will be valuable in any career path. 5. Does the Fellowship experience in Teach For Malaysia really provide me more opportunities to enhance my career in the future? Yes. In addition to leadership and skills development outlined above, the Fellowship provides you a powerful career platform through interaction with Teach For Malaysia's corporate partners. Our corporate partners are excited about the calibre of talent Teach For Malaysia is attracting and recognise the selective nature of the programme as well as the significant leadership skills Fellows would gain and bring with them to their future organisations. Globally, a premier range of organisations such as Goldman Sachs, McKinsey & Co, Exxon Mobil, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Boston Consulting Group, HSBC, Credit Suisse, Deloitte, Google and the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, are proud supporters of our partner programmes abroad. Locally, Teach For Malaysia is proud to receive early stage support from the Ministry of Education and Khazanah Nasional Berhad. Leading corporations such as General Electric, Maxis, McKinsey & Company and PricewaterhouseCoopers have recently stepped forward to join Khazanah Nasional in support of Teach For Malaysia's highly selective and challenging two-year Fellowship. Find out more about our current and new partners here. 6. Which schools would Teach For Malaysia place its Fellows in? Teach For Malaysia is committed to placing our Fellows in high-need schools. We study a variety of factors before arriving at a school placement decision. These include, but are not limited to, the academic performance of schools in public examinations and the support our Fellows, the socio-economic background of students in those schools, staff and partners would receive from a school's leader and staff. Fellows would be placed in groups of three to four per school. For 2012, 17 schools were selected to partner with Teach For Malaysia. These schools are some of the highest-need schools in the country, and are located in Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Negeri Sembilan. 7. Can I choose my placement school, school level or subject that I will teach? You are allowed to indicate your subject and placement preference during the admissions process. While Teach For Malaysia will endeavour to meet these preferences, your placement will ultimately depend on factors such as the availability of teaching positions in a particular subject. Applying earlier to the Fellowship will increase the possibility of you obtaining your preferences. 8. What level of Bahasa Malaysia must I have if I am a Fellow? Fellows placed in government schools will teach in Bahasa Malaysia, unless the medium of instruction for the subject they would teach is in English. Hence, Fellows should be sufficiently proficient in Bahasa Malaysia to be able to teach their subject effectively and communicate with students and other teachers. For those who have previously studied Bahasa Malaysia but have been out-of-practice for some time, Teach For Malaysia will hold refresher classes before your placement begins to assist you with language practice. However, it is important to note that the onus lies with Fellows in ensuring that they are sufficiently proficient in Bahasa Malaysia to be effective and impactful in their roles. 9. What level of English must I have if I am a Fellow? All teacher training and leadership development courses for Teach For Malaysia will be conducted in English, except for selected subject and assessment materials. Hence, Fellows must have a level of proficiency in English that will enable them to fully participate and benefit from these training modules. 10. Will I receive a salary during my teaching placement? Teach For Malaysia is committed to being a financially viable option for our Fellows. Fellows will receive a full-time teaching salary that is competitive with entry-level graduate salaries in the private sector. 11. Will I be officially qualified to teach in government schools? Yes. To be able to teach in government schools, Fellows need an official teaching qualification accredited by the Government of Malaysia. All Fellows will complete this teaching qualification as part of their Fellowship, and will be conferred their teaching qualification at the end of Year One of the Fellowship. 12. Do I have to attend the entire training course? Yes. Given the ambitious goals of preparing Fellows to be effective teachers and leaders during training, the course will be intensive and the schedule will be very full. Fellows are expected to be full-time residents for the duration of the eight-week course. 13. Will I be trained adequately before I start teaching? Teach For Malaysia will work relentlessly to ensure that all Fellows have the knowledge and skills necessary to lead their students towards achievement. Prior to the teaching placement, all Fellows must undergo an eight-week intensive teacher-training and leadership development course at the Teach For Malaysia Institute. Our curriculum and experiential training methodology will be designed to ensure Fellows acquire the foundational knowledge and skills to teach lessons effectively from their first day as full-time teachers in classrooms. Our training curriculum would also be fully accredited and recognised by the Ministry of Education. Please refer to Training for further information. 14. Will I receive ongoing training and support after I start my placement? Yes. Fellows will receive continued support from Teach For Malaysia throughout their entire two-year placements. This includes: Access to a Leadership Development Officer, who will support and guide Fellows in becoming excellent teachers and leaders. Our Leadership Development Officers have one goal that is to ensure that Fellows build skills and maintain energy to reach classroom and community/school project goals; Access to a School-Based Mentor, based in the same school as the Fellow, who would likely be a senior teacher, providing support and guidance; Access to a Business Coach, who would be an employee of one of Teach For Malaysia's corporate partners, that would help Fellows strategise, plan and implement a small-scale, sustainable project in their placement community; Access to internship opportunities with Teach For Malaysia's corporate partners that will equip participants with a non-education related working perspective to complement overall leadership development.