PETALING JAYA: SK Kempadang in Kuantan and SMK Kampong Jawa in Klang have earned themselves a spot in the global top 10 finalists for the World’s Best School Prize.

       SK Kempadang is in the Top 10 shortlist for World’s Best School Prize for Innovation while SMK Kampong Jawa is in the Top 10 shortlist for World’s Best School Prize for Overcoming Adversity.

       The prize is organised by T4 Education in partnership with Yayasan Hasanah, Templeton World Charity Foundation, Accenture and American Express.

       T4 Education founder Vikas Pota congratulated the schools and said educators globally would be able to learn from the examples of “these outstanding Malaysian schools”.

       Yayasan Hasanah managing director and founding trustee Datuk Shahira Ahmed Bazari said the selection of the two schools was proof that “our public schools are capable of being among the world’s best”.

       Each school stands the chance to win US$50,000 (RM219,650).

       The World’s Best School Prize aims to celebrate schools globally for the role they play in developing the next generation of learners and for their contribution to society’s progress, especially in the wake of Covid-19, T4 Education said in a statement.

       It also said SK Kempadang was unable to access real-time pupil learning data following the closure of schools due to the Covid-19 pandemic and the scrapping of UPSR last year.

       This prompted the school to innovate and develop Smartzoom, a fully automated tracking system that follows pupils’ progress in their studies.

       “Smartzoom uses data input on Google Sheets and Google Chrome as all Malaysian teachers have a designated Google account linked to the Education Ministry.

       “Using that data, staff were able to devise concrete and detailed lesson plans tailored to their specific class.

       “Supporting teachers as well as panel heads were given training material in the form of YouTube videos and workshops that helped them with the transition,” T4 Education said, adding that most of the pupils in the school were from B40 families.

       SMK Kampong Jawa was also facing various issues and was ranked the second last out of 38 schools in Klang for its academic results.

       The issues were associated with urban poverty, poor attendance, vandalism, theft and had its students often groomed into local gangs, T4 Education said.

       However, a newly appointed principal in August 2020, the group said, helped redirect the school’s policies. Among them was an intensive data-driven approach on attendance which included over 500 phone calls made to parents to learn more about students and their home environments.

       “For those who still didn’t attend class, school counsellors would make home visits themselves,” T4 Education said, adding that online attendance and academic results showed improvement.

       The top three finalists for each of the five World’s Best School Prizes, T4 Education said, would be announced later this year and the winners would be announced in October.

       All 50 shortlisted schools in all five categories will share their best practices to innovative approaches and step-by-step instructions on how others can replicate their methods to help improve education.