Leaders in education keep abreast of best practices |25 March 2023

The seminar participants in a souvenir photograph with guests

The Ministry of Education in partnership with SEGI University and Colleges of Malaysia is hosting a two-day school leadership seminar entitled ‘Leading and facilitating school-based reform and changes for better outcomes’.

The seminar which got under way yesterday morning at the ministry’s headquarters in Mont Fleuri, is targeting subject coordinators and deputy head teachers from public schools.

The Ministry of Education said school leaders must keep abreast of new developments and practices especially those practices that have impactful effect on the teachers’ work and the classroom attainment.

The seminar argues that leadership skills need to be learned if the leaders expect to inspire vision, nurture commitment, retain staff and achieve all targets.

When addressing the guests, Minister Justin Valentin said they were witnessing a strong partnership being formed between the two institutions, “which have agreed to collaborate on the development of teachers as leaders”.

Present at yesterday’s opening ceremony were also the Seychelles’ principal secretary for Education, Merna Eulentin, the managing director of SEGI University and Colleges, Stella Lau Kah Wai, as well as Malaysia’s honorary consul to Seychelles, Kabilan Muniandy.

The seminar is also the latter’s contribution to the series of reform happening in schools in Seychelles.

For her part, the managing director of SEGI University and Colleges, Ms Lau Kah Wai, stated that teacher training is the backbone for every nation, “for we are talking about educating the next generation and to do that effectively we must equip our teachers with the knowledge and the skills so that they can do it confidently”.

Speaking to the media, the director general for Network and Engagement at the Ministry of Education, Jutta Alexis, said that for them the training is timely, in that it shows the ministry’s desire to remain headstrong and committed in its objectives and mission as they strive to remain focused in strengthening the schools, through their motto ‘To make the schools strong.’

SEGI University and Colleges is among 26 Malaysian universities offering higher education courses to Seychellois students.

Priscilla Payet, a former student at the university, shared her learning journey to the participants yesterday. She said studying at the Malaysian institution had sharpened her edge. A teacher by profession, Miss Payet is a new addition to the Ministry of Education, holding a master’s degree in Research.

Another participant was Beverly Isaac, the deputy principal at the School of Advanced Level Studies (Sals), who said the session was a really good thing and long overdue.

“There is a lot that we can learn, and although we have just started the seminar and have not yet gone in depth, from what I have heard so far I believe it to be a very good programme,” she said.

The seminar’s facilitator is Professor Maheswari Kandasamy who has served in several positions pertaining to capacity building for training and research innovation projects for educational institutions in Malaysia, Cambodia, Laos, Maldives, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Vietnam.

At the end of the seminar the participants are expected to be able to pros and cons of some critical approaches to leadership in their respective domain, engage with some newer change management theories, apply impactful strategies in monitoring teaching and learning as well as facilitate change in the classrooms and schools.

Diane Larame

Photos by Louis Toussaint