Employing data to enhance teaching and learning in MENDAKI Tuition Scheme (MTS)

Abstract

The Malay community in Singapore has made significant social and economic progress over the years. In 2018, Singapore’s Ministry of Education released figures reflecting educational achievements over a 10-year period between 2008 and 2017. Indicators such as progress in national examinations and increased representation of Malay students in post-secondary institutions over the last decade are encouraging milestones of educational mobility. The community’s educational performance for key national examinations however is generally lower than that of other ethnic groups. Several researchers have highlighted the “under- attainment” of Singapore Malays. The MENDAKI Tuition Scheme (MTS), MENDAKI’sflagship programme, provides highly subsidised tuition to support socioeconomically disadvantaged students in their learning. This paper reports the pilot phase of a collaboration between a university in Singapore and MENDAKI. The primary aim of the collaboration is to leverage on the use analytics to enhance the teaching and learning of disadvantaged Malay students in the MTS. Other secondary aims of the collaboration are to establish structures and to build capability of MENDAKI in the use of data for evidence-based decision making.