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School for the gifted by 2011

KUALA LUMPUR: The country’s first boarding school for gifted and talented children will soon be set up in Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia with co-operation from the Johns Hopkins University Centre for Talented Youths.

The school, expected to be operational by 2011, with an enrolment of 80 Form Four and Form Five students, is part of the National Permata Pintar programme.

The programme’s patron, Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor, said the school would only accept gifted children with an IQ of above 130.

“The boarding school will be for local students and it is located in the UKM campus,” she told a press conference after witnessing the signing ceremony between UKM and the centre yesterday,

She said the Government would allocate RM20mil to build the school and the centre would train the teachers. The project is expected to cost RM80mil.

“We would do it phase by phase. The first step would be the two-week camp that would be held in December at UKM,” she said.

Students around the country who have obtained the required points in the Permata Pintar screening test would be picked to take part in the holiday camp and follow a special curriculum the centre will design.

Children aged between nine and 15 can take the online IQ test at www.permatapintar.com.my where they need to answer 60 questions within an hour in English or Malay.

Upon passing the test, the student would then sit for another test and interview. Only 300 students would be chosen for the holiday camp.

The Permata Pintar programme aims to search, identify and mould gifted children intellectually and socially.

Johns Hopkins University for Talented Youths executive director Dr Lea Ybarra said the co-curriculum designed by the university would meet the child’s needs and not the classroom’s needs.

“In many countries, children who are very bright are not valued by their classmates. They are made fun of and in our country, they are called nerds and geeks.

“But when they come to programmes like these, they are valued for being smart and nurtured to be smart.”

Earlier, Rosmah gave a keynote address at the Malaysian International Early Childhood Education and Care Conference here.

About 700 participants from 42 countries attended the three-day conference which Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak opened on Tuesday.

The Star 16.04.09

Thursday April 16, 2009

By YENG AI CHUN