The Prime Minister recently announced that only the top 20 SPM scorers will receive scholarships to further their studies abroad. 200 students would be sent to Japan, South Korea, Germany and France on Public Services Department’s Special Engineering Programme. And 744 students under the Bursary Graduate Programme will now have to study locally.

MARA, a Malaysian government agency formed to aid, train and guide Bumiputra (Malays and indigenous Malaysians) has also announced that they will reduce the number of students sent overseas. This is in support of Malaysia’s ambition to be an education hub and to support MARA’s own university set to open in June this year.

Comments by June Lo, Manager Education, British Council Malaysia:

In comparison with the new ruling that limits to only the top 20 SPM students, previously SPM students with 9A+ will automatically be sponsored for local pre-university studies and after their pre-university studies if they managed to obtain an offer from any top 50 universities in the world, they will be sponsored for their undergraduate degree.

In view of the announcements made by the two main public sponsorship bodies, UK institutions can expect the number of government sponsored students from Malaysia to reduce significantly this year.