Efforts to attract young people’s interest in STEM require cooperation of all parties

GEORGE TOWN: Efforts to attract young people’s interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) subjects must involve all parties, says Higher Education Minister Datuk Seri Dr Zambry Abdul Kadir.

He said all parties need to take responsibility for creating interest in the STEM field, starting from the school level, which is one of the main issues faced.

“Our responsibility is to create interest among the students to enter the science stream, especially the STEM field. This is one of our main issues. We are working with various parties so this can be improved,” he said in a press conference at the Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) Innovative Incubation Centre here on Monday (Sept 2)

“We cannot give responsibility solely to the Education Ministry; there must be synergy, a focus in primary and secondary schools and at the Higher Education Ministry level.”

Earlier, he visited SAINS@USM and Oppstar Technology Sdn Bhd to witness the development of USM’s collaboration with the industry in empowering the country’s electrical and electronic (E&E) industry in integrated circuit (IC) design.

Meanwhile, Zambry said the demand for the industry, especially related to technology, is very high.

He said the tripartite relationship between industry, university, and government is important because it will greatly impact the production of a more skilled workforce.

“At the Higher Education Ministry level, we open the entire space to local researchers from universities to ensure that they can produce good results, especially in the world of semiconductors, artificial intelligence (AI) and so on,” he added. – Bernama