Jit Sin High School has been one of the greatest educational establishment in Penang and Malaysia. Many has considered Jit Sin High School as the pride of Bukit Mertajam with outstanding achievement in both academic and co-curricular activities. The school have come a long way to what it is today and it is not easy to go through decades without mistakes but we have never failed to overcome them and strive for success after each failure. This virtue has been instilled in the core values of the Jit Sin community.

It is sad to say that today's incident will leave a black mark in the history of Jit Sin High School and we demand accountability and explanation from the Principal, staffs and management of Jit Sin High School and apologize for their irrational act to the students.

The story broke out on 21st February, at roughly 11.30pm on a shared link on Facebook of Cari.com.my Forum showing a picture of students picking up textbooks off the road on Jit Sin campus on broad daylight with a short paragraph stating:

"Books are important for students because education is the key to their future. However the school (newly minted) Principal decided to use harsh force/ treatment towards the students by confiscating their books and throwing them on the road in the school campus and asked the students to queue up to find their own books. The punished students braced the scorching sunlight and the humiliation posed by some of the teachers while they collect their books. This incident happened due to the school policy disallowing students to keep books in their respective tables. The students involved disobeyed the rule because the books are too heavy to carry back home due to the number of modules they are required to take, thus they left the books in their drawers. The Principal reacted by confiscating the books and instructed a team of discipline teachers to throw the books on the road as punishment. The discipline teachers involved stood aside and sneered at the students."

Below is the timeline of the whole incident:

Feb 8 (Sat) : Students do not have activities due to the 9th Day Celebration of Chinese New Year and they decided to keep their books on campus. Some students who were on campus saw teachers collecting books from classrooms.

Feb 10 (Mon) : Students noticed their books are gone and later confirmed a rumor stating that the teachers have confiscated their books.

Feb 21 (Fri) : After two weeks without their textbooks, school management decided to return their books through the method stated above.

This story is getting traction as we speak and we demand action over this tastelessact towards the defenseless students. The school management obviously did not discuss this through while executing this act and this proves that there is major cultural and management flaw in the school management where many teachers chose to maintain silence while those who are responsible decided to punish the students by humiliating them.

We understand while the students are at fault for disobeying school rules, it is still unreasonable to punish students by this means and there should be a structured mechanism for the school to give warnings or punishments to the students. Information reveals that students involved who went to collect their books got a 6 point demerit while those who failed to collect their books received a 12 points demerit; some of the students who could not find their textbooks were further punished with an extra 6 points demerit assuming they do not collect them. According to Cari.com.my forum, some users stated that students who went to collect the books late saw their books on a table and the teachers simply pushed the books to the ground asking students to pick them up.

From our standpoint, the act of demerit alone should suffice and maybe a verbal warning to the students who broke school rules or even punishment that can still maintain the dignity of a student while explaining the reasons not to break said school rules. However, such scare tactic was employed instead by the school management and it has no place in such an outstanding establishment and it should not be adopted as a school culture where fear roams among the students. We are convinced that a more proper solution should be implemented for the long term, for example,  allocate some fundings to purchase lockers in order to allow students to put their textbooks in lockers because school management team is responsible to create a conducive environment for students to study, but not ruining them.

We understand and support the need for punishment to maintain order and discipline on campus but such act has violated the rights of a student. As students are underrepresented and are unable to speak their mind out in the campus for fear of further irrational punishments, we will stand up with them and strongly condemn this disrespectful, degrading and barbarian act of the Principal Mr. Tor Peng Chiang, staffs and management of Jit Sin High School because there should be a better solution to this matter and I ask you to join me to send a message to them saying:" No more bullying!" and to preserve the dignity of being a student.

-ET, PC & TWJ (Class of 08)

P/s: We are encouraging those with evidence or back story to stand up and pin-point the school management’s wrongdoings so that they will not repeat incidents like this again and protect the rights of a student.