PETALING JAYA, Mar 23 (Sin Chew Daily) — The United Chinese School Teachers' Association of Malaysia (Jiaozong) said there are 16 Chinese primary schools in the country with student enrolment below 10 each, and these schools may have to close down eventually if the downtrend is not reversed.

"There were 103 SJKCs with fewer than 30 students each in 2014. The number is now lowered to 96, as some schools without new student intake have since relocated to newer development areas."

Jiaozong said in a statement that the number of SJKC students declined further this year, and only 32 had more than 2,000 students each, five of which over 3,000.

The statement said several factors such as continued decline in the number of students, commissioning of new SJKCs, and relocation of some micro schools to places with higher concentrations of Chinese population, among others, have to a certain extent helped mitigate the issue of overcrowding in some schools.

There were 52 SJKCs with more than 2,000 students in 2008, according to the statement, and 17 of them had over 3,000 students.

"These numbers dropped to 42 and 10 respectively in 2014.”

The statement said it was a normal development for the enrolment of larger schools to fall to more reasonable levels.

Most of the schools with over 2,000 students are found in Klang Valley and Johor Bahru.

The statement said downsizing could help relieve the problem of overcrowding at these schools, besides improving the overall teaching environment and hence, teaching efficiency.

It also said it is necessary for such a development towards more manageable class size especially with the education ministry now actively promoting the School-Based Assessment (PBS) teaching model.