75 Additional Participants To Arrive For ETA Programme Next Year

PORT DICKSON (Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia), May 23 (Bernama) -- The Fulbright English Teachers Assistant (ETA), programme to enhance English instruction in secondary schools is expected to expand when 75 participants arrive in the country, early next year. United States Ambassador to Malaysia Paul W. Jones said, currently the U.S government was involved in the selection process after receiving hundred applications from among university graduates to join the voluntary basis programme. "They will arrive in January (2013) and the current group will leave in November at the end of the school year. Therefore, we are looking to increase the number of schools and perhaps locations where the next students will be. "We have the ETA in Terengganu, Johor and Pahang, and we will be working with the Malaysian government to see if the government would like to extend it to additional states or have more in those states," he told reporters after visiting the Malaysian Peacekeeping Training Center, here Tuesday. Under the programme, young American graduates come from various universities in the US and represent a wide variety of major fields are placed at schools in different districts to assist English teachers. Early this year, a group of 50 Fulbright ETAs arrived and began a 10-month assignment to enrich and enhance English instruction in secondary schools in Johor, Pahang and Terengganu, by providing native speakers as models who can also offer information and insight into American society and culture. Jones also said, the ETA which rewards young Americans and student at the secondary school, here, is expected to be one of the largest government to government programme that the U.S has undertaken. The programme was a shared commitment of U.S. President Barack Obama and Malaysian Prime Minister Mohd Najib Razak, to expand people-to-people exchange programmes, between the United States and Malaysia. The programme is jointly administered by the Malaysian-American Commission on Educational Exchange and the Ministry of Education. -- BERNAMA