“We do not see the need to raise the standard for now,” Dong Zong chairman Vincent Lau told FMT.

Lau’s remark comes amid criticism that the UEC standard for BM does not meet the SPM standard.

He added, however, that Dong Zong would study the feasibility of raising the BM standard at Chinese independent schools and base its next action on the findings.

“Most of our students now sit for both the SPM and UEC and they are able to get a credit in BM,” he said. “But there are some who are incapable of that.”

Lau said the standard of BM at Chinese independent schools was lower because the students learned it as a second language, along with English.

On Jan 7, Deputy Higher Education Minister Mary Yap said in a press interview that “the standard of the BM component of the UEC is not equal to that of SPM”.

She said this was one of four reasons the ministry was unable to grant recognition to the UEC.

The other reasons are UEC’s non-alignment with the national curriculum; public university requirements; and an inadequate syllabus for Malaysian history.

Last week, Lau urged the education ministry to allow UEC students to sit for only the BM paper instead of all six compulsory SPM subjects so that they could apply to study at public universities.

A pass in BM is not a requirement for the UEC.

Kamarozaman Abd Razak, president of the National Union of the Teaching Profession, said standards for SPM met the benchmark of the Cambridge International Examination.

“We follow the benchmark set by Cambridge, which sees SPM as being on the same level as the O-levels,” he said.

Kamarozaman added that it was not hard to score a credit in SPM BM if the students paid attention in class.

“BM is not a tough paper,” he said. “If they follow the lessons taught by the teacher, it is easy to obtain a credit.”