Its minister, Roland Sagah Wee, said the education ministry is supportive of the state’s proposal and has agreed to assist.

“The federal education minister (Fadhlina Sidek) has agreed to help us, so, of course, the state education department will abide by it, and many people are supporting it, even in the peninsula.

“Schools currently have their own system of school-based assessment. We cannot say that it is not good, but we want to do it better.

“The main thing is that the DLP involves science, mathematics and English language subjects, so these are the areas that we will assess.

“We are engaging with officers and experts on this,” he told a press conference at the state assembly building here today.

In his winding-up speech in the assembly earlier, Roland said the assessment is vital because it will gauge the effectiveness of the DLP, alongside other initiatives by the state to increase the uptake of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM, subjects in schools.

However, he said, it would still be premature to elaborate, adding that “the proposed assessment will not cause undue stress”.

Roland also said the ministry has yet to receive an official response from the education ministry on how the decentralisation of education under the Malaysia Agreement 1963 will take place.

“We will not give up and we will keep on reminding them (Putrajaya). We will prepare to have a meeting again with them early next year, together with deputy prime minister Fadillah Yusof, who is coordinating the MA63 meeting,” he said.