The government has offered places to only 418 brilliant students to take up medical studies (first degree) at public institutions of higher learning for this year's intake.

Deputy Education Minister P.Kamalanathan (pic) said the limited number of offers was meant to control the number of new medical graduates and avoid a flood of new doctors in the employment market.

"A total of 1,163 students with a Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA) of 4.00 applied to do medicine, but offers were only made to only 418 of them and the selection was also based on interview results.

"We made this decision following discussions with the Health Ministry and the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC)," he told reporters here today.

He said the others who were not offered medical studies were offered other courses, but related to the field.
He said this in response to complaints by students with CGPA of 4.0 in the Sijil Tinggi Persekolahan Malaysia (STPM) and matriculation who failed to get offer to study medicine.

Kamalanathan advised those who failed to get places at IPTA to appeal to the Education Ministry online at upu.moe.gov.my before August 23.

"A total of 37,467 students have received offers at IPTA, there might be some students who are not happy with their course.

"For them, I suggest they accept the course and register first, then put appeal in writing directly to the university concerned," he added.

The ministry, he said, made sure that all students with CGPA of 4.00 received offers at IPTA for the 2014/2015 academic session.

source:Bernama