Teachers are overburdened with excessive paperwork in addition to their regular classroom duties. They must complete numerous assessment forms, reports, and administrative tasks that take time away from teaching, grading assignments, and engaging with students. The heavy workload causes stress for teachers and reduces their ability to maintain a work-life balance. While technology could help reduce some paperwork, teachers are still evaluated based on these administrative tasks rather than their classroom performance. Reducing unnecessary paperwork would allow teachers to focus more on providing quality education and interacting with students.

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“Teachers Cry Foul Over Increasing Paperwork”
By: Koh Lay Chin
Reviewed by: Muhammad Abbas Bin Abdul Razak
This article by the above writer highlights the many grievances of teachers over the
amount of paperwork they have to do besides classroom teaching. The writer
brings to the attention of the readers on the many different types of assessment
forms teachers have to fill-in, such as Student Assessment Report, Standard
Education Quality Report, oral examination reports, regular monthly reports, book-
loan handling, truancy form, 001 card, scholarship processing forms and so on.
Besides the piling of paperwork and reports, teachers have to spend a lot of time
marking their students homework, project papers and assignment, attending
courses away from school, involved in gotong-royong (cleaning-up work at the
school) and doing relief work during their free time in the school.
The amount of workload put on the teachers’ shoulders is causing a lot of stress
and some other health problems to the teachers. Due to work pressure teachers
have to carry back their work to be completed at home. Staying awake till to the
wee hours doing their work at home robs the teachers of the quality time they
should be spending with their families. Similarly, in the school, they do not get
enough time for a closer relationship with their students. As a result of this, there
are students who commit acts of indiscipline and mischief in schools. To add on to
the paperwork work, teachers are required to draw out working paper for every
little programmes and projects they organize in the school. In facing the
predicament, teachers question as to why there is a lot of paperwork that need to be
accomplished when the country is advancing into information technology? They
feel a lot of reporting can be done online. This article also brings to the attention of
its readers that teachers at the moment are graded and rewarded based on the
amount of paperwork they perform rather than on how they perform in the
classroom.
This article came timely in addressing the problems faced by teachers due to a lot
of paperwork they have to perform. In the light of the situation faced by the
teachers, I am of the opinion that they should be treated as human beings and not
as working machines. Generally a teacher’s job is a tiring and exhausting one and
due to that the amount of paperwork they do should be reduced. They should not
be overburdened with a lot of paperwork that they have to lug home. Doing a lot of

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schoolwork at home can jeopardize a lot of their good humanly relations with
others, particularly for teachers who are married and having children. In my view,
a teacher should not be over burden with the job that can jeopardize his or her
relationship with the rest of his or her family members.
The call by the article echoing the teachers’ request to reduce paperwork is a
reasonable one. The Ministry of Education should emphasize more on quality and
effective teaching by teachers in the classrooms rather than on assigning them to
write too many reports. I guess the duty of a teacher to transfer knowledge and
values to the students should be given the at most preference and importance and
all other works come second to that. I believe that much of the clerical works that
have been done by the teachers can be handed over to the school administration.
By doing that teachers will be more energetic, and can show great passion and
compassion towards their teaching career. Teachers who experience high level of
stress at many time will be less motivated to be effective teachers. Furthermore, a
lot of paperwork will keep the teachers busy and occupied and great deal of time is
wasted in this kind of work rather than making good preparation for their
classroom interaction with their students. As a result of the exhaustion, such
teachers may lose their enthusiasm in teaching.
Besides all the things stated in the article that attribute to stress and exhaustion yet
there are things that can be included to list, like his or her role in setting and
marking of examination papers and being the coordinator of co-curricular activities
(sports, concert, clubs and societies).