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The Begining.

THE Methodist School Nibong Tebal , the only English School in Province Wellesley South, is co-educational and is nearly 110 years old. The school is said to be in existence as early as 1898 and was then known as the Anglo-Tamil School. Later in 1903, Mr. Ganasagasamy founded the Anglo-Chinese School. The school was then a rented shop-house in the town. In 1904, it moved into the district office building with an enrolment of about 50 students and tuition was given up to Standard Five, the equivalent of the present Form One. It was not until 1913 that the Reverend Jesudason erected a proper school building in High Road, coping up with the increase in enrolment with 5 members on the tutorial staff. Then Rev. Samuel added more classrooms and his successor, Mr, J.A.P. Oswald, found ait neccessary to fill up the swamp in the vicinity of the school building to provide a playing field for the children. He also started the first Inter-House Sports and other extra-mural activities. The year saw Mr. Looi Leng Yim extending the classrooms for better accomodations. he planned new buildings for the school and start the building fund, but the war in 1941 put an untimely end to his plans for Mr Looi was killed by the Japanese.

Since the Liberation.

After the war, Mr. Yeoh Kok Kee reorganised the school. It was then an empty building without walls or doors. However, the building was rehabitilitated and the school conducted lessons with double sessions, a step necessitated by the large increase in enrolment. By 1948, accommodation become so acute that the school pursued a policy of expansion. Fortunately, Mr. Lim Hock Leong, a member of the staff of the Anglo-Chinese School, Penang, volunteed to steer the school throught its dark days. Throught his efforts, funds began to flow in from the public and with the generous assistance of the Methodist Church and the Government, two blocks of six classrooms were put upon the land leased by the Penang Rubber Estates. The old building was then sold and the proceeds added to thenew building campaign. The public responded magnificiently and with further assistance from the Methodist Church abd the Governent,12 more class-rooms were build, making a total of 18. The cost amounted to over $ 120,000-00 of which the public contributed $ 35,000-00, the Methodist Church $ 25,000-00 and the Government the rest. The boys and girls in the school numbered 638.

The school still provided education only up to Standard Five, after which pupils had to seek admission to other schools. It was found that it became harder for other school to absord out pupils as they also had to face their own problem of rising enrolments. In 1952, it became necessary to entend tuition to Form Two and to Form Three the following year. This eased the situation partially but tour pupils still had to seek admission elsewhere after passing Form 3. The situation was discouraging, if not pathetic, as only the best pupils had the chance to continue their education, often at great expense as they had to travel a distance of more than 35 miles everyday.

Mr Lam Yet Seng succeede Mr Lim as Principal of the school with an enrolment of nearly 900 and staff of about 40. The efforts of Mr Lam to introduce Upper Secondary education in the school bore fruiy when in 1957, the Form Three class obtain more than 90% passes in the Lower Certificate of Education Examination ( L.C.E ). The Chief Education Officer of Penang, kindly granted the school approval to start the Form Four class in 1958. In the same year, the school was split into the Methodist Primany School and the Methodist Secondary School with Miss Ann Harder, M.A. as the principal of the Secondary Schoo.

Since The Seperation.

Miss Ann Harder strongly felt the need of a Science Laboratory. A sum of $ 18,000-00 was raised locally and together with the aid of the Government, an imposing block of two laboratories was added to the school. the first batch of candidates for the Overseas School Certificate Examination was presented by the school in 1959. Miss Ann Harder was succeeded by Mr Stanley Padman, B.A. in 1960