Volume 01- Issue 03 July 2013

[ w w w . m o j - e s . n e t ]

01.07.2013

The Malaysian Online Journal of Educational

Science Volume 1, Issue 3

July 2013

Editor-in-Chief

Professor Dr. Saedah Siraj

Editors

Dr. Zaharah Hussin

Onur Isbulan

Associate Editors

Professor Dr. Omar Abdull Kareem

Associate Prof. Dr. Ibrahem Narongsakhet Associate

Prof. Dr. Mohd Yahya Mohamed Ariffin, Associate

Prof. Dr. Norani Mohd Salleh Associate Prof. Dr. Wan

Hasmah Wan Mamat

ISSN: 2289-3024

The Malaysian Online Journal of Educational Science Volume 1, Issue 3

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Copyright © 2013 - THE MALAYSIAN ONLINE JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL SCIENCE All rights reserved. No part of MOJES’s articles may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means,

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MOJES, Editor in Chief

University of Malaya, Malaysia Published in Malaysia


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Message from the editor-in-chief

The Malaysian Online Journal of Educational Sciences (MOJES) strives to provide a national and international academic forum to meet the professional interests of individuals in various educational disciplines. It is a professional refereed journal in the interdisciplinary fields sponsored by the Faculty of Education, University of Malaya. This journal serves as a platform for presenting and discussing a wide range of topics in Educational Sciences. It is committed to providing access to quality researches ranging from original research, theoretical articles and concept papers in educational sciences.

In order to produce a high quality journal, extensive effort has been put into selecting valuable researches that contributed to the journal. I would like to take this opportunity to express my appreciation to the editorial board, reviewers and researchers for their valuable contributions to make this journal a reality.


July 2013

Editor in chief

Message from the editors

The Malaysian Online Journal of Educational Sciences (MOJES) seeks to serve as an academic platform to researchers from the vast domains of Educational Sciences. The journal is published electronically four times a year.

This journal welcomes original and qualified researches on all aspects of Educational Sciences. Topics may include, but not limited to: pedagogy and educational sciences, adult education, education and curriculum, educational psychology, special education, sociology of education, Social Science Education, Art Education, Language Education, educational management, teacher education, distance education, interdisciplinary approaches, and scientific events.

Being the editors of this journal, it is a great pleasure to see the success of the journal. On behalf of theeditorial team of the Malaysian Online Journal of Educational Science (MOJES), we would like to thank to all the authors and editors for their contribution to the development of this journal.

Dr. Zaharah Hussin

Onur Isbulan

July 2013

Editor


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Editor-in-Chief

Professor Dr. Saedah Siraj, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Editors

Dr. Zaharah Hussin, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Onur Isbulan, Sakarya University, Turkey

Associate Editors

Professor Dr. Omar Abdull Kareem, Sultan Idris University of Education, Malaysia

Associate Prof. Dr. Ibrahem Narongsakhet, Prince of Songkla University, Thailand

Associate Prof. Dr. Mohd Yahya Mohamed Ariffin, Islamic Science University of Malaysia

Associate Prof. Dr. Norani Mohd Salleh, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Prof. Dr. Wan Hasmah Wan Mamat, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Advisory Board

Emeritus Professor Dr. Tian Po Oei, University of Queensland, Australia

Professor Dr. Fatimah Hashim, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Professor Dr. Jinwoong Song, Seoul National University, Korea

Professor Dr. H. Mohammad Ali, M.Pd, M.A., Indonesian University of Education, Indonesia

Professor Dr. Moses Samuel, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Professor Dr. Nik Azis Nik Pa, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Professor Dr. Richard Kiely, the University College of St. Mark and St. John, United Kingdom

Professor Dr. Sufean Hussin, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Zawawi Bin Ismail, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Editorial Board

Emeritus Professor Dr. Rahim Md. Sail, University Putra of Malaysia, Malaysia

Professor Dr. Abdul Rashid Mohamed, University of Science, Malaysia

Professor Dr. Ananda Kumar Palaniappan, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Professor Dr. Bakhtiar Shabani Varaki, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran.

Professor Dr. H. Iskandar Wiryokusumo M.Sc, PGRI ADI Buana University, Surabaya, Indonesia

Professor Dr. Ramlee B. Mustapha, Sultan Idris University of Education, Malaysia

Professor Dr. Tamby Subahan Bin Mohd. Meerah, National University of Malaysia, Malaysia

Associate Professor Datin Dr. Sharifah Norul Akmar Syed Zamri, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dato’ Dr. Ab Halim Bin Tamuri, National University of Malaysia, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Abdul Jalil Bin Othman, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Ajmain Bin Safar, University of Technology, Malaysia


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Associate Professor Dr. Habib Bin Mat Som, Sultan Idris Education University, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Hj. Izaham Shah Bin Ismail, Mara University of Technology, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Jas Laile Suzana Binti Jaafar, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Juliana Othman, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Loh Sau Cheong, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Mariani Binti Md Nor, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Mohamad Bin Bilal Ali, University of Technology, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Norazah Mohd Nordin, National University of Malaysia, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr.Rohaida Mohd Saat, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Associate Professor Dr. Syed Farid Alatas, National University of Singapore, Singapore

Dato’ Dr. Hussein Hj Ahmad, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Datuk Dr. Abdul Rahman Idris, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Datin Dr. Rahimah Binti Hj Ahmad, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Abu Talib Bin Putih, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Abd Razak Bin Zakaria, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Adelina Binti Asmawi, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Ahmad Zabidi Abdul Razak, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Chew Fong Peng, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Diana Lea Baranovich, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Fatanah Binti Mohamed, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Ghazali Bin Darusalam, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Haslee Sharil Lim Bin Abdullah, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Husaina Banu Binti Kenayathulla, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Kazi Enamul Hoque, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Latifah Binti Ismail, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Lau Poh Li, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Leong Kwan Eu, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Madhyazhagan Ganesan, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Megat Ahmad Kamaluddin Megat Daud, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Melati Binti Sumari, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Mohammed Sani Bin Ibrahim, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Mohd Rashid Mohd Saad, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Muhammad Azhar Bin Zailaini, University of Malaya, Malaysia


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Dr. Muhammad Faizal Bin A. Ghani, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Nabeel Abdallah Adedalaziz, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Norlidah Binti Alias, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Pradip Kumar Mishra, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Rafidah Binti Aga Mohd Jaladin, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Rahmad Sukor Bin Ab Samad, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Renuka V. Sathasivam, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Rose Amnah Bt Abd Rauf, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Selva Ranee Subramaniam, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Sit Shabeshan Rengasamy, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Shahrir Bin Jamaluddin, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Suzieleez Syrene Abdul Rahim, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Syed Kamaruzaman Syed Ali, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Vishalache Balakrishnan, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Wail Muin (Al-Haj Sa’id) Ismail, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Wong Seet Leng, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Zahari Bin Ishak, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Zahra Naimie, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Dr. Zanaton Ikhsan, National University of Malaysia, Malaysia

Cik Umi Kalsum Binti Mohd Salleh, University of Malaya, Malaysia

En. Mohd Faisal Bin Mohamed, University of Malaya, Malaysia

En. Norjoharuddeen Mohd Nor, University of Malaya, Malaysia

En. Rahimi Md Saad, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Alina A. Ranee, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Azni Yati Kamaruddin, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Fatiha Senom, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Fonny Dameaty Hutagalung, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Foziah Binti Mahmood, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Hamidah Binti Sulaiman, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Huzaina Binti Abdul Halim, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Ida Hartina Ahmed Tharbe, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Norini Abas, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Roselina Johari Binti Md Khir, University of Malaya, Malaysia


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Pn. Shanina Sharatol Ahmad Shah, University of Malaya, Malaysia

Pn. Zuwati Binti Hashim, University of Malaya, Malaysia


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Table of Contents

CAPACITY LEVELS OF ACADEMIC STAFF IN A MALAYSIAN PUBLIC UNIVERSITY: STUDENTS’ PERSPECTIVE

1

Muhammad Jawad Tajuddin, Muhammad Faizal A. Ghani, Saedah Siraj,

Mohd Helmi Firdaus Saifuldin, Husaina Banu Kenayatulla, Faisol Elham

CAREER GUIDANCE, PARTICIPATION OF STUDENTS AND ITS IMPLICATION FOR KANO, NIGERIA 14

Isa Ado Abubakar

FINANCIAL DECENTRALIZATION IN MALAYSIAN SCHOOLS:STRATEGIES FOR EFFECTIVE IMPLEMENTATION

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Norfariza Mohd Radzi, Muhammad Faizal A. Ghani, Saedah Siraj, Mojgan Afshari

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LEARNING STRATEGIES AND MOTIVATION BY USING STRUCTURAL EQUATION MODELING APPROACH

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Mohamad Azrien Mohamed Adnan, Mohd Sahari Nordin, Mohd Burhan Ibrahim

RESEARCH AND TRENDS IN THE STUDIES OF SCHOOL-BASED ORAL ENGLISH ASSESSMENT FROM 2003 TO 2011: A REVIEW OF SELECTED JOURNALS

41

Nur Diana Mohd Kamal, Saedah Siraj, Norlidah Alias, Mohammad Attaran


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Capacity Levels of Academic Staff in a Malaysian Public University: Students’ Perspective Muhammad Jawad Tajuddin [1], Muhammad Faizal A. Ghani [2], Saedah Siraj [3], Mohd Helmi Firdaus Saifuldin [4], Husaina Banu Kenayatulla [5], Faisol Elham [6]

[1] Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA [email protected]

[2] Faculty of Education, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur [email protected]

[3] Faculty of Education, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur

[4] University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur



ABSTRACT

This research aims to develop a competency model for staff of higher education institutions in Malaysia. The model involves the listing of the main features and implementation strategy for the development of academic competence. Specifically, this research aims to achieve the following research objectives: a) to identify if there is any significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff in terms of capacities, b) to identify if there is any significant correlation between the following demographics and levels of capacity, i. teaching experience, and ii. academic position; and c) to identify the level of capacity effectiveness among staff? This research applies a quantitative methodology through survey research. The sample includes 120 students in a public university evaluating 10 staff; 5 locally educated & 5 international. The instruments involves a modified questionnaire from an original instrument by Tengku Noorainun Tengku Shahdan (2011) The data analysis will use both statistical descriptive analysis – mean and standard deviation – and statistical inference analysis – Spearman’s r correlation and Mann-Whitney U. This research found that there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated faculties in terms of capacities when p = 0.267 (p > 0.05). For the second research question, this research found that there is no significant correlation between teaching experience with capacity level when p=0.314. On the other hand, there is a significant correlation between academic position with capacity level when p=0.032. For the third research question, this research found that both locally and internationally educated staff have a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is more than 3.80. The implication of this research is staff must pay more attention to developing themselves through scholarly works.

Keywords: Comparison, capacity, locally educated faculty members, internationally educated faculty members, public university

INTRODUCTION

After the Industrial Revolution in the 1900’s, an organization is evaluated based on its performance. One major contributing factor towards high performance is manpower with capacity. This matter is mentioned by Askling (2002) that many studies found that there is a correlation between the effectiveness of an organization with the high capacity of its manpower. Moreover, employers tend to look at end product rather than at the process that includes capacities (Townsend, 2001).

In Malaysia, research on manpower is still limited. Marzuki (2004) portrayed the statement by arguing that research on manpower is only limited to university students doing their masters and doctorates which only involve a small sample size. The same goes to research on capacities, in which most scholars tend to prefer capacities of private university faculties over public ones (Tengku Shahdan, 2011).

Based on the above phenomenon, this research aims to evaluate capacities among public university faculties in enhancing manpower performance. The result of this study will benefit policymakers in setting up professional

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development programs.

Problem Statement

In recent years, output is assumed as a better indicator of an organization’s success rather than the process that was implemented to achieve the success. Mahmod (2008) agrees with the statement by adding that organizations that are task‐oriented overlook the process that includes the welfare of their employees. In fact, they put higher priority on achieving the objectives through the output standard that was set up (Abdullah, 2007).

Since the focus was on output rather than on the process, the welfare of staff are pushed more to the side. The implication of this situation is that the performance of organizations decline. This echoes the statement made by Nordin (2011) in which he argued that government investment in education achieved lower than targeted goals in terms of producing staff with high capacities. The staff in turn is demotivated from attending professional development programs (Abdullah, 2007).

Moreover, the phenomenon becomes more serious when universities promote faculty based on capacity levels rather than teaching experience. This situation discourages staff from excelling (Hussin, 2004) and decreases the performance of universities (Nordin, 2011). To take an example, capacity levels of staff are low because public universities stress on publications and researches instead of professional development (Siraj, 2003). In other words, universities only look at output of staff and neglecting their process in performing their tasks.

Based on the above phenomenon, there is a need to do a research that stresses the importance of capacity among staff in public universities. The results of this research can benefit universities to change their current policy to focus on both task and human‐oriented.

Theoretical Framework

Mulder, Gulikers, Biemans and Wesselink (2009) in their research argue that the concept of competency is always used in education. They said that competency consists of a set of capability integration, knowledge collection, skills, task performance, able to solve problems, and effective competency to a certain standard. Diagram 1 shows in diagram the discussion above.

Figure 1. Relationship between competency and competent with performance

Resource: Young and Dulewicz (2005). Linking Competency and Competence to Performance.

Research Purpose

This research aims to develop a competency model for staff of higher education institutions in Malaysia. The model involves the listing of the main features and implementation strategy for the development of academic competence.

Self‐development

•Who are they?

Academic knowledge

•What can theydo?

Institutional ethics

•What do theyneed to do?

Competency

Performance

•What can theyachieve?

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Research Objective

This research is to achieve the following objectives.

a) To identify whether there is any significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff interms of capacities;

b) To identify whether there is any significant correlation between the following demographics and levels ofcapacity:

(i) Teaching experience;

(ii) Academic position, and c) To identify the level of capacity effectiveness among staff.

Literature Review

The field of comparative education on national level, at least in Malaysia, deals primarily with the notion of capacity building. Only by understanding the different types of capacity building available will one be able to go through the different models promoted by different scholars that will ultimately help one to understand the education policies especially in Malaysia. There are several types of capacity building, with each giving a slightly different name in front of the word capacity.

Definitions of Capacity

The first definition is Innovation Capacity which can be summarized as innovation being flexible new ideas for product or service advance with improved features. Then, the word capacity can refer to the dimensions of innovation on a time line. Thus, innovation capacity refers to “a continuous improvement of the overall capability of firms to generate innovation for developing new products to meet market needs” (Szeto, 2000). What this means is that a few seminars will not be sufficient for one to develop capacity in innovation because there is a need to do follow‐up on the beginning step until one is able to reach the next level where the needs of the market, or in the context of this paper, the students.

Along similar lines, Sullivan proposes his idea of Collaborative Capacity which involves ‘Theories of change’ where one form of the theory‐driven approach is used to evaluate complex public policies. This ‘theories of change’ requires education policies to explain the collaborative nature of the ‘process–outcome’ interactions within a ‘whole systems’ approach to education. The theory focuses attention both on the means available to “realize the partnership activities and the appropriateness of the organizational framework to support collaborative activity” (Sullivan, 2002). By linking both Innovation and Collaborative Capacity, one will find that both suggests changes to occur within the people involved so that they will produce better students that satisfy the needs of each specific audience.

However, one may need to be reminded that the phrase capacity‐building may have become so “all‐encompassing a term as to be ‘useless’ from an analytical and practical point of view” (Potter, 2004). For this very purpose, this paper tries to be very precise on what capacity‐building should mean. This paper agrees with Potter’s recommendation through his own Systemic Capacity which emphasizes the creation or reinforcing of capacity for program implementation independent of the durability of an institution. Systemic Capacity refers to the creation, expansion or progression of a stock of wanted qualities and features called capabilities that could be frequently drawn upon over time. The focus of capacity building therefore tends to be on refining the stock rather than on handling whatever is available (Potter, 2004).

This definition of capacity building is supported by United Nations which adds that this kind of capacity building needs to be addressed at three inter‐related levels: individual, institutional and societal. What it means is that it could also be described as being integrative across levels instead of independent of each other.

Researcher Rehman et al (1988) called capacity building as Competency Validation in his 1988 research. This paper has a questionnaire that used the keyword competency instead of capacity because most Malaysian scholars of capacity building uses the keyword competency to better suit Malaysian customs of understanding capacity as a horizontal measure rather than vertical. Competency (Capacity) Validation is the process of forming the need or lack of

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need of a specific competency. Validation can be done by those who have appropriate insight to be able to judge the relevance and need of a competency in a professional perspective, at the moment or in the future. According to Rehman et al (1988), validation can be performed by in‐depth content analysis or by a brief investigation conducted by experts. The validation process identifies specific competencies as acceptable norms for future direction.

Now that the definition of capacity‐building has been agreed upon for the purpose of this paper, we now turn to look at some aspects of Malaysian education in both lower and higher institution to see the connection between the two in terms of native and foreign languages before going through several different models that has been suggested and will be used in this paper.

METHODOLOGY

Research Design

A research design is a precise planning for data collection and data analysis (Zikmund 2003). According to Sekaran (2000), research design involves the process of decision and selection based on research objective, research location, unit of analysis, sampling method, data collection and analysis. In short, research method is used to answer the research questions.

This research uses an edited version of an original questionnaire that has been validated and certified. Questionnaire is chosen as the main method because through administration, unbiased student evaluation can be obtained. Further elaboration is available in the Data Collection. Besides that, it is the easiest method to obtain data from a large sample size (Othman 2002; Barbie 2000; Gay & Airasian 2000).; Mitchell & Jolley 2004; Frankel & Wallen 2006).

Research Subject

Research subjects are chosen based on the topic and research questions set by the researcher during planning. However, the main component of choosing them adheres to the research ethics that are based on their willingness to participate in this research. Frankel & Wallen (2006), Gay & Airasian (2000) and Patton (2002) all agree with the mentioned component which is their willingness of participate. On top of that, both Patton (2002) and Van Dalen (2001) suggest that researcher also consider the following; (a) research scope, (b) amount of data to be collected and analyzed, (c) interpretation and inference of collected data, and (d) time, expenses and energy used to complete collection and analysis. Therefore, the researcher has decided on the research subjects based upon the following:

Location

A specific public university is chosen as the location for this research that is easily accessible through contact persons since the researcher is not in Malaysia at the time of research. This aligns with the opinion of Spradley (1980) and Taylor & Bogdon (2000) which explains that the researcher has his own reason for choosing that particular location. Furthermore, Marshall & Rossman (2001) suggest seven aspects as guide on deciding a location for research sampling; easily accessible, has an environment that is full of process (related with research issue), subject characteristics, conducive organizational environment, organizational structure that is preferred by the researcher, quality and reliability is maintained and close relationship between the researcher and research subjects.

For that reason, this research chooses a specific public university because the researcher has contacts inside the university that allows data collection without interruption since the researcher does not need to enter the environment. Besides that, the researcher also takes into consideration Snelbecker’s opinion (1974) in which he stated that the implication of choosing a good location will provide a good model and able to become a reference in the future.

Population and Sample

Research population consists of students from two classes that are taught by the researcher’s contact person inside the public university. The two classes are “Early Childhood Leadership and Management” (60 students) and “Societies, Career and Education” (60 students). Students are chosen as research respondents because they are considered as the people who receive direct input by the staff members. Besides that, students can give an accurate picture of the capacity levels of the staff members (McNulty et al. 2005).

To decide the number of needed samples, Krejcie & Morgan (1970) and Sekaran (2003) is referred to as guidance. According to Sekaran (2003), a sample size between 30 to 500 people is enough to make an observation. Therefore, 94 students are enough to represent the whole department if not the university. Meanwhile, Haase & Nilson (1998) which is quoted by Baharom (2004) argues that the sample size needs to be more than the minimum to get

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significant findings. A higher number of students will lead to a more accurate finding.

Research Instrument

Data regarding research instrument is a very important component in determining a research design for the purpose of collecting data (Cresswell 1994). A research instrument will be able to help the researcher to collect the data needed in order to answer the proposed research questions. One can build it oneself, use an already existing instrument, or edit and combine the already existing one (Cresswell 1994).

This research uses a questionnaire that is modified from a questionnaire by Tengku Noorainun Tengku Shahdan (2011) because it is as follows a) based on Malaysian context; and b) developed by 15 experts in the higher educational field.. Questionnaire is used because of its quantitative nature and involves a big sample. The instrument for this questionnaire has two parts. The first part is the demographics of the evaluated faculty members which has four items; gender, years of teaching in university, highest academic achievement, and position within department. The second part has three types of capacity levels; self‐development, academic knowledge, and institutional ethics. Student perception of faculty members’ capacity levels is evaluated using a 5‐point Likert scale as follows; (1) Never, (2) Seldom, (3) Sometimes, (4) Often, and (5) Very Often.

Then, the reliability of this instrument is 0.92 according to the Cronbach score while its content validity is evaluated by three experts in this field of organizational management. Specifically, each of the three capacity dimensions is in Table 1.

Data Collection Procedure

Before field work is done, the researcher gets permission from many parties. At the first level, the researcher asks for permission through email from the dean of the department that supervises the students who are the respondents. After receiving the dean’s permission, the researcher asks permission from a contact person who is teaching the students in the two classes to distribute the questionnaires during class.

The contact person gives the students 30 minutes to complete the survey and hand it in. On the first day, students evaluate locally educated staff members. The 84 students were divided into 5 groups and were assigned 5 different staff members. On the next day, the same procedure is repeated for internationally educated staff members. To make assorting easier, the front page of questionnaires for locally educated faculty members are colored blue while for the internationally educated ones are colored green.

Data Analysis Procedure

The data analysis will use both statistical descriptive analysis and statistical inference analysis. According to Fink (1995), to test the data, the type of data needs to be identified first whether it is nominal, ordinal, range, or ratio. Accordingly, this research uses ordinal data because of the Likert scale from 1 to 5.

Statistical Descriptive Analysis

Statistical descriptive analysis involves a comprehensive explanation about the different demographics. In this research, demographics include gender, years of teaching in university, highest academic achievement, and position within department. In answering the first research question, mean score analysis is used. To evaluate levels of mean scores, the researcher follows the interpretation as provided by Nunally & Bernstein (1994); 1.00 to 2.00 indicates a very low mean score, 2.00 to 3.00 shows a low mean score, 3.00 to 4.00 illustrates a high mean score, and 4.00 to 5.00 demonstrates a very high mean score. To evaluate the level of effectiveness and its interpretation, this research uses Gay’s suggestion for determining the level of effectiveness and its interpretation as shown in Table 1.

Table 1 Interpretation of mean score for capacity effectiveness level

Mean Score Effectiveness Level Interpretation 1.00 to 2.49 Low Less Satisfactory2.50 to 3.79 Average Average 3.80 to 5.00 High Satisfactory

(Resource: Gay, L. (1996). Educational Research: Competencies for Analysis and Application. 5th Ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall)

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Statistical Inference Analysis

Statistical inference analysis is used to find any significant correlation between the demographics of the staff members and the evaluation of their three dimensions of capacity levels (self‐development, academic knowledge, and institutional ethics). Before testing out the hypothesis, the data needs to be determined whether it has a normal bell curve or not. Tan Soo Yin (1999) quotes Cohen & Cohen (1993) by arguing that if the data is not normal, then a transformation should be done to only use median ranges of 25 percent to 75 percent. The researcher discovers that there are no abnormal data being collected. For that reason, two statistical inference analyses are used to answer the remaining research questions; Spearman’s r and Mann‐Whitney U test.

Spearman’s r

According to Hair et al. (1998), Spearman’s r is used to test the difference in mean scores between two ordinal sample groups. Since this research has ordinal groups, Spearman’s r is best to be used. Mohd Majid (1990) and Tabachnik & Fidell (2001) argue that Spearman’s r can be used if the variables have two categories. For that reason, this research uses Spearman’s r to analyze the difference in mean scores of capacity levels between locally and internationally educated staff members. To evaluate the power of correlation, this research uses Gay’s suggestion for determining the power as shown in Table 2.

Table 2 Power of r correlation

r correlation size Correlation power 0.91 to 1.00 or -0.91 to -1.00 Very Strong 0.71 to 0.90 or -0.71 to -0.90 Strong 0.51 to 0.70 or -0.51 to -0.70 Average 0.31 to 0.50 or -0.31 to -0.50 Weak 0.01 to 0.30 or -0.01 to -0.30 Very Weak

0 No correlation

(Resource: Gay, L. (1996). Educational Research: Competencies for Analysis and Application. 5th Ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall)

Mann‐Whitney U

Mann‐Whitney U is a non‐parametric test to analyze the difference between two groups that use ordinal scales. This test is used in this research to determine the correlation between capacity levels of locally and internationally educated faculty members. According to Chua (2008), a normal t‐Test is not suitable to be used in this type of research because it does not use a mean score with a range or ratio score.

FINDINGS

Respondent Profile

Information for the respondents is as follows:

Student Profile

Information for the students is shown in Table 3.

Table 3 Student information that comprises gender, ethnicity, and age

Category Item Total PercentageGender Male 72 60

Female 48 40

Ethnicity Malay 93 77.5 Chinese 15 12.5 Indian 9 7.5

Others 3 2.5

Age <20 0 0

20.1-21 0 0 >21.1 120 100

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Table 3 shows that seventy‐two (72) male students were involved and 48 female students. This number represents 60 percent for males and females (40%). Next, in terms of ethnicity, there are 93 Malays that represents 77.5 percent of the total respondents. Chinese (15 respondents, 12.5%), Indians (9 respondents, 7.5%), and others (3 respondents, 2.5%). Then, in terms of age, all of them are of 21 years old and above that represents 100 percent.

Faculty Profile

Information for the staff is shown in Table 4.

Table 4Faculty information that comprises gender, teaching experience, and academic position

Category Item Total PercentageGender Male 4 40

Female 6 60

Teaching experience <10 years 1 10 11-25 years 3 30 26-35 years 4 40

>36 years 2 20

Academic position Professor 4 40 Associate Professor 2 20 Senior Lecturer 2 20 Lecturer 1 10 Tutor 1 10

Table 4 shows that there are four male staff and six female staff. This number represents 40 percent for males and females (60%). Next, in terms of teaching experience, 1 staff has less than 10 years, which represents 10 percent of the total staff being evaluated. 11‐25 years (3 staff, 30%), 26‐35 years (4 staff, 40%), and over 36 years (1 staff, 10%). Then, in terms of academic position, 4 staff are professors which represent 40 percent of the total. Associate professors (2 staff, 20%), senior lecturers (2 staff, 20%), lecturer (1 staff, 10%), and tutor (1 staff, 10%).

Difference of Capacity between Locally and Internationally Educated Staff

This part is to answer the first research question. To answer the question, data was collected among 120 students to evaluate 4 male staff (2 local and 2 international) and six female staff (3 local and 3 international). The data was analyzed using Mann‐Whitney U at a confidence interval of 0.05 or 5 percent. Overall findings are shown in Table 5.

Table 5 Overall findings for locally and internationally educated staff

Overall Category Ranking Mean z value Sig.Competency Local 41.26 -1.459 p=0.267

International 45.46

(Note: * = significant at confidence interval p<0.05 two tails)

Table 5 shows that there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff in terms of capacities when p = 0.267 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for international is 45.46 and local is 41.26. Detailed findings of the difference between locally and internationally educated staff in terms of capacities are shown in Table 6.

Table 6 Detailed findings for locally and internationally educated staff

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Dimension & Element Category Mean z value Sig.

Self-development Competency a) Self-control

b) Internal emotion

c) Psychological influence

Local International

Local International

Local International

41.26 49.93 41.80 49.37 42.35 48.89

-1.639

-1.819

-1.427

p=0.110

p=0.231

p=0.278

Academic Competency

Skill

Knowledge

Understanding

English Competency

Local

International Local

International Local

International Local

International

40.60 50.62 42.22 48.94 43.89 47.18 33.99 57.54

-2.638

-1.831

-0.854

-4.367

*p=0.049

p=0.232

p=0.523

*p=0.000

Institutional Competency

Vision

Institutional culture

Coordination

Local

International Local

International Local

International

43.60 47.38 42.04 49.11 43.44 47.65

-0.699

-1.165

-1.176

p=0.485

p=0.291

p=0.502


Table 6 shows each dimension of the competencies. For the first element of self‐development competency, self‐control, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.110 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 41.26 and international is 49.93. For the second element of self‐development competency, internal emotion, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.231 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 41.80 and international is 49.37. For the third element of self‐development competency, psychological influence, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.278 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 42.35 and international is 50.62.

For the first element of academic competency, skill, there is a significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.049 (p < 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 40.60 and international is 49.93. For the second element of academic competency, knowledge, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.232 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 42.22 and international is 48.94. For the third element of academic competency, understanding, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.523 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 43.89 and international is 47.18. For the fourth element of academic competency, English, there is a significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.000 (p < 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 33.99 and international is 57.94.

For the first element of workplace competency, vision, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.485 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 43.60 and international is 47.38. For the second element of academic competency, institutional culture, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p = 0.291 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 42.94 and international is 49.11. For the third element of academic competency, coordination, there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated

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staff when p = 0.502 (p > 0.05). However, capacity levels of internationally educated staff are higher than that of locally educated when mean score for local is 43.44 and international is 47.65.

To conclude the above findings, the majority of elements from the three dimensions have no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p > 0.05. There are self‐control (p=0.110), internal emotion (p=0.231), psychological influence (p=0.278), knowledge (p=0.232), understanding (p=0.523), vision (p=0.485), institutional culture (p=0.291), and coordination (p=0.502). Meanwhile, there are two elements that have a significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff when p < 0.05. There are skill (p=0.049) and English competency (p=0.000).

Correlation between Teaching Experience and Academic Position with Capacity Levels

This part is to answer the second research question. To answer the question, data was collected among 120 students to evaluate 4 male staff (2 local and 2 international) and six female staff (3 local and 3 international). The data was analyzed using statistical inferential analysis Spearman’s r Correlation at a confidence interval of 0.05 or 5 percent. The research findings are explained with regards to the related demographics as follows and are shown in Table 7.

Table 7 Correlation between teaching experience and academic position with capacity level

Item Capacity

r correlation size Sig. Power Teaching Experience r=0.101 p=0.314 Very WeakAcademic Position r=-0.160 *p=0.032 Very Weak


Table 7 explains as follows:

a) Teaching experience

There is no significant correlation between teaching experience with capacity level when p=0.314 (p>0.05). However, its power is very weak.

b) Academic position

There is a significant correlation between academic position with capacity level when p=0.032 (p<0.05). However, its power is very weak.

In conclusion, there is no significant correlation between teaching experience with capacity level when p=0.314. On the other hand, there is a significant correlation between academic position with capacity level when p=0.032.

Level of Capacity Effectiveness among Staff

This part is to answer the third research question. To answer the question, data was collected among 120 students to evaluate 4 male staff (2 local and 2 international) and six female staff (3 local and 3 international). The data was analyzed using statistical descriptive analysis which is mean and standard deviation. Overall findings for the level of effectiveness and its interpretation are presented with regards to the staff’s educational background as follows.

Locally Educated Staff

Overall findings for the level of effectiveness and its interpretation are shown in Table 8.

Table 8 Interpretation of mean score for capacity effectiveness level for locally educated staff

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Competency Mean Standard Deviation Level InterpretationPersonal 4.21 0.67 High SatisfactoryAcademic 3.96 0.71 High SatisfactoryWorkplace 4.21 0.66 High Satisfactory

TOTAL 4.13 0.68 High Satisfactory

Table 8 shows that all of the capacity dimensions have a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 4.13 and its standard deviation is 0.68. Based on each dimension, personal competency dimension has a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 4.21 and its standard deviation is 0.67. Next, academic competency dimension has a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 3.96 and its standard deviation is 0.71. Likewise, workplace competency dimension has a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 4.21 and its standard deviation is 0.66.

Internationally Educated Staff

Overall findings for the level of effectiveness and its interpretation are shown in Table 9.

Table 9 Interpretation of mean score for capacity effectiveness level for internationally educated faculty

Competency Mean Standard Deviation Level InterpretationPersonal 4.42 0.63 High SatisfactoryAcademic 4.34 0.67 High SatisfactoryWorkplace 4.34 0.64 High Satisfactory

TOTAL 4.37 0.65 High Satisfactory

Table 9 shows that all of the capacity dimensions have a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 4.37 and its standard deviation is 0.65. Based on each dimension, personal competency dimension has a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 4.42 and its standard deviation is 0.63. Next, academic competency dimension has a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 4.34 and its standard deviation is 0.67. Likewise, workplace competency dimension has a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is 4.34 and its standard deviation is 0.65.

To recap, both locally and internationally educated staff have a high level of effectiveness and satisfactory when the overall mean score is more than 3.80.

DISCUSSION

National revenue emanates from income taxes which consist of individual and company taxes. If a company has higher revenue, it can make a larger contribution through tax charges. However, higher revenue can only be achieved when its manpower has high level of capacity effectiveness (OECD 2000). This statement agrees with the models created by Mulder, Gulikers, Biemans and Wesselink (2009) and Olawale (2010). Their models stress the importance of capacity in order to create a good product.

This research found that there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff in terms of capacities. This finding has its connection with the recruitment policy being adopted by most public universities in Malaysia. The policy requires applicants who wish to become a faculty in universities to have a high academic performance in both undergraduate and graduate levels. Sullivan et al. (2002) portrayed the statement through faculty recruitment policy as not just looking at academic performance; it also takes into consideration personal criteria and previous working experience. The implication of this policy is that an organization’s productivity increases with employees’ higher capacity level (Horowitz, 1989).

From the discussion of recruitment policies as above, university is successful in earning high performance faculties. Therefore, the process of promotion for staff is also based on their capacity levels (Szeto, 2000). By comparing some of the demographics, this research found that teaching experience has no significant correlation with capacity levels while academic position has. This finding contradicts with Abdullah’s opinion (2007) which states that teaching experience has a correlation with capacity levels in educational institutions. This contradiction meets with Baharom (2004) which argues that capacity level increases with teaching experience because of facing different challenges throughout those years. However, this research is based on student perspectives towards their faculties compared to Abdullah (2007) and Baharom’s (2004) opinion which are from the perspectives of the faculties.

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Despite the significantly different demographics between faculties, this research found that both locally and internationally educated staff has high level of capacity effectiveness which is satisfactory. A sound reason for this situation is that high performance staff are attracted to incentives made by universities in terms of academic position and financial support. This statement is supported by data from Ministry of Education in 2007 that reports at least 11 school teachers transferring into universities after earning their doctorates throughout Malaysia (MOE, 2007). The implication of this situation is that schools lose their best teachers by mobilizing into universities with attractive incentives (Mahmod, 2008).

To sum up, this research found that capacity levels of staff are important to increase the performance of organizations. Therefore, to ensure that capacity levels are of high priority for the staff, universities make it as an indicator for promotions such as academic positions.

CONCLUSION

To recap, the objectives of this research were to find any significant differences between capacity levels of locally and internationally educated staff, to find any significant correlation between capacity levels with both teaching experience and academic position, and find the level of capacity effectiveness among staff. It turns out that there is no significant difference between locally and internationally educated staff. Although there is no significant correlation between capacity levels and teaching experience, but there is a significant correlation between capacity levels and academic position. Both locally and internationally educated staff have high and satisfactory level of capacity effectiveness.

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Career Guidance, Participation of Students and its Implication for Kano, Nigeria Isa Ado Abubakar [1]

[1] Institute of Education International Islamic University Malaysia [email protected]

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the study was to examine students’ participation in career guidance activities as mechanism through which young adults are developed into productive, responsible personalities well equipped for life and work in today’s technology based society. The study focused on career information search, career exploration and assessment aspects of participation. Thus, the findings would help the stakeholders, policy makers and educators in improving the career guidance in schools for effective delivery. Data were collected on 387 participants through 4 Likert scale questionnaires and descriptive statistic, independent t- tests and multiple regression analysis were performed. The results revealed that participation in career guidance activities is generally low and no significant difference existed in the pattern of participation among genders. The predictors were determined and implications of the study are discussed.

Keywords: Career Guidance, Participation, Career Development, Career information, Exploration, Assessment

INTRODUCTION

The purpose of education is to explore and develop potentials of individuals and to do so inform career choice must be made in the student’s life. Students need career guidance to explore and plan for future career endeavors based on their individual interests, skills and values. Participation in career guidance enhances linkage of academic and career experiences and thus, improves career preparation and management.

Guidance service is assistance given to student in school in order to increase the quality of the individual’s potentials. Adolescents in school require what Baker (2000) described as “transition enhancement assistance” aimed at preparing them for further education, training or employment. Therefore, a school guidance programme is to provide an array of services that cater for the developmental and career development needs of these young people. As summarized by Rosemary (2002): “acquiring knowledge self knowledge, developing specific career and educational goal, adjusting to changing conditions, planning career and educational programme to achieve goals, developing problem‐solving and decision making skills, coping with the outcome of decisions, and enhancing social, emotional and cognitive skills”.

The paper examines the role of participation experience as it helps students become more aware of career options and interests. The analysis was carried out on career information search, career exploration and assessment to match self and ideal environment.

Career Development

Career choice is a portrayal of oneself into the world of work having identified the specific occupation that one could perform best in relation to one’s existing personality traits. It involves the person’s creation of a career pattern, decision‐making style, integration of life roles, values expression, and life‐role self concepts (Herr & Cramer, 1996).

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Holland’s theory maintains that in choosing a career, people search for environments that will let them use their skills and abilities, and express their attitudes and values. Behaviour is determined by an interaction between personality and environment. This approach suggests that people are attracted to a given career that has similar qualities to their peculiar personalities and other background variables (Holland, 1992). Holland’s perspective accentuates the accuracy of self‐knowledge and career information as necessary prerequisites for career decision making. The individual’s interest paves way to the understanding of how individuals differ in personality, interest, and behaviors (Spokane, 1996). Interests are multifarious in nature and express our personality, style, preferences, values and self‐efficacy. Hence, people perform better when these variables are consistent with that of the chosen working environment.

Students and Career Guidance Participation

Participation in career guidance activities in school provides students with necessary awareness, knowledge and skills required in the world of work. It is a strategy for providing occupational orientation to students to become aware of what is contained and required in the career of one’s choice that match interest and abilities. Occupational orientation is viewed as an important aspect of the career development process; adolescents must identify their interests and abilities, balance them with labour market opportunities and gradually develop an occupational preference (Super, Savickas, & Super 1996). The importance of providing “transition enhancement” assistance has been emphasized in the further education, training or employment of students (Baker 2000). Career guidance participation will help students acquire the knowledge, skills and awareness necessary for effective career development (Herr, Cramer, & Niles, 2004)

The relevance of vocational guidance and counselling programmes in satisfying the vocational needs of the students by helping them to explore the range and structure of occupation in the local, state and national levels cannot be underestimated (Manuel & Asuquo, 2009). Students are involved in career guidance for better self‐understanding (Hiebert, Collins, & Robinson 2001). The inclusion of students’ responses is a result of recognition that adolescents may be the best source for identifying their own needs and that including the student’s perception could increase the accuracy of the assessment results.

Career Information

Success is more likely when individuals make decisions about what they are to learn in a well‐informed manner; link what they learned to their interests, capacities, aspirations, and are then informed about the existing opportunities to which the learning can guide. Holland’s theory emphasises the accuracy of self‐knowledge and career information necessary for career decision making (Zunker, 1994).

Good quality career information is a crucial factor for first‐rate career decision making. Career information should include relevant information about education and training opportunities, occupations and their characteristics; labour market supply and demand. Similarly, career information should contain occupational implications of educational decisions, and on the learning pathways that lead to particular occupational destinations. Career information is necessary, but not sufficient for good‐quality career decision making unless students have access to the information they need, understand the information, relate it to their personal needs and situation, and then convert it into personal action, with help of professional counselors and participation in career guidance related activities provided in schools.

Exploration

Career exploration has been recognized by the Parson (1908) and Holland (1992) theories in order to match individual qualities and that of the workplace environment. Participation in career guidance enables students to achieve social modeling which Bandura (1995) described as the second domain through which individuals develop self efficacy. Various studies have been conducted in many countries to examine the level of participation in career exploration as an integral part of the career development process.

Rashid et al. (2009) have examined career development invention in high school in Terengganu, Malaysia and found out that there is adequate participation in the career guidance activities provided. Song and Werbel (2007) have examined the role of social networks in the process of career exploration in a longitudinal study among US and Chinese

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graduating students. The findings indicate that social networks in job search have greater effects on job search intensity in the USA sample than in the Chinese due to moderation effects.

Assessment

Assessment is a tool of the trait‐and‐factor approach that began with the three‐step career choice process by Frank Parsons (1908). Various assessment tools have been used to assess students aimed at helping them to make better career choice.

The research inventory focused on students’ participation in manual and computer assessment in the process of career choice and decision.

METHOD

Participants

Participants were 387 secondary school students (186 boys, 201 girls) from three education zones in Kano metropolis. The sample was good enough to represent secondary school students in the state and they cut across all the levels of senior secondary education (SS1‐3) with mean age of 17.73 years and SD 1.75. The participants were selected based on convenience sampling from 21 randomly selected schools.

Instrument

A self developed career participation inventory was used to measure students’ participation in three areas of career development activities that include career information search, career exploration and assessment. These career participation subscales were selected to measure the degree to which students participate in searching for career information, exploration of the careers and match self personality and that of occupational environment through assessment. The questionnaire contained 15 items with internal consistency of .65. The inventory uses a 4‐point Likert type scale (1 = never, 2 = rarely, 3 = sometimes, and 4 = always).

Procedure and Data Analysis

All the respondents completed the inventory that has personally been administered in group session in each of the schools. Instructions were clear enough and standard testing procedure was observed. The data collected were then analyzed using descriptive statistics to examine the difference in career participation subscales. A regression analysis was later applied to examine the predictability of gender, level of study, goal selection and exploration on career participation.

RESULTS

Descriptive Statistics

Table 1 Descriptive statistics for Career Participation Subscales

Subscale N Mean SD

Career information 387 10.47 2.89

Exploration 387 9.24 3.01

Assessment 387 10.80 3.54

The means and standard deviation of the students’ participation in the career activities is presented in Table 1. The result depicts that career information seeking (M = 10.47; SD = 2.89) and participation in assessment exercise (M = 10.80; SD = 3.54) have high means score over career exploration (M = 9.24; SD = 3.01) indicating that students’ participation in career information search and assessment is high while participation of students in career exploration is low among students.

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Table 2 Mean, Standard Deviation, t-Values for Gender Participation in Career Guidance Activities’ Subscale

Subscale Gender N Mean SD t p

Career Information

Male 186 10.06 2.95 ‐2.68

.547

Female 201 10.85 2.79

Exploration Male 186 9.03 2.91 ‐1.32

.252

Female 201 9.43 3.09

Assessment Male 186 10.52 4.07 ‐1.49

.861

Female 201 11.06 2.96

N = 387, *p < .005

The independent t‐test in Table 2 shows participation in career guidance activities among genders. No significant difference was found (t (385) =‐2.68, p > .05), (t (385) =‐.32, p >.05) and (t (385) = ‐1.49, p >.05) indicating that the level of participation in career guidance in terms of career information search, exploration and assessment is the same among different genders.

Regression Analysis for students’ participation

Regression analysis was conducted to investigate the contribution of gender, level of study, goal selection and exploration in predicting career participation among students.

In the regression model predicting students’ participation in career guidance activities, career exploration and goal selection accounted for 57.9% of the variance explained indicating that career exploration and goal selection are the significant predictors of participation in career guidance activities among students; this also indicates that desire to explore career information based on set goals influence students to participate. This shows that much needs to be done to make career guidance activities more attractive to improve the participation level among students.

Table 2 Summary of Multiple Regression Analysis predicting Students’ participation in career guidance

Variable B Beta t R2 F

Exploration 1.715 .718 20.66 .579 131.593

Goal selection

.387 .146 4.258

Measured by Career Participation inventory; Durbin Watson =1.48, R=.761, Tolerance 9.11 & .937, ; VIF 1.09 &.06 *p < .005

DIsCUSSION

The findings have contributed to the literature involving career guidance activities among secondary school students particularly from developing countries such as Nigeria. It is clear that the pattern of participation among genders remains the same which is consistent with Rashid et al. (2009). Students’ exploration on career opportunities is very much consistent with one of the Donald Super’s stages of developmental tasks that characterized the stage as ‘Trying out’ through classes, work experience, hobbies, tentative choice and related skill development.

Vocationally, the explorative tendency exhibit within the age of 14-25 years is regarded by Super (1990) as a period of developing and planning a tentative vocational goal, and solidifying goals for training and employment.

The implications of poor participation in career guidance activities could have both short and long run effects on

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the students’ career decision on one hand and on the quality of labor to be produced through the process on the other. In the short run, low participation in career guidance prevents students from making considered career decisions based on personality variables such as skills, values and aptitude and so forth, hence resulting in competency mismatch.

Low participation in school career guidance activities particularly in the assessment aspect indicates the level of inadequate preparedness of students and their incapability to match personality with occupational environment thereby utilizing potentials maximally to attain higher productivity. The 21st century demands for competency and productivity which are obtainable when informed career decision is made through assessment, career information search and exploration.

Career guidance in schools remains the only vehicle that can connect students with right opportunities based on personal assets thereby exploring and putting potentials into judicious use in today’s competitive environment.

The implication for the state being under the federal system of government is that it cannot supply adequate labor for federal service as well as to other organizations due to the high demand for competencies and skills in such jobs; hence the state will remain incapable of filling its quota especially at federal government level and its agencies. Similarly, in terms of pursuing higher education, there will be uneven distribution of students across careers, thereby creating unnecessary congestion in some areas and educational institutions. Careers that relate to sciences, mathematics and engineering will continue to have scanty number of students which will not help the state in its efforts towards utilizing its teeming population optimally as well as in fulfilling all its quota in federal government, its agencies and other organizations while careers involving human sciences and languages will continue to absorb large quantity of students beyond the existing capacities, which obviously leads to unemployment problems.

In addition, poor participation in career guidance activities leads to under utilization of potentials and existing opportunities. Reardon, Lenz, Sampson, and Peterson (2000) maintain that “the basic nature of working is changing. Gone are those days when one began his or her life at a company or organisation and remained there as a loyal employee until retirement”. The trend of participation depicts that students underutilize the opportunity to identify their skills, values and aptitude adequately; nor do they explore the existing careers relevant to respective personalities, which are fundamental for survival in the 21st century. Identification of skills and their application will certainly reduce heavy dependence on government and promotes economic self reliance among the youth.

However, going by the Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT), participation in career guidance is likely to reduce the degree to which perceived career barriers affect career development as it limits translation of interests into goals and goals into actions (Brown & Lent, 1996).

CONCLUSION

The level of students’ participation in career guidance activities indicates that counselors need to improve the mechanism for providing career guidance in schools to encourage student participation. Teachers, school administrators and policy makers as stakeholders need to improve what is expected towards making school guidance programs successful for the benefit of students, society and the country at large. However, the findings portray that collaboration among the stakeholders needs to be improved. Stakeholders must join hands to improve the service collectively so as to assist students to make use of their potentials accordingly.

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Financial Decentralization in Malaysian Schools: Strategies for Effective Implementation Norfariza Mohd Radzi [1], Muhammad Faizal A. Ghani [2], Saedah Siraj [3], Mojgan Afshari [4]

[1] Faculty of Education, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia [email protected] [2] Faculty of Education, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia [email protected] [3] Faculty of Education, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia [email protected] [4] Faculty of Education, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia [email protected]

ABSTRACT

This article presents findings on the essential strategies required at the school site and the relevant people responsible for the effective implementation of school-based financial management in Malaysia. Many lessons have been learned since more than a decade of the school-based financial management reform in Malaysia through the establishment of school as Responsibility Centre or Pusat Tanggungjawab (PTj). The government of Malaysia has allocated an enormous amount of money for the education sector during last the few decades to ensure the highest quality of education for Malaysian society. Therefore school finance has to be managed strategically to confirm the best educational outcome through effective resource allocation. This study employed the qualitative approach using the interview method with ten selected principals heading schools with financial autonomy in Malaysia. The findings revealed a few essential strategies that need to be focused by schools both at individual level and school level in order to successfully manage school finances. The collaboration and mutual effort from all stakeholders are expected to bring transformation toward effective school based financial management in Malaysia..

Keywords: school-based, financial management, effective, stakeholders, Malaysia

INTRODUCTION

In the current era of challenging economic condition, the issue of education financing will remain important and the management of education finance will always be a great concern of any government. In order to cope with global education transformation, the education sector has persistently been granted the highest allocation of the budget by the Federal Government of Malaysia where approximately 20% to 25% of government spending goes toward the country’s Development Plan (INTAN, 2006). The operation expenditure allocated for the primary and secondary education also accounted for nearly half the total education operating expenditure as a whole (Kementerian Pelajaran Malaysia, 2009). As the main provider of education funds for primary, secondary and higher level of schooling, the federal government of Malaysia through the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Higher Education contributed about 98% of the total financing (Shahril@Charil Marzuki, 2008). It was only in recent years that the full potential of the private sector was unleashed to maximize the available resources in providing quality education for society. Thus, the responsibility for managing school resources effectively is currently widened to many parties involved in the education sector from both the public and the private sectors (PEMANDU, 2010).

The movement toward financial management decentralization at the public school level in Malaysia began in early 2000 following the massive changes within the government sectors since 1989. The government formally recognized selected schools with guided financial autonomy known as Pusat Tanggungjawab (PTj) or Autonomy Center (Responsibility Center). It has become an initiative for increasing the autonomy of the individual schools through independent decision making authority for managing financial resources. It was expected that with greater authority and accountability, school leaders and their communities could channel the allocated money in a more productive way thus enabling schools to perform the best in their curriculum delivery and the expected final educational outcomes. The critical aspects of school based financial management (SBFM) mainly rely on the decisions made by the school authorities in allocating the financial resources for the preparation of curriculum delivery. In other words, the budget

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determination will allow for the physical resources to be arranged so that they will strengthen the teaching and learning process and subsequently the intended educational outcome.

Throughout the years of establishment of PTj schools in Malaysia, one issue involved a certain group of schools that still demonstrated a weak quality of financial management. Even though the PTj schools are appointed based on good financial management, they were reported to be in poor condition in terms of lacking resources and unsatisfactory financial performance. This was especially certain in the aspect of internal audit and financial controls. The Auditor General’s Report has noted the unsatisfactory financial performance of Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Agama (SMKA) from the aspect of control of revenue, expenses and the management of schools’ assets (Jabatan Audit Negara Malaysia, 2002). It was found that most of the schools fail to follow the rules on cash saving, salary remuneration and bill payment. The most critical parts were on the maintenance of Capital and Inventory Registration and the assets’ physical inspection. Another problem identified was the principals’ lack of knowledge and necessary skills in school financial management; the principals merely delegate their duties of overseeing the school finance to the administration clerk (Shahril@Charil Marzuki, 2005b; Wan Azman Wan Idris, 2002). There was no consistency in monitoring the financial records or documentation during the school expenses transactions. In some rare cases, principals simply neglected duty in monitoring the school financial management because of their other responsibilities (Mohd Noor Said, 2004; Rusli Wahab, 2005; Wan Shamsiah Wan Yusoff, 2008).

Moreover, another issue is the failure of some principals to allocate resources based on the school objectives and priorities. The School Audit Division in its Annual Report has reported that some principals of PTj schools failed to list their objectives based on priorities and to provide a proper strategic plan for schools to reach their objectives (Kementerian Pelajaran Malaysia, 2007b). In another case, some principals used the money for wrong purposes in a large and significant amount even though the specific allocation had been planned in the school budget every year (Kementerian Pelajaran Malaysia, 2007b; Shahril@Charil Marzuki, 2006). Thus, to ensure a continuous provision of education to society, educational resources have to be directed and allocated to the establishment and improvement of the teaching and learning process. As resources are essential and finances are necessary to get the resources, financial aspect thus plays a role in ensuring a continuous access to education for society. For many countries around the world, particularly the developing ones, the government sector primarily has the obligation to manage the public money to ensure a successful flow of money for education.

The country’s education expenditure has steadily increased from the early independence period in 1957 till now (Shahril@Charil Marzuki, 2005a; Shahril@Charil Marzuki, Rahimah Ahmad, & Hussein Ahmad, 2010). This was in congruence with the government aspirations to boost education thus providing the best human capital that could contribute to the country’s development and economic growth. Among the recent major government policies for the education sector are the Education Development Master Plan or Pelan Induk Pembangunan Pendidikan (2006-2010) in the Ninth Malaysia Plan and the Economic Transformation Program in the Tenth Malaysia Plan. Throughout these policies, the concept of school-based management with a guided autonomy has been recognized through the formation of Cluster schools in 2007 in support of decentralized school financial management. Then in 2011, the Economic Transformation Program also has successfully launched the Trust school in Malaysia which marked a positive collaboration between the public and private sector in Malaysia. It was hoped that this positive effort will be able to resolve the financial constraints experienced in most of the centralized national schools in the country (PEMANDU, 2010). All the recent policies also demonstrated the government effort to solve the education financial issues such as limited financial support, lack of society’s contribution and imbalance between number of students and school facilities. Therefore, this research was conducted based on the following objectives:

a. To identify the school stakeholders responsible for the effective financial management of schools with autonomy in Malaysia; and

b. To identify strategies needed for the school based financial management effectiveness in Malaysia.

Literature review

The concept of decentralization is the key concept related to the devolution of higher authority to the lower management at the school level. Decentralization has been understood as the delegation of power and authority from the central government to the school level as a means to improve the management quality in support of the school’s main task of executing the teaching and learning process. Wohlstetter and Mohrman (1993) described decentralization as the transfer of control from central offices to individual school sites in attempts to give school constituents such as administrators, teachers, parents and community more control over what happens in school. Cheng (1996) in his explanation on decentralization, emphasized the concept of flexibility in which he suggested that the schools should be managed by themselves according to their own condition. This is actually aimed at efficiency and problem solving where the schools are given the power and responsibility to solve problems effectively in time. The concept of decentralization was also thoroughly discussed by Bullock and Thomas (1997); it was claimed that decentralization is not end in itself but

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a means of achieving other ends or purposes. In this case, the aims of this reform clearly related to the ultimate educational aims of ensuring the school achieved its objectives in the most effective way.

Decentralization is also indicated by freedom, differentiation and responsiveness (Caldwell, 2003). It includes demand for less control and uniformity that subsequently reduce the size and cost associated with maintaining a large central bureaucracy. Furthermore, these demands for greater freedom and differentiation also increase commitment for school community empowerment and the desire to achieve high levels of professionalism. With regard to financial decentralization, budgeting system at the school level is important in the sense that there is unique mix of student learning needs in the school which calls for a unique mix of resources. Thus, it calls for decentralization that could make possible for such a mix to be determined by a people who really understand the situations (Caldwell, 2005). Concisely, financial decentralization is actually the transfer of power and authority from the central authority to the individual school management in an effort to enable the schools to make better decision and arrangement. It acts as a means for better management and administration which could facilitate achievement of the targeted educational outcomes.

The concept of decentralization began in the late 1960s and 1970s in many western countries such as England, United States and Australia. This reform took placed in the government sectors which moved from the conventional style of bureaucracy. Decentralization was identified as a tool for more effective decision making while delegating autonomy and responsibility to the lower management level specifically for those who are accountable. The idea of decentralization spread to the public schools as a concept of school based financial management (SBFM) which is called by different names around the world. For example, in Canada and the United States, the early focus of decentralization began with the concept known as school-based budgeting (SBB) which concerns the self-budgeting of individual schools for better decision making (Caldwell & Spinks, 1992). Britain also came out with local financial management (LFM) of schools which implied the lack of a centrally determined framework for schools finance and the emergent concept of self-management.

The school-based budgeting initially started in the mid-seventies at Edmonton Public School District in Alberta, Canada and a few districts in the United States. It continued to be a successful evolution for the Edmonton Public which was described as school-site decision making (Caldwell & Spinks, 1988). A few conferences and pilot projects have been established which involved many principals, teachers, parents and students on the school based budgeting project which have aroused interest. Generally, the school based budgeting concept focused on the decisions related to the allocation of resources that encompassed the financial allocation for teaching and non-teaching staff, equipment, school supplies and also services. Another successful reform of school based management was created in Britain which has been inspired by the Conservative Manifesto in the 1987 national election. The Manifesto has contained a proposal of four major reforms that influence the shift of schools toward self-management and the change to the concept of decentralization. Among the changes suggested was the dissemination of control over school budgets to the governing bodies and head teachers of all secondary schools and many primary schools within five years. Furthermore, the state schools were given opportunity to opt out of Local Education Authority (LEA) control in which the schools will directly receive grants from the national government for the school expenses.

Financial management involves budgeting, granting the money, accounting and financial reporting, evaluating and the critical aspect of auditing and internal control. Among the earliest research on the requirement for a successful school financial devolution was one done by Knight (1992). Twelve key questions have been raised for consideration by all school managers to ensure a successful school based financial management implementation through well-equipped strategies and plans. In addition, Murphy (1994) did a study based on the conceptual discussion of five conditions necessary to facilitate school based management. Nevertheless, both of these studies appeared as a plan targeted at practitioners without being backed by relevant empirical studies. Furthermore, Odden (1994) has designed a systemic reform of school based finance in which the incorporated elements have been drawn from the studies of effective management in the private sector. Another prominent study on school-based management was done by Wohlstetter and Mohrman (1994) which was also based on extensive studies on the previous experiences undergone by many schools in the United States (U.S.). This study was developed over several years and in 2003, it managed to highlight several more essential actions based on the context of U.S. reform (Briggs & Wohlstetter, 2003).

In the United States of America, the public educational system was highly centralized at the state level. However, comprehensive attempts at decentralization reform have taken so many forms with different purposes. The significant development in the school based management occurred mainly in the states of California and Florida in the 1970s that managed to empower the community. The early concern of the school site management also on the budgetary matter in which the principal was held responsible for preparing the budget within the framework imposed by the state and district authorities. The school budgeting management involved not only the teaching and learning materials for matching the needs of students, but included the staff salary systems and also the allocation for school maintenance and utilities. The early approach was to provide the school with a lump sum payment and the principal was held accountable to the superintendant of the district to provide the report based on the district-wide instructional

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goals and priorities (Odden & Picus, 2000; Wohlstetter & Van Kirk, 1995).

The financial management of the public sector in Malaysia was largely influenced by developed countries such as England and Australia. It is bounded by regulations namely Federal Constitution (96-112), Financial Act 1957, Audit Act 1957, Local Government Act 1976, Treasury Directives, Treasury circulations and accepted accounting principles such as GAAP and IAS. The financial management of the public sector is significantly affected by the country’s annual budget which sets up the flow of income and expenses forecast for the next year. Under the public sector paradigm shift from the Progressive Public Administration to New Public Management, Malaysia has been practicing the Modified Budgeting System (MBS) since 1990. It was an improvement from the previous application of Program and Performance Budgeting System (PPBS) and the early Line Item Budgeting System (Xavier, 2002). MBS was believed to bring evolution to the country’s budgeting system with a distinct shift toward output orientation and greater delegation of authority. It has strengthened the concept of ‘Let Managers Manage’ previously introduced in the PPBS which makes the lower level management more accountable and responsible. The twin objectives of MBS implementation in Malaysia’s government sector are the rational and improved allocation of resources besides better and accountable program management. Government departments are recognized as Pusat Tanggungjawab (PTj) or Autonomy Centres (Responsibility Centres) and have their own accountability and responsibility in managing financial resources based on their stated programs and objectives.

Among the characteristics of decentralized financial management being practiced under PTj were responsibility based on the given authority and improved decision making through better budgeting process and decrease of bureaucracy. Individuals under this system have their own role to contribute to a better financial performance within the cooperation and guidance given by the higher authority. The measurement was based on the achievement of the outcome rather than the input being delivered. Thus, the financial performance depended on the PTj initiative which could subsequently create entrepreneurship among its members. In Malaysia, the financial decentralization reform has widely spread to include a small institution such as public schools. The recognition of schools as PTj was started with 30 schools being elected in the pilot project launched by the Ministry of Education in 2000. Then, starting in 2001, around 200 schools were awarded annually and recognized as PTj level schools marked their financial autonomy and the decentralized decision making authority granted by the federal government of Malaysia (Kementerian Pelajaran Malaysia, 2007a).

The three main aims listed by the government to become the main purposes of recognizing schools as the PTj schools is to enable school managers to plan for efficient and effective management of school expenditure. Furthermore, schools are able to spend based on their actual needs through the permitted financial allocations and procedures. In addition, the purchase transactions including payment can be done promptly without the hassle of bureaucracy previously experienced under centralized financial management. According to the policy, the recognition of a school as a PTj is based on the good financial performance for three consecutive years as shown by excellence in the audit report and overall unqualified audit opinion. Therefore, principals are expected to manage the financial resources through the concept of ‘let the manager manage’ and be fully responsible, knowledgeable and committed to their tasks. The establishment of school as PTj also allows school as the ‘end consumer’ to use their money according to their priorities and channel it to the way that could benefit the teaching and learning process (Marzita Abu Bakar, 2010).

Money received by schools of PTj level (called the warrant) has to be managed and recorded in a different way from other ordinary schools. Schools were using a computerized accounting system named eSPKB to facilitate and coordinate all the financial records with the Accountant General Department (Ibrahim Tamby Chek & Rosli Samat, 2006). The role of the principal and the head of department also have been empowered particularly in budgeting to ensure that all financial allocations are in line with the school vision, mission and objectives. Furthermore, the existence of school as PTj has subsequently created new management procedures at the upper level. The state education department will act as the Head of PTj schools with responsibility in the distribution of the allocated warrant, supplying related facilities and monitoring the financial administrative tasks. In addition, the state education department will also act as the intermediate agent between schools and the Accountant General Department ensuring that any vacancy in the school financial administrative post is filled. Stakeholder commitment is important to support any changes and to achieve the targeted motive behind the establishment of PTj schools. The attitude of readiness and awareness is important for all stakeholders to reinforce the effort toward the best education outcome through improvement in school site financial management.

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METHODOLOGY

Qualitative method has been chosen as a means to answer the research question due to its nature which allows the researcher to get at the inner experience of the participants and to discover something rather than to test variables (Corbin & Strauss, 2008). Furthermore, Merriam (2009) has claimed that it is a richly descriptive method which enable researchers to explore a phenomenon. The phenomenon being studied could involve the descriptions of the context, the participants involved and the activities of interest. Overall, the nature of qualitative study is seen as well suited to be employed in completing the research goal. Interview sessions have been carried out with the main purpose of gathering information on the strategies needed for the implementation of an effective SBFM. This method of study is practical and relevant for gaining in-depth information that needs explanations from certain individuals. In addition, it acts as the best tool in uncovering the meaning of a phenomenon by exploring the inner experience of participant (Corbin & Strauss, 2008; Merriam, 2009). A few previous studies have been analyzed to determine at the best sample size. Merriam (2009) in her writing mentioned the size for purposeful sampling is to be determined by informational consideration. No additional sample is needed in situations where the data has reached the saturation level if the purpose is to maximize information. Nevertheless, Dukes (1984) has suggested 3 to 10 subjects in the phenomenology study to reach a satisfactory level of information (Creswell, 2007). Thus, this study has selected 10 principals from those schools in Malaysia granted with autonomy and who meet the specific following characteristics:

(i) Has at least a bachelor degree

(ii) Performed as a principal for more than seven years in the PTj schools

(iii) Performed in the schools that have been recognized as PTj schools for more than seven years

In performing the research, the initial task involved the permission granted by the higher education authority through the formal letter of consent produced by the Division of Educational Policy Planning and Research, Ministry of Education (BPPDP). For the interview session, 10 principals of selected PTj level schools have been carefully and thoroughly selected as the research samples. Therefore, they were contacted personally through mail and further confirmed by phone for acceptance. The researcher had set up time and place to conduct the interview session. The sessions have been recorded for transcription.

The questions in the interview protocol also have been examined by two experts in school finance and qualitative study. Then, a preliminary study has been conducted to check on the validity and reliability of the interview protocol questions. It was done to ensure the questions reflected the main research questions being highlighted and were able to produce the accurate answer for the research findings. Any misunderstandings of the questions by participants were handled with necessary corrective actions for the next interview session. Furthermore, the transcripts produced in the transcription process were rechecked by the participants who verified the contents of the transcript and corrected any errors that changed their original meaning. The data recorded were transcribed to ensure that accurate information was given. Then, the process of coding took place which involved arrangement and categorization of the data. The whole process was completed using Microsoft Word 2007 for the transcription process and NVivo version 9, the software for qualitative data analysis. The analysis process was ended with specific themes that emerged from the whole process of analysis.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

The goal of this research was to clarify the relevant people involved in school based financial management in Malaysia and strategies needed for effective financial management. Findings from all the selected informants confirmed that school finance administrative work should be treated only by the fixed committee members inside the school. In other words, the stakeholders are welcome to bring financial support to school in the form of donations, parents’ contributions and so on without interrupting the administrative work performed by the school financial committee selected with the principals’ approval. Furthermore, all of the principals agreed that the current formation of the school finance committee is good enough to manage the financial resources effectively. The school financial committee is chaired by the principal or head teacher with the help of a financial administrative assistant and further include senior assistant principals and the selected internal auditor. For budgeting, the subject senior teacher will work collaboratively with the head of division in formulating the annual budget for their particular subjects. The accounting and reporting matters will be handled by the chief administrative assistant or chief clerk exclusively for the record of any expenses and receipt of money. Then, at least one teacher will be selected to act as the internal auditor to ensure that school adheres to the school finance rules and circulars. Nevertheless, some schools will set up their own supporting committees such as assets disposal committee, school cooperative committee and many others in support of the main school financial committees. All of these committees have their own responsibilities and authority in performing tasks

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being handed over by the school principal to ensure excellent financial performance.

“The ultimate power is in the hands of the principal. However, the principal should consider the views of teachers as the financial committee and also the finance chief clerk. However, PIBG is not allowed to use its power over any matters involving the school administrative tasks.”

“The Financial committee includes the principal, senior assistants, heads of divisions and heads of subjects. This is only for administrative tasks. PIBG usually help in support of their children’s’ activities.”

The majority of the participants agreed on this condition as the parents usually are less knowledgeable about school financial matters. However, every opinion should be heard through the PTA meetings especially on the allocation of school money for their children’s academic and co curriculum activities. The principal will act as the adviser or formally become an ex officio member who will transfer the relevant information to parents for their consideration.

The important findings from this research show that successful school financial management of PTj level schools in Malaysia was partially contributed by good cooperation between them and Non-Government Organizations (NGO) especially the profit oriented firms or companies. It came in the form of a common understanding between them which usually benefited both parties and was seen as a future investment for the firms. The commitments also ensure continuous financial support by the firms or companies to schools and avoided transience in the flow of money. This clarifies the issue of lack of parents’ involvement in school financial matters in Malaysia and limited contributions by them. With the tradition of dependency on the government purse and limited financial support by them, parents continue to have less power in manipulating school progress compared to many developed countries in the world. The initiative largely depends on the school leaders to create entrepreneurship among the school members. Nevertheless, some government aided schools in Malaysia continue to survive with the existence of a school governing body usually backed by their religious society or individuals with high personal income. These comprise only a small percentage of total schools in Malaysia and often exist in certain urban areas and specific locations as agreed by the school governing bodies.

Further, the analysis done from the data gathered in interview sessions revealed a few elements that should be equipped by schools to achieve effective SBFM in Malaysia. These were considered as essential basic needs for the school’s stakeholders besides adherence to school financial rules, government circulars and related references. These elements are described as the following themes:

A good school vision and mission which are grasped by all school members

It is important that school vision and mission be fully understood and comprehended by all school members and the relevant parties outside the school. A good mission and vision statement will create a high quality school plan which eventually leads school for the financial consumption of the high priority activities that could increase the quality of teaching and learning. One of the principals highlighted the importance of school mission and vision in his conversation:

“Yes, yes….school vision and mission is important. This is what all school members should know. We always remind teachers, students and staff members and even the security staff on their critical roles in the school mission.”

The senior teachers normally take the responsibility to set up the financial budget based on the teaching and learning program suggested throughout the year. They should collectively do so with the relevant teachers by considering the ideas and suggestions by others. Even though the Per Capita Grant (PCG) amounts for subjects have been fixed by the Ministry of Education, any extra programs should be considered within the framework of school’s yearly program that could realize the school’s vision and mission achievement. This is especially true for Cluster schools and High Performance schools in Malaysia which received certain amount of money by the government with the objective to boost the students’ overall achievement. With the guided autonomy granted to schools, principals and other school leaders are expected to spend the money carefully and to achieve the Key Performance Index (KPI) set up by the higher education authority in Malaysia.

Relevant knowledge and skills

The financial and technical knowledge and skills are especially important for the people involved in the administrative positions. The chief clerk and the finance administrative assistant should be familiar with the school accounting procedures, relevant government circulars and even the current accounting application they have to use in

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preparing the reports. The participants believed that most of the administrative staff who performed well in their job actually gained their expertise from experience and good relationships with the higher authority such as the School Audit Division. Because of the limited days of training provided by Ministry of Education and the large numbers of participants involved, most of the school leaders and the financial administrative staff gain less input during the workshop series. Rather, the best knowledge is said to be gathered from the individual’s own initiative to learn continuously from the School Audit Division staff and the experiences gained throughout their career experience. Two of the principals emphasized their ideas in the following conversations:

“Experience is most important in increasing people’s knowledge and skills. It was only when a problem arises that we will directly consulting the higher authority such as the Ministry, Department or the Audit Division to get their view and advice (viewpoint).”

“Besides clerks that should be experts, principals, senior assistants and relevant teachers also need to have these skills. All needs for knowledge. I for example, have learned through experience….”

In addition, principals or head teachers and other school leaders should develop good communication skills which are practically important in building relationship with the external stakeholders such as NGO, alumni and parents. Successful collaboration among all the school stakeholders promotes teamwork for the school’s future development especially in the financial aspect. Principals should be knowledgeable on the school performance and send the message accurately to the people outside the school building block.

Transparency and integrity

The government of Malaysia has placing high priority on transparency in performing duties and requires all the public workers to uphold high integrity. It becomes the significant feature of Malaysian public practices compared to other developed and developing countries. It also becomes the main concern for all public school communities including teachers and the supporting staff. In this case, the principal as the manager should work collaboratively with teachers and the administrative staff without covering up any shortcomings important school financial matters. The importance of transparency while managing the school finance was portrayed in the following statement:

“Managing school finance calls for transparency. That is what I am practicing. When we receive the money, all the relevant committees will meet and the amount will be announced and presented. For example, this allocation is for this department…. Thus they will do the budget together for their own departments.”

Besides accountability, integrity has become one of the important traits cultivated by the Government of Malaysia for all public staff. Everybody should avoid and free themselves from involvement in corruption, bribery, abuse of power and the issue of delay or ‘red tape’. Any criminals charged under all these offences will face the resulting sentences and penalties besides poor performance recorded by the higher administrator. The Government’s effort to strengthen public service integrity include establishing policies, rules and regulations, working procedures and systems, codes of behavior and ethics and internal control for the high risk activities or tasks. For the sake of controlling the corruption among the public staff, one formal body called Badan Pencegah Rasuah (BPR) has been established. Any misuse of resources shall be investigated by the School Audit Division and the Internal Auditor from the National Audit Department.

Entrepreneurship

In the existing challenging economic period, schools are no longer encouraged to merely rely on the government resources. There are many things schools can do to increase their funds such as developing good relationships with the external community. Schools also can collaborate with NGOs, alumni and the wider community to create programs that could benefit the students and schools. Collaboration with the NGO especially the profit-based firms was seen to support schools through a consistent flow of financial support. It was created through an agreement between both parties and perceived by the firms as community services and future investments. Besides NGOs, the superior schools usually largely benefited from their alumni association for expertise and financial contributions. Schools

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could also save money by approaching their alumni that are willing to share their skills and knowledge either for academic or extra curriculum activities. Some of them already contributed large sums of money to the schools especially alumni from the High Performance Schools in Malaysia.

In addition, leasing some school facilities such as multipurpose halls, computer labs and other facilities to the outside community has generated income. Many technical and vocational schools are encouraged to be innovative in creating products for commercialization. Schools members need to have an entrepreneurial mind set thus to think and act in versatile ways to strengthen their financial positions. One principal described his initiatives as follows:

“For your information, the financial resources are actually gained from both government and non-government agencies such as Public Higher Institution, communities and the surrounding society. For example, we manage to increase our funds from the program with the Tabung Haji (Pilgrim Fund Board). What can I say is that a good relationship with the community is very important. Principal should know many people and create a good relationship with them for benefit of the school in the future.”

Meaningful autonomy at the school site

The principal or school leader should understand completely the autonomy devolved at the school site and use it for the main aim of increasing academic achievement and overall school performance. In the case of Malaysia, the financial autonomy granted for schools of PTj level are still limited and mainly targeted to reduce the hassle of bureaucracy in the payment of staff salaries. Principals should have accountability in managing the money particularly the school capital spending to ensure a smooth financial operation. The establishment of Cluster school in 2007 has widened the scope of financial autonomy granted to schools. Cluster schools have been granted greater autonomy compared to PTj level schools which enables them to use the money for school development and realization of their own niche areas. This guided autonomy also works within certain government policies and regulations to avoid any mismanagement and inappropriate actions by the school leaders.

Therefore, based on the different purpose of government financial allocations, school leaders should understand their authority over the money. These include the way the money should be spent, the accountability that should be undertaken and limitation that bounded the financial operation of the public entity. Failure to understand the autonomy meaningfully will only disrupt the purpose of granting the autonomy and hinder schools from maximizing their potential. About autonomy, one principal said:

“Everybody has to understand his or her roles. A principal needs to help teachers and staffs understand their duties in managing money. If everyone performed their jobs as have been directed, there should be no problem.”

Clear distribution of power among members

Schools granted financial autonomy have to organize their own financial committees which will be involved in budgeting, accounting and internal control. However, the most important part is the understanding of all involved to be excellent in performing their duties. The critical issue commonly arising is the commitment of teachers who have been appointed to the school financial committee. Teachers should be ready to adapt to the new roles under this SBFM reform and pursue their duty whole-heartedly for the benefit of the school. One principal mentioned the importance of this matter as follows:

“It is great if everyone is clear on their duties. For example on the PCG allocation, the head of a department or the selected senior teacher should understand the allocation that they received and the way they should use the money to strengthen the performance of the teaching staff”.

Since the entire school entity has a major role to play under the SBFM reform, it is crucial for the principal to ensure a good understanding among their subordinates. As autonomy indicates greater accountability that leads to more job load and responsibility, it should be shared among the school members to ensure successful implementation of that reform. Senior teachers should set up the departments’ financial meeting and keep good track of all expenses and the relevant programs that have been planned. In addition to the responsibility circulated among the internal school members, PIBG members also should be clear on the financial status of the schools. It is important for them to support

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schools program which could accelerate future school improvement and development.

Good information distribution

To reach for SBFM effectiveness, the relevant stakeholders should have good information distribution on the school financial matters. The information could be in the form of policies or circulars from government and any sources that have direct effect on the school financial management. Most of the informants believed that this task should be initiated by the principals and supported by all members. Good information sharing promotes teamwork and collaboration for realizing school vision and missions. In this period of high technology, communication failure should not occur among the school stakeholders. Parents and the surrounding community should be ready to receive any school information and willing to be part of the school development effort. This is important when schools are planning to increase their financial resources such as with fund-raising program, donations and many more. The importance of good information distribution was described by one principal as follows:

“Information and instruction should be received by all parties. If we received the wrong information such as what included in the circulations or anything else, we are strictly confined to the qualified audit opinion.”

Recognition for performance

Most of the principals believed that recognition awarded by the higher authority is important for schools to uphold their quality performance. It works as motivation for school members to perform well in their job and remain competitive among other schools. Also, the initiative by the Ministry of Education to consider financial performance as among criteria for the High Performance School award or Sekolah Berprestasi Tinggi (SBT) has induced determination among schools to perform effectively in their tasks. The importance of having recognition from the higher authority has been reflected by one of the principal as follows:

“Yes, yes…the reward received by this school has a big role. For example recently, our school received the recognition as the ‘Sekolah Harapan’. But, what we received was not in the form of financial reward. It was a one big project as a gift for our effort and acts as a motivation for us to maintain our excellent performance. Actually, rewards are helpful to increase our enthusiasm and teachers’ motivation to better perform all their duties.”

In addition to recognition given to schools for good financial performance and curriculum achievement, the internal school members should also receive appreciation by higher authority for their individual attainment. The current practices revealed that job promotions among principals and head teachers include the criteria of consistently leading the schools without qualified audit report. Thus, this effort could similarly be adopted for recognizing teachers but in a different way. They should have significant contribution toward the school’s successful financial performance and play a major role in the financial management at the school-based level. The recognition can be in the form of job promotion, salary increment or excellent teacher award.

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

In order to ensure successful school-based financial management reform in the Malaysian public schools, all stakeholders should work collaboratively through meaningful roles. In addition to the administrative tasks performed by the school financial committee, parents through Parent-Teacher Associations (Persatuan Ibu Bapa dan Guru, PIBG), alumni, non-government organizations (NGO) and the surrounding society have to assist school in improving their financial position thus facilitating the school overall development. NGOs particularly the profit oriented firms play a major role in helping schools to stabilize their financial position especially in the area of school facilities. This is due to the consistent flow of money given to schools besides the common benefit gained from this form of collaboration. The collaboration effort between the internal and external school stakeholders could only succeed through concurrent effort of individuals, the school entity and the higher government authority. To implement effective SBFM, all the internal and external stakeholders should collaborate to ensure schools are equipped with the following characteristics: (a) a good school vision and mission understood by all school members, (b) meaningful autonomy at the school site, (c)

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clear distribution of power among members, (d) relevant knowledge and skills, (e) transparency and integrity, (f) good information distribution, (g) entrepreneurship and (h) recognition for performance.

In addition, different stakeholders should understand their power accordingly and be able to play their legitimate roles for success of the school site financial management. Surrendering authority to stakeholders that are incapable of performing their duty will only worsen the situation and generate equally unproductive outcomes (Chikoko, 2009). Among all these strategies, transparency and integrity have become the main issues frequently highlighted in many developing countries. It symbolizes ethics and moral empowerment for every government organization’s level. In recent issues of public sector financial management in Malaysia, integrity has been highlighted as the most essential component that should be cultivated in the hearts of all public servants (Ahmad Zaki Husin, 2001; Zulkurnain Awang & Xavier, 2001). Integrity is important to avoid any mismanagement, corruption and dishonesty in managing the public money and further facilitate the aim of reaching an effective level of financial management. For the neighbouring developing countries such as Indonesia, transparency and clean control functions and mechanism were seen as a vital effort to be applied in the reform of education decentralisation since 2001 (Kristiansen & Pratikno, 2006).

The importance of skills and professional development have been described in previous studies as a key variable formula to be adapted to the new changing context of school based management (Al-Taneiji & McLeod, 2008; Bandur, 2009; Ho, 2010; Maszuria Adam, Azuraida Shahadan, Muhammad Faizal A. Ghani, & Sharil@Charil Marzuki, 2008). The principal, teachers and the supporting staff require special training and preparation that could enable them to handle the additional administrative tasks integrated in this financial reform agenda. Ho (2010) did find that in order to form a sound school based budget, the relevant school members have to be equipped with practical knowledge in school financial management and accounting, interpersonal and communication skills, knowledge of the relevant laws and regulations and further capability in collecting and distributing relevant information among the school members. Even more, the local government was recommended to provide relevant materials on school based management in the form of research and public seminars or workshops to advocate more for the technical practices thus improving the school members’ understanding on their tasks and responsibilities (Bandur, 2009, 2011).

This study highlighted several important elements which were in line with recent propositions of continuous improvement in schools by Anderson and Kumari (2009). The prominent factor above all was a dynamic vision for school development which is widely communicated and understood among all the internal and external school members. Furthermore, the school leaders mainly the principal or head teachers should have strategic interactions with external resources that could bring opportunity for increasing school resources. Schools should be able to take advantage of the external policies, private sector involvement and many local developments as a process that could accelerate school improvement through sound financial management. Then, schools should also create initiatives for investing in professional capacity development for the relevant school stakeholders especially the principals and teachers in order to prepare them for challenging future needs of schools management. As a consequence, the necessity for performance recognition cannot be denied. The higher authority could provide many ways of establishing appreciation for the school members through award and honour to schools or staff members and even bonus and salary increment for staff with constant excellent contribution. Evidence from Western China has shown that teachers’ salaries and remuneration were established based on their academic experience and the performance bonuses were determined from students’ exam scores (Liu, Murphy, Tao, & An, 2009). By providing incentives to teachers through achievable economic bonuses, it was seen as a tool to increase their motivation which then associated with subsequent improved exam results among the students.

Based on the existing context of school-based management in Malaysia and future vision for a better improvement, it is suggested that the contribution of Parent Teacher Associations (PTA) or PIBG is strengthened by selecting specific committee members to assists schools involving the financial matters. The scope of tasks could be revised and the best example for references should be the function played by school’s Board of Governors established in some government-aided schools such as Mission schools in Malaysia. In this case, the higher authority should take the initiative to improve the current policies through a formal circular regarding the school finance matters. In addition, entrepreneurship among members should enable schools to vary their school income generation efforts. In other words, schools should increase their marketing plan by referring to many successful private schools and avoid the typical public school stance of heavy reliance on the government. Schools should start by leasing some important facilities to the public and selling products invented by students especially from the technical and vocational schools. Schools must develop the culture of innovation in the heart of every school member including teachers and students.

Therefore, the efforts for school based financial management effectiveness should receive serious actions by all stakeholders. The success of this reform will only be realized through the improvement of the public schools’ mind set and aggressive actions by the school leaders and their teams. The higher authority should start bringing exposure to all school leaders on their authority and accountability besides necessary strategies that should be undertaken through eight elements proposed by this research. The financial decentralization in public schools in Malaysia will only succeed

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through collaboration by all stakeholders equipped by good school vision and mission, meaningful autonomy, clear distribution of power, relevant knowledge and skills, transparency and integrity, good information distribution, entrepreneurship, and recognition for performance by the higher authority.

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Bullock, A., & Thomas, H. (1997). Schools at the centre? A study of decentralisation. London, UK: Routledge.

Caldwell, B. J. (2003). School based management and its potential to enhance decentralization in education. Paper presented at the Third International Forum on Education Reform, Bangkok, Thailand.

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Chikoko, V. (2009). Educational decentralisation in Zimbabwe and Malawi: A study of decisional location and process. International Journal of Educational Development, 29(3), 201-211. doi: 10.1016/j.ijedudev.2008.05.003

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Ho, H.-f. (2010). The prospects for the implementation of School-based Financial Management in Taiwan. International Education Studies, 3(1), 145-150.

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Relationship between Learning Strategies and Motivation by using Structural Equation Modeling ApproachMohamad Azrien Mohamed Adnan [1], Mohd Sahari Nordin [2], Mohd Burhan Ibrahim [3]

[1] Academy of Islamic Studies University of Malaya Nilam Puri, Kelantan [email protected]



ABSTRACT

This paper aimed at examining the learning strategies constructs and to investigate the relationship between learning strategies and motivation in Arabic courses. The study uses a questionnaire as the information-gathering instrument, and the participants comprised students from two public universities in Peninsular Malaysia who are studying Arabic language. A total of 139 students were selected for this study. The questionnaire’s construct validity was tested using confirmatory factor analysis. Confirmatory factor analysis indicated that a model including factors representing the dimensions metacognitive self-regulation, organization and peer learning was the best fit. Significant correlations between motivation and learning strategies subscales (metacognitive self-regulation and organization) provided preliminary evidence of predictive validity of the measure. Metacognitive self-regulation strategy has positive correlation with organization and peer learning strategy. The organization strategy was also positively correlated to peer learning strategy. The metacognitive self-regulation and organization have significant effect on motivation. Contrary to our expectation, peer learning has no significant effect on motivation.

Keywords: Learning strategies, motivation, and structural equation modeling

INTRODUCTION

Learning strategies play an important role in second/foreign language learning and the role of learning strategies in student learning has been explored by many researchers in recent years (Lai, 2009; Li & Chun, 2012; Macaro, 2001; Mohamad Azrien & Shukeri, 2011; Qiufang & Lifei, 2004). It is believed that the use of effective learning strategies is an important factor for successful learning and that students may need a variety of strategies to regulate their own learning (Marsh, Hau, Artelt, Baumert, & Peschar, 2006; Zimmerman & Martinez‐Pons, 1990).

Researchers have defined learning strategies in various ways. Mayer (2007) explained that a learning strategy refers to the cognitive processes developed by students during learning to improve the quality of learning and help the students achieve their respective goals. Zimmerman (2000) suggested that learning strategies should be incorporated into the framework of self‐regulated learning (SRL), which refers to “self‐generated thoughts, feelings, and actions that are planned and cyclically adapted to the attainment of personal goals” (p. 14). The use of learning strategies, therefore, can be viewed as a sub‐construct of SRL.

Self‐regulated students participate proactively in the learning process emotionally, motivationally and cognitively. These students have their intention of self‐activated and self‐directed efforts in order to gain knowledge and skills by using specific strategies (Nota, Soresi, & Zimmerman, 2004). Pintrich, Smith, Garcia, and McKeachie (1991) have come up with a manual for the use of the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) which categorized self‐regulated learning into two main strategies. First is a cognitive and meta‐cognitive strategy which includes rehearsal, elaboration, organization, critical thinking and meta‐cognitive self‐regulation. Second are resource management strategies which include time and study environment, effort regulation, peer learning and help seeking.

Zimmerman and Martinez‐Pons (1986) identified 14 commonly used academic self‐regulated learning strategies which include: self‐evaluation, organizing and transforming, goal setting and planning, seeking information, keeping

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Figure 2: Conceptual Framework of Self-Regulated Learning Strategies and Motivation

Self‐Regulated Learning

Constructs

Metacognitive Self‐Regulation

MotivationOrganization

Peer Learning

record and monitoring, environmental structuring, self‐consequences, rehearsing and memorizing, seeking peer assistance, seeking teacher assistance, seeking adult assistance, reviewing tests, reviewing notes and reviewing texts. They used a structured interview called self‐regulated learning interview schedule (SRLIS) in order to assess how these strategies were implemented.

Learning strategy is not enough to improve student achievement. Students should be motivated to use strategies, and organize cognitions and their efforts (Paris, Lipson, & Wixson, 1983). Motivation is the internal power that drives individuals to act in order to satisfy their desire (Yates, 2004). Mohamad Azrien (2006) explored the relationship between motivation components and self‐regulated learning components in an Arabic course. In his study, the construct validity was tested using exploratory factor analysis. His findings revealed that most of the factors in the motivation components were significantly correlated with the self‐regulated learning components. Therefore, this study aims is aimed at confirming the relationship between learning strategies and motivation in Arabic courses taken by Arabic students of two public universities in Malaysia.

Theoretical Framework and Hypothesis Development

Self‐Regulated Learning Theory According to self‐regulated learning theory, self‐regulated learning is an integrated learning process, which

occurs when individuals attempt to adjust the characteristics of their own behaviour, motivation, and cognition to best suit their own learning. Pintrich (1999) described self‐regulated learning as an active, constructive process whereby learners set goals for their learning plan actions and monitor, regulate and control their cognition, motivation and behaviour.

An important aspect of self‐regulated learning theory is that student learning and motivation are interdependent. Their learning strategy enables them to be self‐aware, knowledgeable, and decisive in implementing their learning strategy. While in terms of motivation, they posses high self‐efficacy, self‐attribution and intrinsic task interest. Their self‐motivation is also evident in their continuing tendency to set higher learning goals for themselves when they achieve the earlier goals (Zimmerman, 1990). In that level, self‐regulated learners are not only self‐directed but are self‐motivated as well.

According to Pintrich et al. (1991), learning strategies can be classified into cognitive, metacognitive, and resource management strategies. In this study, we only used cognitive and metacognitive strategy as our theoretical framework. The cognitive and metacognitive strategies can be further classified into metacognitive self‐regulation, organization and peer learning. Paris et al. (1983) suggested that using self‐regulated learning strategies promotes students’ motivational beliefs. Therefore, it is expected that metacognitive self‐regulation, organization strategy and peer learning strategy have some effects on motivation. Figure 1shows the conceptual framework of self‐regulated learning strategies and motivation.

Metacognitive self‐regulation

Metacognition refers to the awareness, knowledge and control of cognition (Pintrich et al., 1991). It contains three essential skills, namely planning, monitoring and evaluating. Planning refers to the appropriate selection of strategies and the correct allocation of resources that affect task performance. Monitoring refers to one’s awareness of

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comprehension and task performance and evaluating refers to appraising the final product of a task and the efficiency of that task performance. This can include re‐evaluating the strategies used. Therefore in this study, it is hypothesised that:

Hypothesis 1: Metacognitive self‐regulation strategy has an effect on motivation

Organisation strategy

Organisation strategy is a deeper processing strategy which includes activities such as selecting the main idea from reading text, outlining text or reading material and using a variety of specific techniques for selecting and organising the ideas for example sketching a network and mapping the important ideas (Pintrich, 1999). These activities results in students being actively involved in the task and should result in better performance. In the current study, it is hypothesized that:

Hypothesis 2: Organizational strategy has an effect on motivation

Peer learning

Communication and discussion with peers can help a student clarify and elaborate more on reading materials. Peer learning strategy includes activities of collaboration, communication and discussion with peers during the process of learning (Pintrich et al., 1991). The activities can help students to clarify and elaborate more on learning materials. These activities are normally found in cooperative learning as students will interact with their peers within the group. According to Stefanou and Salisbury‐Glennon (2002), the use of peer learning indicated significant effects due to involvement in a learning community on motivation. Therefore, it is hypothesized that:

Hypothesis 3: Peer learning strategy has an effect on motivation

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The proposed model and hypotheses were estimated by structural equation modeling (SEM), which is a powerful multivariate technique for analysing causal models. A structural equation modeling composed of a measurement model and a structural model. The measurement model is estimated using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to test whether the latent variables possess sufficient construct validity. The structural model is used to present the relations of causal effects among the latent variables. The data analysis proceeded with the two‐step approach of the structural equation modeling. In this study, the motivation is the endogenous variables. The exogenous latent variables include metacognitive self‐regulation, organization and peer learning.

Sample description

The questionnaires was adopted and adapted from the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaires (MSLQ) originally developed by Pintrich et al. (1991). This instrument was one of the most frequently used (see for example Easton & McColl, 1997; Gay, Mills, & Airasian, 2006). Each item was measured on a seven‐point Likert scale, ranging from not at all true of me (= 1) to very true of me (= 7). Data were collected from two public universities in Malaysia. The participants in this study were university students who enrolled in undergraduate degree programmes in Arabic language study. The population was sampled by cluster sampling methods. A total of 220 questionnaires were sent and 139 were returned. Respondents who participated in this study consisted of 27 men (19.4%) and 112 women (80.6%). All the subjects had formally studied Arabic for six years in high school. They ranged from the second semester up to the final year.

Reliability

To examine the internal consistent reliability of the observed item questionnaire, Cronbach’s alpha was assessed. The resulting alpha values ranged from .650 to .904, which were above the acceptable threshold, as shown in Table 1.

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RESULT

Assessment of the Measurement Model

The measurement model was assessed by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). According to Segars and Grover (1993), the measurement model should be evaluated first before generating the best overall model fit. The hypothesized 3‐factor measurement model was evaluated using confirmatory factor analysis to assess the factorial validity of the measurement model.

The values for composite reliability (CR) and average variance expected (AVE) were needed in order to obtain the divergent validity. Yates (2004)suggest that the recommended threshold of average variance extracted is 0.5, while Hair Jr, Black, Babin, Anderson, and Tatham (2010) suggest that the recommended threshold of composite reliability should be greater than 0.7. All composite reliabilities measures of constructs exceed the recommended threshold of 0.7. The factor loadings that are smaller than the recommended level of 0.5 should be removed. Discriminant validity can be tested by comparing the square roots of the AVE with the correlations among the constructs. All of the square roots of the AVE by constructs were greater than the correlation among constructs as shown in Table 1, so discriminant validity was supported. In brief, the measurement model assessment, including convergent and discriminate validity measures, was satisfactory.

The overall model fit was assessed in terms of four measures. These indices included: the chi‐square/degree

of freedom (2/d.f), the traditional chi‐square (CMIN), the degree of freedom (DF), the Comparative Fit of Index (CFI) and the Root Mean Square of Error Approximation (RMSEA) (Hair Jr et al., 2010) to obtain a model fit. The CFI value must exceed 0.90 and the RMSEA value must be lower than 0.08 (Schumacker & Lomax, 2004) in order to obtain an

acceptable fit with the data. Hayduk (1988) suggests that 2 /d.f should not exceed 3. Accordingly, all the fitness measures in this research fell into acceptable ranges using CFA. Consequently, the proposed model provided a suitable fit.

Table 1: Estimates of the measurement model

Construct ItemFactor

Loading Cronbach’s

alpha CR AVE

Metacognitive

Read the task carefully 0.789

.879 0.909 0.598

I check again if I made a mistake 0.773I try to remember what the

lecturer said 0.807

I try to remember the fact0.745

I try to put together the information from class

0.750

I work hard to get good grade 0.618

Organization

While reading, I stop once in a while

0.844

.821 0.825 0.543 I think what to learn 0.643

I can concentrate on my course work 0.762

I reflect all the steps in the procedure of task solving 0.682

Peer Learning

I identify student for help 0.769

.807 0.808 0.584 I ask another students 0.747

I try to work with other students 0.776

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We estimated the proposed model by using structural equation modeling with the maximum likelihood estimation method. The chi‐square goodness‐of‐fit test showed that the model did not fit the data well, ÷ 2 = 94.533, p < .05. Although the model did not fit well by the chi‐square test, the baseline comparisons fit indices of CFI were close to or exceeded 0.9 (CFI = 0.959) and the ratio chi‐square /d.f. is 1.525. The RMSEA showed a value of 0.066 indicating a good model fit. Accordingly, the recommended thresholds and results of the measurement model fitness indicate a good model fit. Figure 2 shows the results of the measurement model.

Figure 3: The Measurement model of Students' Learning Strategies

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Analysis of Path Coefficient

Based on the good fit of the measurement model, the path coefficients of the structural model were then estimated. Figure 3 shows the results of path coefficient analysis.

Figure 4: Relationship among learning strategies constructs and motivation

Empirical Findings

According to the path coefficient, results showed that organization strategy was positively correlated to peer learning strategy and metacognitive self‐regulation strategy (r = 0.63, p < .001 and r = .58, p < .001, respectively). The results indicated that students, who had a better organization strategy, would have better peer learning and metacognitive self‐regulation strategy. Peer learning strategy was significantly correlated with metacognitive self‐regulation strategy (r = .57, p < .001). Students who had more strategies in peer learning were found to be using more strategies in metacognitive self‐regulation.

Metacognitive self‐regulation strategy has direct influence on motivation (β = 0.31, p < .001), supporting hypothesis 1. Organizational strategy also has direct influence on motivation (β = 0.33, p < .001), supporting hypothesis 2. Contrary to expectation, peer learning strategy has no significant effect on motivation (β = 0.00, p < .998, sohypothesis 3 was not supported.

DISCUSSION

This study was conducted to assess the reliability and validity of the students’ learning strategies instrument by applying confirmatory factor analysis to a Malaysian case and to examine the relationship between learning strategies construct and motivation. The results of the CFA provided support for a three‐factor model of learning strategies consisting of metacognitive self‐regulation, organization and peer learning. Results suggested that the three‐factor model was the best overall fit to the data. The metacognitive self‐regulation dimension was represented by six indicators related to reading task carefully, reading again, checking task from mistakes, trying to remember what the lecturers said, trying to remember the facts, trying to put together the information, and trying to work hard to get good grade. The organization dimension was represented by four indicators which are stopping once while reading, thinking what to learn, concentrating on the course work, and reflecting all the steps in the procedure of task solving. The peer learning dimension was represented by three indicators namely identifying students, asking friends, and working with other students.

Considering our findings for the structural model, where we examined the relationship between learning strategies constructs and motivation, the results revealed that metacognitive self‐regulation and organization were significantly correlated to motivation. The R2 of 0.322 suggested that the independent variables accounted for 32.2% of the total variance explained by the independent variable, which indicated a good effect size.

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The results of this study have practical implication for language learning strategies. The preliminary predictive validity evidence suggests that the questionnaire may be useful for teachers who wish to identify students who are in need of instruction in how to self‐regulate their learning. Language teachers could use the questionnaire at the item or subscale level to help identify particular weaknesses in their students’ learning approaches. Teachers would do well to introduce and implement such strategies as how to formulate and develop a concept, how to create analogies, and how to apply a mnemonic device in order to help their students maintain their learning strategies.

Future Research

This study was conducted in only two public universities involving a small sample size. It is therefore restricted in terms of its generalizability. Thus further research is required to validate the instrument with students from other higher educational institution, and with a bigger sample which would allow generalising of the findings. Also, future studies may examine the causal effect between learning strategies, motivation and achievement.

REFERENCES

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Research and Trends in the Studies of School-Based Oral English Assessment from 2003 to 2011: A Review of Selected JournalsNur Diana Mohd Kamal [1], Saedah Siraj [2], Norlidah Alias [3], Mohammad Attaran [4]




[4] Faculty of Education, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur attaran @um.edu.my

ABSTRACT

Assessing oral proficiency is a real challenge for English language practitioners. Throughout the process of assessing, many features of oral competence are worth given attention by teachers as the assessors. As such, the Malaysian Ministry of Education has urged for another alternative for oral assessment in 2002 with the intention of revamping and improvising the existing system. This new assessment is none other than School-Based Oral English Assessment (SBOEA). Therefore, this paper intends to review the studies done on the implementation of School-Based Oral English Assessment (SBOEA). Among the 15 articles selected from 2003 to 2011, 7 of them focused on the Malaysian school context. The rest of articles touched on School-Based Assessment in other contexts and speaking test as a whole. Based on this review, it is now possible to postulate that most studies were conducted to investigate respondents’ attitude and perception toward this type of assessment. At this juncture, it is also obvious that mixed methods which involve the use of both quantitative and qualitative study are the most preferred method in the studies of School-Based Oral Assessment. Although the use of questionnaire is fairly dominant in these journals articles, it is noted that other instruments such as semi-structured interview, observation and document analysis were also employed for data analysis. In addition, the insight and the data gained from these studies could be beneficial for future reference in reviewing and modifying the implementation of School-Based English Oral Assessment in Malaysia. As such, the findings drawn from the studies can shed some light for better implementation in Malaysia.

Keywords: school-based assessment, studies, review, research purpose, trend

INTRODUCTION

Throughout the years, it is universally acknowledged that assessment has played an integral part in teaching and learning at any learning institution around the world. The word “assessment” itself may have been interpreted distinctively by concerned parties. For example, Gurnam, Chan, and Sarjit (2011) state that five different parties which include policy maker, administrator, teacher, parent and student may hold different perceptions and conceptions on assessment. According to Gurnam et al., policy makers define assessment as standards to monitor the quality of education. Administrators view assessment as a means to monitor the strengths and weaknesses of a program whereas teachers use assessment as a tool for monitoring student progress and performance. By contrast, students perceive assessment as an indicator of their ongoing progress and performance. Instead, parents regard assessment as a kind of feedback on their child’s progress as well as the gauge to indicate the school’s accountability in offering effective teaching and learning. In this sense, the assessment system not only affects teaching and learning but it does affect the society at large. Hence, Mariam and Sabrin (2008) concur that new approaches to assessment are certainly necessary for educational reform.

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Traditionally, assessment in Malaysian schools was centralised on national examination. Students were required to sit for three main public examinations as a prerequisite to the next level of education. In Hamzah and Paramasivan (2009), these principal examinations have been generally known to Malaysians as the Primary School Assessment (UPSR), the Lower Secondary Assessment Examination (PMR) and the Malaysian Certificate of Education (SPM). Nevertheless, School‐Based Assessment was introduced in 2002 as a move away from traditional teaching to keep abreast with changing trends of assessment. In other words, this initiative was also a directive from our Ministry of Education aimed to suit the global trend of decentralisation of assessment. One of the reasons for this implementation is to help improve students’ communicative competence which is parallel to the learning outcomes outlined in the English Language Syllabus for Malaysian Secondary Schools (Lembaga Peperiksaan Malaysia, 2002). To meet this need, School‐Based Oral English Assessment (SBOEA) was integrated for the teachers to promote the improvement of English communication skills.

According to Gurnam, Chan, and Azleena (2011), the rationale for integrating School‐Based Oral English Assessment (SBOEA) into the School‐Based Assessment component is the power of this alternative assessment as an authentic form in assessing students’ actual speaking activity. In comparison, the conventional Oral English Test administered before 2002 failed to offer true reflection of students’ actual communication skill (Gurnam, Chan et al., 2011). In addition, Zaitun, Arshad, Mazanah, and Malachi (2011) believe that SBOEA mandates both teaching and testing to be integrated in the English classroom. In this respect, these ongoing oral assessments can also promote teaching and learning in the English classroom as they are conducted three times throughout two years of upper Secondary education. In gaining more insightful information on the implementation of SBOEA, a review has been done on selected journals from different educational publications. This review of published articles in academic journals has seen various areas of studies conducted. This variance comprises the perception, perspectives and attitude, similarities and differences, influencing factors, knowledge and understanding and the concerns on the implementation of School‐Based Assessment. Therefore, the following sections will discuss the review findings according to research purpose, method, results and discussion, implications and conclusions as well as limitations of the research.

Research purpose

This paper intended to investigate the research and trends in the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment (SBOEA). The articles published by 13 different educational journals such as Journal of Malaysian English Language Teaching Association (MELTA), Journal of English Language Teaching, Asian EFL Journal, Journal of the English Teacher, The International Journal of Educational and Psychological Assessment, Procedia Social and Behavioural Sciences, Malaysian Journal of Learning and Instruction, Journal of US‐China Education Review, International Education Studies, Language Testing, Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism Education, JALT Testing and Evaluation and Educational Studies between the years 2003 and 2011 were reviewed by research topic, journal, publication year, research purpose and trend.

The review of selected journals might outline the research trends and patterns of the articles related to School‐Based Oral English Assessment (SBOEA) in recent years. The trend may encompass the methodology used (whether it is qualitative or quantitative) and the instruments used in gathering data. As such, it is hoped that this review can help school administrators, English Head of Panel as well as English teachers in Malaysia to gain some better insight into the publishing trends of School‐Based Oral Assessment studies. To a larger extent, this review could be somehow beneficial for the Teacher Education Division (Bahagian Pendidikan Guru) and Malaysian Examination Syndicate (Lembaga Peperiksaan Malaysia) to improve the existing assessment and to promote further study on the subject matter. In addition, the insight offered by this review could be useful for future reference in reviewing and modifying the implementation of School‐Based English Oral Assessment especially in Malaysia.

Hence, three research questions were developed to guide this review. They were as follows:

1. Which context shows the highest percentage of conducting studies on School‐Based Oral English Assessment?

2. How many categories can be generated based on research topics?

3. What was the trend of the studies conducted on School‐Based Oral English Assessment in these eight years?

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METHOD

Research papers for review

This paper used articles published by 13 different educational journals which include Journal of Malaysian English Language Teaching Association (MELTA), Journal of English Language Teaching, Asian EFL Journal, Journal of the English Teacher, The International Journal of Educational and Psychological Assessment, Procedia Social and Behavioural Sciences, Malaysian Journal of Learning and Instruction, Journal of US‐China Education Review, International Education Studies, Language Testing, Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism Education, JALT Testing and Evaluation and Educational Studies.

It is worth noting that this paper only provides a review on selected journal articles. Any other research documents such as book review and unpublished theses are not included for this review. In order to find the related articles, some key terms were used and those terms included “School‐Based Oral Assessment”, “School‐Based Assessment”, “Oral Assessment” and “Speaking Test”. These journal articles were then selected when the contexts have primarily focused on assessment of English oral production, not other languages than English. As a result, 15 articles were identified to meet these requirements best. Based on the 15 selected journal articles, the review was done by analysing abstracts and other significant sections such as method and data collection in order to determine the publishing trends of School‐Based Oral Assessment studies.

Research topic analysis

The purpose of analyzing the research topic is to determine the number of studies which were closely related on School‐Based Oral English Assessment. In reviewing 15 selected articles from 13 different educational journals, the research topics were first categorized into seven different categories based on the research topics themselves. In relation to the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment, these respective categories include: perception, similarities and differences, analysing factors, knowledge and understanding, concerns, washback effects and miscellaneous. Table 1 will further explain the content of the articles based on different categories:

Table 1: Research topic analysis

No. Categories Description No. of

articles

1. Perception

Articles in this research category generally discuss perceptions, reactions, perspectives and views on School-Based Oral English Assessment from different parties. The data were obtained from different groups of respondents including teachers, students and parents.

5

2. Similarities andDifferences

This topic of research touches on similarities and differences in teachers’ and students’ perception on School-Based Oral English Assessment. However, this article is hardly categorised under ‘Perception’ category because of the absence of such word in the research topic.

1

3.Analysingfactors

This category explores the influencing factors which are associated with oral performance. 1

4. Knowledge andunderstanding

This topic category generally focuses on teachers’ knowledge and understanding of School-Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia as a whole.

1

5. Concerns

This topic of research includes the concerns expressed by teachers on the implementation of School-Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia. 1

6.Washback

effects

This category includes a study which aimed to determine the washback effects of an oral assessment among EFL learners. 1

7. Miscellaneous Articles that fall under this category are quite general in 5

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nature (somehow related to School-Based Assessment and Oral Assessment) and hardly categorised under aforementioned categories. The following includes the research topic for these articles:

School-Based Assessment: Will it really change the Education Scenario in Bangladesh (Mariam & Sabrin, 2008) Oral Examination Assessment Practices: Effectiveness and Change with a First Year Undergraduate Cohort (Oakley & Hencken, 2005) Assessing speaking in Japanese junior high schools: Issues for the senior high school entrance examinations (Akiyama, 2003) Interaction in group oral assessment: A case study of higher and lower scoring students (Zhendong, 2010) Rating criteria for the three speaking test format: Monologue, dialogue and multilogue (Nakamura, 2009)

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Percentage for contexts related to the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment

By reviewing these 15 journals articles from 2003 to 2011, it is noted that seven of these articles were closely related to the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia. The analysis can be further explained as presented in Table 2.

Table 2: Number of articles related to the studies of School-Based Oral English Assessment for different contexts

Contexts Msia HK Japan Bdesh UK S’pore Cbia

Related articles 7 2 2 1 1 1 1

First, the review has identified that 7 of the selected articles were closely related to Msia (Malaysia). As for HK (Hong Kong) and Japan, 2 articles were closely related to each country respectively. By contrast, the review has revealed that only 1 article was related to the following countries: Bdesh (Bangladesh), UK, S’pore (Singapore) and Cbia (Colombia). Based on the information presented in Table 2, a pie chart was generated to provide a clear picture of percentage for contexts related to the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment.

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Figure 1: Percentage for contexts related to the studies of School-Based Oral English Assessment

From the preceding analysis, it can be seen that almost half (46%) of 15 articles published in 13 educational journals between 2003 and 2011 were related to School‐Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia. As for the Hong Kong and Japan context, the articles analysed represent 13% of the overall percentage. Also, Fig. 1 has proven that other countries such as Bangladesh, UK, Singapore and Colombia only constitute 1% of the percentage of the related articles. Therefore, based on this analysis, it is feasible to conjecture that most studies on School‐Based Oral English Assessment have been conducted in Malaysia.

Research purpose analysis

After reviewing 15 selected articles from 13 different educational journals, it is now possible to categorise the articles into six different categories based on various research purposes. These respective categories include: perception, analysing factors, knowledge and understanding, concerns, washback effects and miscellaneous. The rationale of this is to find the most common purpose related to the studies on School‐Based Oral English Assessment. The following table will provide further elaboration of the area of studies based on different categories:

No.; Malaysia; 7; 46%

No.; Hong Kong; 2; 13%

No.; Japan; 2; 13%

No.; Bangladesh;

1; 7%

No.; UK; 1; 7%

Singapore 7%

Colombia7%

Percentage for contexts related to the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment

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Table 3: Research purpose analysis

No. Purpose Description No. of

articles

1. Perception

Articles in this research category generally aim to find out perceptions, reactions, perspectives and views on the following matters: the implementation of SBOEA, challenges and problems arise, its effectiveness as an accurate gauge, impact and consequences of SBOEA. Instead, two articles among these eight focus on the similarities and differences as well as the relationship in perceptions between different parties. Those parties included teachers, students and parents.

8

2. Analysing factors

This topic of research generally hopes to identify factors associated to students’ oral performance. Besides that, study was also done on the relationship between these factors and students’ oral scores.

1

3.Knowledge andunderstanding

This category investigates teachers’ knowledge and understanding of SBOEA in Malaysia. The subject matters comprise of objectives, the implementation (pre, while and post administration) and challenges faced.

1

4. Concerns

This topic category investigates the concerns of the teachers on School-Based Assessment at 5 stages using the model from Hall, George, and Rutherford (1977).

1

5. Washback effects

This topic of research was conducted to determine the washback effects of an oral assessment between experimental and comparison group. 1

6. Miscellaneous

Articles falling under this category touch on Oral Assessment in general and are still considered to have little connection with School-Based Assessment. These three articles do not share the same purpose.

Zhendong (2010) – identify the interactional features that characterise a group of higher-scoring and lower-scoring students’ participation in group oral assessment Nakamura (2009) – Rating criteria for the three speaking test formats: Monologue, Dialogue and Multilogue Akiyama (2003) – discuss how high school teachers in Tokyo assess speaking skill

3

As can be seen from Table 3, it is noted that 8 articles fall under the ‘Perception’ category. Articles that fall under this category were written by Gurnam, Chan, and Sarjit (2011), Liying, Andrews, and Ying (2011), Zaitun, Arshad, Mazanah, and Malachi (2011), Norashikin, Mohan, Shashi Kumar, and Emily (2010), Suseela and Sim (2010), Hamzah and Paramasivan (2009), Mariam and Sabrin (2008) and Oakley and Hencken (2005). In comparison, only 1 article can be categorised into these respective groups: Analysing factors (Chan, Gurnam, Norhamimah, & Norazah, 2011), Knowledge and Understanding (Gurnam, Chan, & Azleena, 2011), Concerns (Faizah, 2011) and Washback Effects (Muñoz & Álvarez, 2010). Under ‘Miscellaneous’ category, 3 articles (Akiyama, 2003; Nakamura, 2009; Zhendong, 2010) were considered to fit into this category.

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Figure 2: Percentage of research purpose analysis

The published percentage of related purpose in each category for 15 selected journal articles between the years 2003 to 2011 are presented in Fig. 2. Fig. 2 reveals that ‘Perception’ has made up more than half (53%) of the overall percentage. That is to say, “Perception” is the most common category among all. In addition, it is also worth noting that many researchers were interested in studying respondents’ perceptions and views on School‐Based Oral English Assessment based on this analysis. This highest percentage is then followed by ‘Miscellaneous’ (20%), Washback effects, Concerns and Knowledge and Understanding which respectively accounted for 7%. It is also interesting to note that ‘Analysing factors’ had 1% less than the second lowest even though they share the same number of articles.

Trends of the studies conducted on School‐Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia

In determining the trend of the studies conducted on School‐Based Oral English Assessment for the past eight years (2003 ‐ 2011), it is worth giving attention to the methodology employed and the instruments used in gathering data. In terms of methodology, the articles from selected educational journals can be categorised into three categories: quantitative, qualitative and both quantitative and qualitative. According to Cohen, Manion, and Morrison (2011), quantitative study involves the prospect of analysing numerical data. By contrast, Cohen et al. define qualitative study as data analysis which involves organising, accounting for and explaining the data and often largely lies on interpretation. The following Tab. 4 summarises the methodology employed and instrument used in the studies of selected journal articles.

Table 4: Trends of the studies conducted on School-Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia

No. Title Author(s) Methodology Instrument

1.

Between the Ideal and Reality: Teacher’s perception of the implementation of School-Based Oral English Assessment (SBOEA)

Hamzah Md Omar and Paramasivan Sinnasamy (2009)

Quantitative study Self-constructed

questionnaire

2.

School-Based Assessment in Malaysian Schools: The Concerns of the English teachers

Faizah A Majid (2011)

Quantitative study Questionnaire

No.of articles; Perception; 8; 53%

No.of articles; Analysing Factors; 1;

6%

No.of articles; Knowledge and

Understanding; 1; 7%

No.of articles; Concerns; 1; 7%

No.of articles; Washback effects; 1;

7%

Miscellaneous20%

Research purpose analysis

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No. Title Author(s) Methodology Instrument

3.

Impact and consequences of School-Based assessment (SBA): Students’ and parents’ views of SBA in Hong Kong

Liying Cheng, Stephen Andrews, and Ying Yu (2011)

Quantitative study

(Questionnaire)-1 for Students (SQ) and 1 for Parents (PQ)

4.

Assessing speaking in Japanese junior high schools: Issues for the senior high school entrance examinations

Tomoyasu Akiyama (2003)

Quantitative study Questionnaire and test

result analysis

5.

Rating criteria for the three speaking test format: Monologue, Dialogue and Multilogue

Nakamura Yuji (2009)

Quantitative study Questionnaire

6.

Upper Primary Teacher’s perception of PSLE English Oral Assessment

Norashikin Mohamed Noor, Mohan K. Muniandy, Shashi Kumar Shanmugan, and Emily Jothee Mathai (2010)

Qualitative study Semi-structured interview

7.

The School-Based Oral English Test: Similarities and Differences

Zaitun Abdul Majid, Arshad Abd Samad, Mazanah Muhammad, and Malachi Edwin Vethamani (2011)

Qualitative study Interview andobservation

8.

Teacher perspectives of school-based assessment in a secondary school in Kuala Lumpur

Suseela Malakolunthu and Sim Kwan Hoon (2010)

Qualitative study

Semi-structured interviews, Observation of Oral Assessment session

9.

Interaction in group oral assessment: A case study of higher and lower scoring students

Zhendong Gan (2010)

Qualitative study Observation (based ongroup oral assessment)

10.

Students’ Reactions to School – Based Oral Assessment: Bridging the Gap in Malaysia

Gurnam Kaur Sidhu, Chan Yuen Fook, Sarjit Kaur Sidhu (2011)

Quantitative and qualitative study

Questionnaire and Focus Group Interview

11.

Analyzing factors associated with students’ oral test performance

Chan Yuen Fook, Gurnam Kaur Sidhu, Norhamimah Rani, Norazah Abdul Aziz (2011)


Questionnaire, A set of Oral Test Paper, Semi – structured interview

12.

Teachers’ Knowledge and Understanding of the Malaysian School-Based Oral English Assessment

Gurnam Kaur Sidhu, Chan Yuen Fook, Azleena Mohamad (2011)


Questionnaire, Semi-structured interviews and document analysis

13. School-Based Assessment: Will Mariam Begum Quantitative and Questionnaire,

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No. Title Author(s) Methodology Instrument it Really Change the Education Scenario in Bangladesh

and Sabrin Farooqui (2008)

qualitative study interview and document analysis

14.Washback of an oral assessmentsystem in the EFL classroom

Ana P. Muñoz and Marta E. Álvarez (2010)


Surveys for students and teachers, class observations and external evaluations)

15.

Oral examination AssessmentPractices: Effectiveness andChange with a First YearUndergraduate Cohort

Ben Oakley and Clare Hencken (2005)

Quantitative andqualitative study

Questionnaire,observation

First, the results of this analysis revealed that mixed methods involving both quantitative and qualitative study are the most favoured methodology used for the studies on School‐Based Oral Assessment. This may be due to the notion that mixed method can enable rich data to be collected which later affords triangulation of the findings (Cohen et al., 2011). It can be seen that 6 articles out of 15 starting from Article No. 10 to 15 have employed this mixed method. The result is then followed by the use of quantitative study which includes 5 articles starting from No. 1 to 5 and 4 articles on qualitative study starting from No. 6 to 9.

As presented in Tab. 4, it can also be concluded that more than half of the studies (11 articles) have employed questionnaire as a main tool in gathering data. Owen (2002) believes that employing a questionnaire in an educational research is very beneficial as it offers unbiased representation of the population of interest. This claim may somehow explain the highest usage of questionnaire as a primary data collection method. Nonetheless, some other methods were also used in these articles and they involved the use of interview (7 articles), observation (5 articles) and document analysis (3 articles). Although a variety of methods used does exist, the questionnaire remains the most prevalent among all.

IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS

As mentioned in the previous section, three research questions were posed as a guide for this review. Hence, this section will elucidate the findings as well as implications derived from each research question. The first research question referred to the percentage for contexts which were related to the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment. This review has indicated that almost half of 15 journal articles from 2003 to 2011 were closely related to the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia. For instance, the review has identified that 7 of selected articles were closely related to the Malaysian context.

When the data were analysed into percentage form, it can be seen that 46% of these 15 articles were related to School‐Based Oral English Assessment in Malaysia. As such, it is possible to claim that a substantial number of studies had been conducted on the subject matter in Malaysia. This may somehow imply that many different parties in Malaysia were interested in studying the implementation of this School‐Based Oral English Assessment as a whole. Nonetheless, it would be interesting if more studies on such subject are also conducted in other countries.

The second research question concerned the research purposes related to School‐Based Oral English Assessment which were published in the selected journals over the past 8 years. After reviewing 15 selected articles from 13 different educational journals, it is now possible to categorise the articles into six different categories based on various research purposes. These respective categories include: perception, analysing factors, knowledge and understanding, concerns, washback effects and miscellaneous. The review has shown that 8 out of 15 articles fall under the ‘Perception’ category. In addition, Fig. 2 shows that ‘Perception’ makes up more than half (53%) of the overall percentage. In this respect, there were indications that most of researchers were interested in investigating the respondents’ perceptions, perspectives, views as well as attitudes toward School‐Based Oral English Assessment. Therefore, the insight offered by this review which comes in the form of feedback could be beneficial for future reference in reviewing and modifying the implementation of School‐Based Oral English Assessment needs assessment for program planning and program development especially in Malaysia. Nevertheless, more in‐depth investigation on

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other areas which may include teachers’ and students’ readiness, impact and consequences and the future of School‐Based Oral English Assessment are also deemed worthy of attention.

Additionally, the third research question investigated the trend of the studies conducted on School‐Based Oral English Assessment in these eight years. At this juncture, it is obvious that mixed methods which involve both quantitative and qualitative study are the most preferred method used for the studies on SBOEA. As presented in Tab. 4, it is noted that 6 articles out of 15 have employed mixed method. Besides that, this review has also indicated that the questionnaire appears to be a primary data resource as more than half of the studies (11 articles) have employed questionnaire as a main tool in gathering data. Inadvertently, this paper has disclosed that these two predominant trends are most preferable among recent researches. As such, it can also shed some light on the best selection of method and instrument in extending similar studies.

Limitations of the research

Taking all the results from journals, we have now gained a better insight into the research and trends in the studies of School‐Based Oral English Assessment. Nevertheless, it is worth addressing a few limitations of the studies in order to ensure precise interpretation of the findings. First, it is not too much to postulate that a limitation of this content analysis lies in the generalisation of the findings. Although almost half of the articles centred on the Malaysian context (7 articles), it is still hard to determine that most studies on School‐Based Oral English Assessment have been conducted in Malaysia. Under such circumstances, the results only offer us a snapshot of the studies in a particular context. As well, the findings offered by each study could not simply be generalised to other countries in the world. The purpose of conducting studies on School‐Based Oral English Assessment may vary from one place to another even in the same country, considering many other external factors. Second, it is obvious that the use of mixed method and questionnaire is the most prevalent among recent studies throughout this review. Nevertheless, it is also worth noting that the small number of selected articles (15 articles) can hardly represent the research trend around the globe. As well, it is also recommended that the studies be repeated in the next few years in other different contexts in order to get a precise picture of pattern and trend in the studies of the subject matter.

REFERENCES

Akiyama, T. (2003). Assessing speaking in Japanese junior high schools: Issues for the senior high school entrance examinations. JALT Testing and Evaluation, 7(2), 2-11.

Chan, Y. F., Gurnam Kaur Sidhu, Norhamimah Rani, & Norazah Abdul Aziz. (2011). Analysing factors associated with students’ oral test performance. The International Journal of Educational and Psychological Assessment, 9(11), 27-47.

Cohen, L., Manion, L., & Morrison, K. (2011). Research methods in Education (7th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.

Faizah A Majid. (2011). School-Based Assessment in Malaysian schools: The concerns of the English teachers. Journal of US-China Education Review, 8(10), 1-15.

Gurnam Kaur Sidhu, Chan, Y. F., & Azleena Mohamad. (2011). Teachers’ knowledge and understanding of the Malaysian School-Based Oral English Assessment. Malaysian Journal of Learning and Instruction, 8, 93-115.

Gurnam Kaur Sidhu, Chan, Y. F., & Sarjit Kaur Sidhu. (2011). Students’ reactions to School- Based Oral Assessment: Bridging the gap in Malaysia. Asian EFL Journal, 13(4), 300-327.

Hamzah Md. Omar, & Paramasivan Sinnasamy. (2009). Between the ideal and reality: Teacher’s perception of the implementation of School-Based Oral English Assessment. A Journal of the Malaysian English Language Teaching Association, 38(2), 13-29.

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Lembaga Peperiksaan Malaysia, Kementerian Pendidikan Malaysian. (2002). Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia. Pengendalian ujian lisan berasaskan sekolah (ULBS).

Liying, C., Andrews, S., & Ying, Y. (2011). Impact and consequences of School-Based Assessment (SBA): Students’ and parents’ views of SBA in Hong Kong. Language Testing, 28(2), 221-249.

Mariam Begum, & Sabrin Farooqui. (2008). School-Based Assessment: Will it really change the education scenario in Bangladesh. International Education Studies, 1(2), 45-53.

Muñoz, A. P., & Álvarez, M. E. (2010). Washback of an oral assessment system in the EFL classroom. Language Testing, 27(1), 33-49.

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Volume 01- Issue 03 July 2013

Documents

Transcript of Volume 01- Issue 03 July 2013