Things You May not know about Malaysian Higher Education System

Malaysia, a Commonwealth Nation and one of the few developing countries in Asia has heavily subsidised education and healthcare system. After its independence from the United Kingdom, the country‘s economy has grown rapidly with an average GDP growth of six percent per annum for almost 50 years and this success is largely due to quality of education in Malaysia. Malaysia introduced its Education Act in 1996, which dictates the Federal Government, the state and federal territories and the education ministry of Malaysia (widely known as Kementerian Pendidikan) to govern the education system of the country. In accordance with the law of the country, primary education and standardised tests are compulsory in Malaysia. Let’s have a look at Malaysia’s education system in.

Malaysian Higher Education System

Since 2004, the government formed the Ministry of Higher Education to oversee tertiary education in Malaysia. After completing post secondary education, where students complete 12months matriculation programme known as the ‘kolej matrikulasi’, students enrol in local universities. At present, there are 43 universities, 31 private university colleges, nine foreign university branch campuses and 414 private colleges in Malaysia. The Malaysian Qualifications Framework (MQF) is responsible for tertiary education in Malaysia and conducts unified system of post secondary qualifications on a national basis in the vocational and higher education sector. The higher education is inclined towards meritocracy as the government reduced the reliance of racial quotas in 2002. There are a number of public universities in Malaysia, but the public tertiary institutions have shortage of lecturers. To deal with the situation, it removed the need of a post-graduate degree of a lecturer in 2004.

What are the Benefits of Studying in Malaysia?

International Exposure to Students

Statistically, students around the globe are interested in private universities for its reputation and international education facilities and the same goes for Malaysian students too. Study in Malaysia is always beneficial because students get a chance to study in United States, United Kingdom and Australia as the public institutes have tie ups with foreign universities. The chance of getting international exposure and overseas qualifications are prove really beneficial for the students. Most of the private colleges offer a “twinning” programme where a student start its degree in a particular college and completes it in any other institution. Twinning is a education programme in which records of a student is transferable and admission to the partner institute for an associate degree is done easily maintaining the norms and regulations of the partnering university. On the top of that, there are foreign university branches (Monash University, Curtin University,  Swinburne University of Technology,Newcastle University Medicine, University of Southampton, Heriot-Watt University, University of Reading,Xiamen University, Royal College of Surgeons and University College Dublin) in Malaysia supporting international education.

The Malaysian education system attracts 5,000 talents annually which they call “brain gain”, a scheme set by Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad in 1995.  Late Datuk Dr Jamaluddin Jarjis, former Science, Technology and Innovation Minister in a parliamentary reply stated, “The scheme attracts 94 scientists (24 Malaysians) in pharmacology, medicine, semi-conductor technology and engineering from abroad between 1995 and 2000.”

Postgraduate Programmes

In Malaysia, the Master of Business Administration (MBA) and the Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) are gaining popularity. Every public and private university are offering these courses along with Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy.

Polytechnics

Malaysia also provides polytechnic courses for bachelor’s degree, advanced diploma, diploma and special skills certificate.