Academic Credentials, Students’ Characteristics, Decision Making Behaviour Of Malaysian Polytechnics Students And Their Educational Choice
Loading...
Date
2018-01
Authors
Foo, Jyy Wei
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Universiti Sains Malaysia
Abstract
An understanding of the decision making process of post secondary education
by students is needed for administrators to successfully recruit and retain students.
This study seeks to provide research findings on Malaysian polytechnics’ students
educational choices regarding Technical and Vocational Education Training (TVET)
in terms of enrolment programme with students’ characteristics, academic credentials
and decision making behaviour. Student characteristics, academic credentials and
decision making behaviour were assessed via a self-report questionnaire; data
included socioeconomic status (SES), educational aspirations, performance in
secondary school, availability of desired programmes, employment opportunities,
satisficing, decision difficulty and alternative search. A participant selection (quan-
QUAL) explanatory sequential case study was carried out using a proportional
stratified sampling technique. There are 643 students from Malaysian polytechnics
who participated in this study. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS)
was used to analyse the collected data. Descriptive, multi layer crosstabs,
independent sample t test, logistic regression, rank biserial, chi-square tests and
spearman's rho were conducted to analyse the data. The results suggest that majority
of Malaysian Conventional Polytechnics students come from low socioeconomic
status family background with low parental education level, low total household
monthly income and performed averagely in their secondary school but have high
educational aspirations regardless of their educational choice on TVET. There is also
a moderate correlation between satisficing decision making behaviour and
maximizing decision making behaviour. 40 first semester students enrolled in
Malaysian conventional polytechnics in Terengganu were chosen as the participants
of the qualitative study.
Description
Keywords
Decision making behaviour of , Malaysian polytechnics students