Admission
There are quite numerous educational institutions in Malaysia. Tertiary education in Malaysia includes public, private, foreign as well as private colleges. Students right from high school are required to submit a Certificate of Education as well as transcripts for each year of secondary education study completed plus a certificate in English translation to be allowed to enroll in the University or College. The Malaysian government launched the Malaysian Education Blueprint in 2013 which was meant to define the course of education reform over the next decade and address the challenges that were being experienced. The tertiary education is highly subsidized by the Malaysian government. At present, there are about 20 public and 32 private universities. Twining programs which involve creating partnerships between local school, as well as the foreign universities, has recently gained popularity.
Teachers play a critical role in commutating knowledge to students of different backgrounds and social set up. Teachers are usually more inclined to regard students as active participants while in a lesson than to see the teacher’s primary role as the transmitter of information and knowledge. However, to efficiently handle students of different cultural backgrounds, teachers can begin by getting to know students on a personal level and tailor the teaching style to use to suit students’ interests when possible thereby enabling students to utilize their talents and promoting student’s abilities by using them as examples. Learning involves communication which may either be verbal or non-verbal. Speaking to one another is the only way to facilitate verbal communication. Education leads to the transmission of values in defining cultural identity. While learning, verbal communication between teachers and students is indispensable. Facial expression, voice tone as well as body gestures mean a lot. When verbal and nonverbal messages fail to match up, the focus is shifted towards nonverbal messages. However, it may turn out to be difficult especially if nonverbal communication is not understood most likely because of diversity in cultural norms. According to Bennett (2003, p.257), culturally relevant teaching has three underlying principals which include the fact that students ought to experience academic success, they ought to develop and maintain cultural competence and develop a critical consciousness and thus help counter social injustice. In the education process, students get to categorize themselves into groups according to a particular race, social class or religion. These categories bring about social constructions of culture. They contribute immensely towards a sense of cultural identity. Teachers, in this case, have a significant role to play. They can use information about cultural identity to create learning environments that recognize the cultural contributions of students. Moreover, they educators should empower students to succeed in creating an enabling environment which embraces all cultures, diversity and celebrates the differences too. In this case, teachers should spend more time mentoring them rather than managing them.
Cultural identity is adapted and changed throughout life in response to political, economic, educational as well as social experiences. Different cultures have different expectations about eye contact, physical touch, body gestures etcetera. Gender, age, class, individual preference may make communication ever more challenging. However, integrating cultural identity into the learning environment has been a nightmare to many teachers especially because they have to come up with a system that accommodates students of all ethnic, racial, linguistic, social, religious or economic differences. Malaysians tend to value harmonious relationships. They respect the elderly and believe in face-saving. Eye contact, for example, may be taken to mean disrespect especially if a student from Latin America and Asian cultures avoid direct eye contact, especially when conversing with authoritative personalities. For an American Indian student, for example, looking a teacher in the eye when answering a question in front of the class may be taken to mean showing off. The teacher might not know this and may take this to say that the child is unmotivated, shy or inattentive.
Culture influences attitudes about physical contact are it a handshake, hug or pat on the back. In Asia, female friends often hold hands and men casually embrace one another as they walk. Americans, on the other hand, may feel quite uncomfortable doing so in public. In Asia, affectionately patting an adult’s head is strictly taboo, although it can be an acceptable behavior between adults and young children. When conversing, how close should be the distance between the two people? In the Middle East and South America, standing close to one another when conversing is the norm. However, European Americans prefer to have a larger distance when talking to one another whiles some African Americans prefer even more space. Not being aware of this fact can obscure people from understanding or accepting another person’s ideas.
Non-verbal communication ought to match with the verbal messaging.
Malaysian society comprises primarily of three large ethnic groups including Malay (65.1%), Chinese (26.0%), and Indians (7.7%) (Central Intelligence Agency, 2013). Each of these ethnic groups maintains its strong ethnic identity with its cultural customs, practices, language, values and belief (Abdul Rashid & Ho, 2003). Malaysian society remains ingrained with traditional values and historical practices. Though the Chinese are the minority in Malaysia, they are seen to be more proactive and outperform Malaysians in conducting business, in attending colleges’ etcetera. Worst case ever is the fact that discrimination is legalized in Malaysia and due to this, the Chinese and Indians who are the Minority are discriminated. Nevertheless, they still stand out and outperform the Malaysians. Over the last century, economic and social policy in Malaysia has been filled with discrimination particularly when Bumiputras have been favored while the Chinese and Indians have been discriminated. The preferential treatment of Bumiputras has been favored with justifying reasons such as growth and poverty among the Bumiputras surfacing the discussion. Ideally, reverse discrimination has been greatly evidenced especially in the higher education sector. Education policies in Malaysia have contributed to the inefficiency while income distribution has been thwarted. The Bumiputras have been on the receiving end of policies which favor them have been formulated and implemented.
There is a need for an affirmative action especially on the majority and empower the minority. Scrapping the legalized discriminatory rules is just one way to go about it.