The Impact of Educational Policy Borrowing

in a Malaysian University

UQ Postgraduate Research Community Conference 2017

Liyana Ahmad Afip

School of Education
The University of Queensland
 Overview

• Introduction
• Overview of English curriculum reform for University in
Malaysia
• Four stages of policy borrowing in Malaysia
• Discussion
• Conclusion
 Introduction
• The higher education sector  highly educated
workforce.
• English is the language of globalised world  graduates
able to communicate effectively in English within
Malaysia and internationally.
• Different institutional cultures of public universities
realistic approach (a general framework to design own
English language programmes and modify to suit own
circumstances) CEFR
 CEFR around the globe

Source: http://eltlearningjourneys.com/2016/02/01/extending-the-cefr-
across-english-and-the-globe/
CEFR targets in Malaysia

(source: Mohd Don, et al. 2015)

Background of the study
To address issue regarding English language
proficiency among graduates

CEFR based
Policy
 The need for reform
• Curriculum:
• No common curriculum across all
universities
• Programmes and courses not • Assessment:
informed by a common standard
of reference • Discrepancy between graduates’
English competency based on
• Insufficient course credits range their English language scores in
from 2-8 (80-320) university language courses and
• Minimum English requirement
their actual performance during
job interview
not implemented
• Teaching and learning:
• No common denominator for
comparison of reference
• No common minimum • No alignment with international
proficiency level for teachers standards
• Teacher-centred pedagogy
• Instructional materials: original,
adapted materials or textbooks
based on course outcomes.
 Purpose

• To analyse the process of ‘policy borrowing’ in the case of

Malaysia.
• It aims to explore the processes that took place during
this ‘policy borrowing’ process, namely - why and how
this borrowing was implemented and what are the
expected outcomes.
 Significance of the study

• To promote understanding and awareness of the policy

document to the University English language teachers.
• Contribute to the existing body of knowledge related to
the CEFR and how it is adopted and adapted in local
context.
 Overview of English Language
Education Reform in Malaysia

• Guided by the Malaysian Education Blueprint (2013-2025)

and the Graduate Employability Blueprint (2012-2017)
• 4 Phases:
• Preparing for structural change (2015-2016)
• Implementing and monitoring structural change (2017-2020)
• Scaling up structural change (2021-2025)
• Post-MEB phase (2026-2028)
• The Roadmap
 Methodology

• Qualitative case study

• Document analysis
• English Language Education Reform in Malaysia: The Roadmap
(2015-2025)
• Graduate Employability Report
• Malaysia Education Blueprint (2013-2025)
• Newspaper articles
• Website page (Ministry of Education Malaysia)
Theoretical Framework: Phillips and
Ochs (2003)
 Stage 1: Cross national attraction-
impulses and externalizing potential

• Portrays the impulse that might

• These impulses leads to six foci of
attraction-aspects of educational
cause this attraction: “why is there
policies and practices that can be
a need to change the policy?”
borrowed.
• Political change
• Guiding philosophy or ideology
• Systematic collapse
• Ambitions or goals
• Internal dissatisfaction
• Strategies
• Negative external evaluation
• Enabling structures
• Novel configuration
• Processes
• Knowledge/ skills innovation
• Techniques
 Stage 2: Decision
• Theoretical: “Governments might decide on the policies as
broad as ‘choice and diversity’ and they might retain general
ambitions not easily susceptible to demonstrably effective
implementation”.
• Realistic/practical: Here we can describe measures that are
proven to be successful in a certain location, without having
various contextual factors.
• ‘Quick fix’: This type of change occurs when governments
make immediate necessary political changes.
• ‘Phoney’: This type includes the kind of “enthusiasm shown by
politicians for aspects of education in other counties for
immediate political effect, without the possibility of serious
follow-through”
 Stage 3: Implementation

• Implementation depends on the “contextual conditions”

of the ‘borrower’ country (Phillips, 2005:32) – how does it
suit the context. The speed of change depends on the
attitudes of “significant actors”, whether they support or
reject the policy. Rejection might lead to delaying the
process of implementation, or even “non-decision”.
 Stage 4: Internalisation/
Indigenisation
• What impact does the policy have on the existing system?
Here we have to examine “the motives and objectives of the
policy makers in conjunction with the existing system”
• The absorption of external features. How and to what extent
have the features from another system been adopted? Here it
is important to do the close examination of context.
• Synthesis. How did the policy and practice become part of the
overall strategy? This process has to be examined.
• Evaluation. Have the expectations of the ‘borrowing country’
been realistic? The process of internalization has to be
reflected and evaluated. The results of evaluation might start
the whole process again. This brings the whole model “full
circle”.
 Discussion
• Four stages of policy borrowing in Malaysia
• Stage 1: Internal dissatisfaction & negative external evaluation
• In service teachers need the means to improve their proficiency,
knowledge and skills, and to catch up on advances made since they
were trained.
• GE Blueprint (2012) views university as “the cornerstone of a country to
supply quality and talented human resource” by ensuring the
graduates are linguistically proficient in English.
• Parents want their children to be given the English proficiency needed
for employment and advance in their career.
• Cambridge Baseline Study (2013)- used the CEFR to evaluate the
current state of English teaching and learning in Malaysia  English
language education system not sufficient to succeed in a globalised
world.
 Discussion
• Stage 2: Mixture of ‘realistic/practical’ and ‘Quick fix’.
• The Ministry of Education Malaysia assisted by the English
Language Quality Standards and Council decided to adopt CEFR to
reform the English language education.
• Stage 3: Implementation takes place at all levels of education
starting in 2017. Universities have the means to move ahead
with the CEFR irrespective of what is happening in the rest of
language programme.
• Stage 4: Teachers are encouraged to carry out educational
research related to CEFR implementation (refer to The
Roadmap, p.28). There is an evidence that the overall
evaluation will be conducted in Phase 3 (2021-2025). The Post-
MEB Phase (2026-2028) –establish external validation of
graduate competency in English from Employer Satisfaction
Survey.
 Discussion
• Acceptance from the media
• Most of news reports provide information on the rationale of using CEFR to guide the
transformation of English language education in Malaysia and the targets to be achieved at
the end of the implementation. (The Star online, 2016; BorneoPost online, 2017).
• Ministry of Education Malaysia’s website- Mahdzir Thoughts
(http://portal.tokdet.my/author/admin/)
• “the cooperation between the Malaysian Ministry of Education and Cambridge English, and I
look forward to signicant improvements in English language teaching and learning following
the implementation of The Roadmap; and most importantly, I believe that this is a vital step
towards the transformation of our education system.”
• Hazlina (2016) expresses her fear with the implementation of CEFR due to:
• Malaysia’s poor record of implementing changes- anything new could suffer the same fate as
previous well-intentioned programmes.
• Cascading training- teacher population might be reluctant to take part, as they will feel
overburdened and lack of desire to change the current operation principles.
(https://www.nst.com.my/news/2016/09/176566/raising-english-language-proficiency)
 References
• Ministry of Education Malaysia. (2013). Malaysia Education Blueprint
2013-2025: Preschool to Post-Secondary Education. Putrajaya:
Kementerian Pendidikan Malaysia.
• Mohd Don, Z. M., Abdullah, M. H., Abdullah, A. C., Lee, B. H., Kaur,
K., Pillai, J. & Hooi, M. Y. (2015). English language education reform in
Malaysia: The roadmap 2015- 2025.
• Philips, D. & Ochs, K. (2003). Processes of Policy Borrowing in
Education: some explanatory and analytical devices, Comparative
Education, 39:4, 451-461, DOI: 10.1080/0305006032000162020.
• Phillips, David (2005). Policy Borrowing in Education: Framework for
Analysis, in Zajda, Joseph (2015) Second International Handbook on
Globalization, Education and Policy Research, Dordrecht: Springer.
• The National Graduate Employability Blueprint 2012-2017. (2012).
Putrajaya: Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia.