General Studies in Malaysian Higher Education System
The Malaysian General Studies subjects aspire to contribute to nation-building by improving graduates' knowledge and soft skill in developing holistic human capital. In 1996, the Malaysian government implemented government-mandated subjects known as General Studies (previously known as Compulsory Subjects), intending to improve students' soft skills and employability. Local and international undergraduate students who are enrolled in Malaysian higher education institutions are required to pass these subjects as a requirement for their graduation. The intention of offering these subjects aligned with the National Education Philosophy, which is to produce good citizens with balanced personality and identity that embrace the following characteristics:
- i.
Trusting and obeying God
- ii.
Knowledgeable
- iii.
Skilled
- iv.
Willing to contribute to society, religion, race, and country
- v.
Responsible to oneself, religion, race, society, and country.
The General Studies aim to curate general education that embeds aspects of knowledge that enhance communication skills and develop an appreciation of noble values, as well as general knowledge that transcends the boundaries of traditional disciplines such as philosophy, arts, and national language. The bigger vision of these subjects is to produce graduates with broad-minded, balanced, and holistic skills who can be competitive in modern society.
At the beginning of the implementation, there were five subjects introduced namely; Malaysian Studies, Islamic Studies, Moral Education, National Language A, and National Language B (for international students). In 2012, these subjects were replaced with the new General Studies subjects which are Malaysian Studies and Communicative Malay 2 for international students. Malaysian students are offered subjects namely Ethnic Relations, Islamic and Asian Civilization, and National Language A. The new subjects intend to align with the Ministry's National Higher Education Strategic Plan (NHESP) which seeks to strengthen nation-building by equipping graduates with both hard and soft skills, resulting in comprehensive human capital. (Yip & Burhanuddin, 2017).
The new subjects were embedded in a new General Studies structure which divides the General Studies subjects into four components (Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia, 2016);
U1: Appreciation of philosophy, values, and history
U2: Mastery of soft skills
U3: Expansion of knowledge about Malaysia, and
U4: Community service and co-curriculum.
In this new structure, students have to complete several credit hours in each component as a requirement for completing their degree. This regulation applies to all higher learning institutions regardless of homegrown institutions or foreign universities located in Malaysia.
Strategically, General Studies subjects were designed based on Malaysia's National Education Philosophy, Malaysia's Education Blueprint 2012–2025 (Higher Education), and High-Impact Educational Practices. These three strategies aspire to develop values, knowledge, as well as cognitive and social skills. The subjects emphasize nation-building, soft skills mastery and development, strengthening and increasing understanding of Malaysia, and utilizing soft skills in preparing students to meet problems in a real and competitive world in the future. (Yip and Burhanuddin, 2017). However, not all aspects are ideal when it comes to the implementation of the subjects at the ground level. There were some challenges that required improvement efforts to address the setback.
As previous research has shown the advantages of project-based assessment in learning and teaching include encouraging active learning among students (Carr et al., 2015), the researcher is interested to further discover whether project-based assessments improve the assessment practice and learning experiences in the General Studies subject. In addition, the researcher is also intrigued to unfold the responsible and responsive learning elements in the project-based assessment practice. Therefore, the study aims to unravel the impact of project-based learning on students' learning experience, particularly through the lens of responsible and responsive learning.
The following section discusses the challenges of learning and teaching General Studies and how the author used project-based assessments to enhance the assessment practice and students’ learning experiences.