Factors that Influenced the Problem of Truancy among Secondary School Students

Abstract

This study aims to identify the factors that influenced truancy among the students in Federal Land Development Authority (FELDA) in a secondary school in Pahang. This study was conducted on 200 respondents consisting of 52 students from Form One, 118 students from Form Two and 30 students from Form Four. These respondents have truancy records that have been identified by the school administrators. The respondents' gender have been selected randomly. The researcher had used the method of observing using the technique of questionnaires. In this research, the researcher also used descriptive statistics to find the mean in the contributing factors and T-Test for Independent Samples Test for the gender differences. The factors that need to be observed are from the respondents themselves, socioeconomic factors, peer influence and school environmental factors which is the attitude of teachers that influence and contribute to truancy. Peer influence is seen as the most dominant factor with the mean = 2.0349, followed by socio-economic factors with the mean = 1.0830, next is the school environmental factors that which is the attitude of the teacher that leads to truancy with the mean = 0.2440 and finally the respondents' self factors with the mean = 0.0947 that lead to the truancy in the school.

The Shadow Education System: Students’ Responses to Private Tutorial Learning

“…Peers are able to influence each other in a positive manner (Steinberg, 1996). In fact, Abdullah, Salim, and Arip (2018) reported that peer influence is one of the factors that influences truancy in schools. According to Ha and Harpham (2005) there is a contextual effect of one parent's need to send her child for private tutoring on other parents' need to do the same.…”

“…Students have to compete to enrol in public universities, to get scholarships, and to gain a chance to further their studies overseas. Yan-Li, Roslan, Abdullah, and Abdullah (2018) suggest that families play a crucial role in adolescent school performance.…”

The Role of Education and Schools in Crime Prevention among Child Offenders in Malaysia: Moving forward

“…Other than truancy, children's most frequent disciplinary problems in schools are bullying, theft, possession of prohibited items in schools, gangsterism (Tie, 2012), and vandalism (Zainal & Mohamad Salleh, 2008). Among factors that have been cited that contributed to truancy among children in secondary schools are personal factors such as lack of motivation (Sueb & Izam, 2016;Abdullah, et al 2018) and self-limitation such as lack of language proficiency, lack of religious knowledge and impulsive behaviour (Sueb & Izam, 2016;Nik Ruzyanei et al 2009). Closely related to personal factors that contribute to truancy among children in school is family factors such as lack of family support, low socio-economic background and broken families (Nik Ruzyanei et al 2009;Sueb & Izam, 2016;Abdullah, et al 2018).…”

“…Among factors that have been cited that contributed to truancy among children in secondary schools are personal factors such as lack of motivation (Sueb & Izam, 2016;Abdullah, et al 2018) and self-limitation such as lack of language proficiency, lack of religious knowledge and impulsive behaviour (Sueb & Izam, 2016;Nik Ruzyanei et al 2009). Closely related to personal factors that contribute to truancy among children in school is family factors such as lack of family support, low socio-economic background and broken families (Nik Ruzyanei et al 2009;Sueb & Izam, 2016;Abdullah, et al 2018). In addition, environmental factors such as teachers' negative attitudes towards children in school also make them feel not valued.…”

“…Additionally, peer factors have influenced children's behaviours, especially when they skip school (Sueb & Izam, 2016). Negative peer influence has been cited as the most dominant factor that leads to truancy cases among children (Abdullah, et al, 2018) and a significant discipline problem in schools in Malaysia (Mansor, et al 2017). Moreover, influence from media and communication and exposure to violent and uncensored movies, pornographic scenes and websites are also contributing factors to disciplinary problems in schools and can potentially lead children to come into contact with the juvenile justice system (Mansor, et al 2017).…”