The Gender Gap in Malaysian Public Universities: Examining The 'Lost Boys'

Abstract

This paper examines the growing gender gap between men and women in Malaysian public universities, using the Gender Parity Index (GPI) to measure gender disparities over time. It considers the gender gap in University of Malaya with other prominent overseas universities, and compares the GPI between all twenty public higher education institutions for the years 2009-2013. It also compares the GPI of public universities in Malaysia with local private education institutions, and examines the gender disparities in public universities in terms of subject segregation. Particular attention is paid to the gender segregation in terms of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects; gender segregation in STEM subjects in Malaysian public universities is compared to East Asia Pacific averages. Lastly, various causes and explanations for the gender gap are explored.

Full text

Journal of International and Comparative Education, 2017, Volume 6, Issue 1 1
The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc
unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
Jonathan Yong Tienxhia
Penang Instute
Abstract: This paper examines the growing gender gap between men and women in Malaysian
public universies, using the Gender Parity Index (GPI) to measure gender disparies over
me. It considers the gender gap in University of Malaya with other prominent overseas
universies, and compares the GPI between all twenty public higher educaon instuons
for the years 2009-2013. It also compares the GPI of public universies in Malaysia with local
private educaon instuons, and examines the gender disparies in public universies in
terms of subject segregaon. Parcular aenon is paid to the gender segregaon in terms
of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathemacs (STEM) subjects; gender segregaon
in STEM subjects in Malaysian public universies is compared to East Asia Pacic averages.
Lastly, various causes and explanaons for the gender gap are explored.
Keywords: gender, higher educaon, disparity, STEM
Introducon
Men have dominated the global higher educaon landscape for most of recorded history; in the
UK, women were not allowed to enrol into universies unl 1920. However, enrolment trends since
the 1990s have produced a reverse gender gap globally, with women outnumbering men in almost
all Organisaon for Economic Co-operaon and Development (OECD) countries (Vincent-Lancrin,
2008). This disparity between men and women in terms of access to higher educaon has been a
worldwide phenomenon with women comprising the majority of terary students in 93 out of 146
countries examined by the Atlas Gender Equality report (UNESCO, 2012). It is important to note that
due to demographic trends, the majority of students live in countries in which men sll outnumber
women in higher educaon (54% of youth), parcularly in sub-Saharan Africa. Nevertheless, the
development of reverse gender gap has caused researchers on educaon to orient their aenon
to the unique problems faced by males in the educaon system, in what was called ‘The Boy Turn’
(Weaver-Hightower, 2003). The reverse gender gap has received greater scruny by researchers
and policy makers over the past several years, as the problem of the falling rate of male enrolment
is increasingly acknowledged. The Higher Educaon Policy Instute (HEPI), a think tank based in
the UK, has referred to the phenomenon as a ‘naonal scandal’ (Weale, 2016), while the Malaysia
Educaon Blueprint 2013-25 specically menoned the problem of ‘lost boys’, warning that these
alienated youths are a potenal source of social instability (Ministry of Educaon Malaysia, 2012).
Why is this issue worth paying aenon to? Some might argue that whatever disparies faced
by men in the sphere of educaon, this hardly translates into an enduring disadvantage. Aer all,
women connue to be le behind in Malaysia’s polical and economic spheres. In 2015, Malaysia
was ranked 111 out of 146 naons surveyed by the World Economic Forum in terms of the gender
gap, the worst placed naon in the Associaon of South East Asian Naons (ASEAN) region (World
Economic Forum, 2015). This paper disagrees with the premise that male disparity in higher educaon
enrolment is not worth paying aenon to due to the prevalence of structural disadvantages against
ISSN 2232-1802 doi: 10.14425/JICE.2017.6.1.0116
a Correspondence can be directed to: j.yong-enxhi@lse.ac.uk

Journal of International and Comparative Education, 2017, Volume 6, Issue 1
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Jonathan Yong tienxhi
women. Firstly, it implies that the problem of under-enrolment of men in universies can only be
resolved if resources and eort are taken away from helping women achieve equity in other spheres
of life. In fact, disparity for or against one gender does not automacally result in an adverse impact
on the other. As Nick Hillman, HEPI director noted, ‘policymaking is not a zero-sum game in which
you have to choose between caring for one group or the other’ (Weale, 2016). Rather, we ought
to understand and eradicate dierences in opportunity where we can nd them. Secondly, the
gap between men and women in higher educaon hurts those at disadvantage the most, hence
increasing overall social inequality. Young men from poor income families are disproporonately
aected by the gender gap in universies, and the Universies Colleges and Admissions Service
(UCAS) has pointed out ‘the widening gap between men and women is acng to stall progress in
reducing inequality overall’ (UCAS 2015, p.1). As we will observe in this paper, the gender gap in
Malaysian public universies is signicantly wider compared to Malaysian private universies. As
public university tuion is vastly lower than private university, this indicates that the gender gap
has a much greater eect on men from lower income groups. Hence, closing the higher educaon
gender gap could have a posive eect on social equality as a whole.
Given the importance of studying the higher educaon gender gap, this paper hopes to
examine the extent in which Malaysian public universies have been part of this global trend, and
to understand the specics of how the reverse gender gap has emerged in parcular Malaysian
universies and elds of study. In addion to this, this paper will consider various explanaons for
the emergence of this gender gap, in order to explain the disappearance of these ‘lost boys’.
The Gender Parity Index
The tool used in this paper to capture the changing demographics of university enrolment is a measure
known as the Global Parity Index (GPI), which can be found by dividing the number of females over
the number of males in a certain student populaon and rounding up to two decimals. A GPI of
less than 1 represents a disparity in favour of males, while a GPI above 1 represents a disparity in
favour of females. The GPI is commonly used in reports by internaonal organisaons, such as in the
UNICEF report ‘Why are Boys underperforming in Educaon?’ and the 2012 World Atlas of Gender
Equality in Educaon produced by UNESCO’s Instute of Stascs. According to UNESCO (2012), a
GPI measurement of 0.97-1.03 indicates that gender parity has been achieved.
The Gender Gap and Naonal Wealth
The countries in which women in higher educaon are sll disadvantaged tend to be those with
low Gross Domesc Product (GDP) per capita, such as sub-Saharan African naons. Conversely,
naons with high GDP per capita tend to have a higher level of GPI. This is according to the World
Atlas of Gender Equality in Educaon 2012, which shows that there is a strong correlaon between
rising GPI in terary educaon and a country’s naonal wealth (UNESCO 2012, p.80). For example,
naons which have high naonal wealth tend to have higher GPI such Iceland and Norway, with GPI
of at least 1.4. Prime Minister Najib Razak has recently stated that Malaysia is on track to be a high
income naon by 2020 (Goh, 2015). Even if this meline is exaggerated, this raises the possibility
that as Malaysia increases its naonal income, there will be corresponding rise in GPI. It should be
noted that there are many excepons to the general trend between GPI and naonal wealth. Japan
has a GPI lower than 1 despite being a high income naon, while the Philippines has a relavely
high GPI despite having less GDP per capita than Malaysia. Of course, Malaysia’s progress into a
high income naon should be welcomed, and it is not predetermined that there will be an increase
in the higher educaon gender gap. However, the global trends suggest a need to ancipate this
problem by paying closer aenon to male under-enrolment where it is strongest. In the context
of Malaysia, this is in our public universies.

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The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
The Gender Gap Reversal in Malaysian Public Universies
The gender gap in Malaysian public universies is comparable to the internaonal trends outlined
earlier, with the gap beginning to emerge towards the end of 1990s and rising quickly in recent years.
According to Malaysia’s Gender Gap Index report, the combined gross enrolment rao was in favour
of men in 1980 (53%-56.9%), but parity was achieved by 1990; women have had a higher enrolment
rao since 2000, of 65.3%-64.3% (Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development Malaysia,
2007). This disparity was already notable by the turn of the century, as former premier Mahathir
Mohamed once asked ‘Where have the bumiputera (translated as ‘sons of the soil’, to refer to the
Malay race and other indigenous groups in Sarawak and Sabah) male students gone to? Are they
not interested in educaon? Or are their qualicaons (to enter university) too low?’ (Khoo 2003,
p.197). Despite this, a detailed examinaon of the gender gap in Malaysian higher educaon has
not been made. Instead, the academic literature on educaonal inequality in Malaysia has tended
to focus on the ethnic divide rather than gender disparity. This was seen in recently published
books such as The Colour of Inequality and The Emergence and Widening of the Ethnic Divide in
the Malaysian Educaonal System. This is partly due to the tremendously important polical and
social dynamics of ethnicity within the educaon system, but also due to the percepon that gender
inequity is no longer a pressing maer with regards to educaon. In 1999, it was found that ‘the
gender gap in aaining upper secondary school within an ethnic group is relavely small compared
to the ethnic gap’ in Malaysia (Pong 1999, p.165). By the 1980s, it was found that increasing levels
of educaon aainment were ‘evenly distributed among genders’ (Milanovic, 2006). This may have
been true around the turn of the century, but does not take into account data which indicate that
educaonal disparity according to gender has begun to increasingly widen in recent years, this me
to the detriment of men.
The Gender Gap at the University of Malaya and Naonal University of Singapore
As Malaysia’s oldest and most presgious instuon of higher educaon, the University of Malaya
(UM) has been emblemac of the shi from female underrepresentaon to forming the majority of
undergraduates. Two years aer independence, UM enrolled 77 female undergraduates, comprising
a mere 10.7% of their total undergraduate student populaon (Ministry of Women and Family
Development, 2013), while the female undergraduate enrolment in 2012 was 61.6%. The drasc
change in gender rao has changed the discourse of educaonal inequity from enabling educaonal
access to female students to ensuring equitable parcipaon of males in educaon.
UM was established in 1949 under the Carr-Saunders Commission, and the University of Malaya
in Kuala Lumpur was formed in 1962 (refer to University of Malaya, n.d.). During the rst six years
of UM in Kuala Lumpur, GPI remained more or less stagnant, as male student enrolment increased
at an even faster rate than female student enrolment (Ministry of Educaon Malaysia, 1967). This is
in stark contrast to the current gender enrolment rao at UM. In 2013, the GPI for undergraduates
at UM was 1.63, a disparity which is greatly in favour of women. The percentage of women enrolled
in undergraduate programmes at UM increased from 24.5% in 1962, to 62% in 2013 (Ministry of
Educaon Malaysia, 2013). These numbers show the extent to which women have succeeded in
drascally increasing their parcipaon in the premier higher educaon instuon of the country.
Comparing the gender parity of UM with Naonal University of Singapore (NUS) is revealing,
as the two share historical roots and geographical proximity. Since NUS is located in Singapore, a
country with a higher naonal income than Malaysia, this makes the gender disparity in Malaysia
even more notable. When comparing undergraduate data between the two universies, we nd
that the gender disparity in UM is consistently higher compared to NUS between the years 2009-
2013. The GPI of UM for this period ranges between 1.58-1.6 (Ministry of Educaon Malaysia, 2013;
Ministry of Higher Educaon, 2010; 2011; 2012) while the GPI of NUS ranges between 1-1.04 (NUS
Registrar’s Oce, 2016). The GPI of NUS can be considered to be achieving gender parity, as it is very
close to the range of 0.97-1.03, which is considered by UNESCO to be the range of gender parity. This

Journal of International and Comparative Education, 2017, Volume 6, Issue 1
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Jonathan Yong tienxhi
trend shows that despite sharing a common history and relavely close geographical and cultural
similaries, the gender parity within UM is unusually high. However, there are twenty other public
universies currently operang in Malaysia. Is the gender gap at UM an anomaly within Malaysian
higher educaon or is it a representave of a larger phenomenon?
GPI Comparison of Malaysian Public Universies
There are twenty public universies (IPTAs) currently operang in Malaysia. It should be noted that
UNICEF categorises any country with a GPI less than 0.8 or higher than 1.25 to be ‘far from goal’ of
gender parity (World Bank, 2004). As all but four Malaysian IPTAs would fall into that category, we
have used a more lenient classicaon to avoid polarising the data. UNICEF’s denion of gender
parity at 0.97-1.03 is maintained, but we include categories ‘close to parity’, ‘intermediate disparity’,
while classifying extreme disparity at GPI less than 0.5 or over 1.5. We also highlight the universies
which have disparies that go well beyond 1.5 in order to illustrate the depth of the problem.
Table 1. GPI of Enrolment Rao for all Malaysian IPTAs in 2013
Fewer women enrolled Gender
Parity
Fewer men enrolled
Extreme
disparity
(<0.5)
Intermediate
disparity
(0.5-0.89)
Close
to
Parity
(0.9-
0.96)
Parity
(0.97-
1.03)
Close to
Parity
(1.03-1.1)
Intermediate
disparity
(1.11-1.5)
Extreme disparity
(>1.5-1.99) (>2.0)
Universi
Pertahanan
Nasional
Malaysia
(UPNM)
Universi
Teknologi
Malaysia
(UTM),
Universi
Teknikal
Malaysia
(UTEM)
Universi
Tun
Hussein
Onn
Malaysia
(UTHM),
Universi
Malaysia
Perlis
(UniMAP)
Universi
Malaysia
Pahang
(UMP)
Universi
Islam
Antarabangsa
Malaysia
(UIAM)
Universi
Malaya
(UM),
Universi
Sains
Malaysia
(USM),
Universi
Utara
Malaysia
(UUM),
Universi
Malaysia
Sabah
(UMS),
UniversiKe
bangsaan
Malaysia
(UKM)
Universi
Putra
Malaysia
(UPM),
Universi
Malaysia
Sarawak
(UniMAS),
Universi
Pendidikan
Sultan
Idris(UPSI),
Universi
Teknologi
Mara (UITM),
(Universi
Sultan Zainal
Abidin
(UniSZA),
Universi
Malaysia
Terengganu
(UMT),
(Universi
Sains Islam
Malaysia
(USIM),
(Universi
Malaysia
Kelantan
(UMK)
Source: Ministry of Educaon Malaysia, 2013

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The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
Table 1 above demonstrates that UM’s GPI of 1.63 is far from an anomaly, but falls well within
Malaysian norms. While 1.63 does represent extreme disparity, most Malaysian IPTAs fall within this
classicaon (13 out of 20 universies). In fact, 8 public universies have a GPI of over 2.0, which
indicates that female undergraduates more than double their male counterparts in those universies.
Only two universies can be said to have achieved gender parity, while one university has extreme
disparity against women. The three universies which show disparity against women are UPNM,
UTM, and UTEM. These disparies can be explained by the course of studies and facules available or
emphasised at these universies. As we will see in the secon below on subject gender segregaon,
engineering remains the sole course of study which sll harbours a signicant disparity against
women, with a GPI of 0.58. UTM is among the top 100 universies in the world for engineering and
technology according to the QS world rankings, and oers no less than 22 bachelor degrees in the
eld of engineering; while in UTEM, ve out of seven of their facules are for engineering. The only
IPTA with extreme gender disparity against women is the Naonal Defence University of Malaysia
(UPMN), with a GPI of 0.41 (30% female). This is undoubtedly due to the subject orientaon at the
university (Naonal Defence), which reects that military remains a male dominated eld.
This table shows that gender inequality has become a signicant phenomenon in certain sectors
of the Malaysian higher educaon landscape. Inequity against women persists in certain subjects
and elds, parcularly naonal defence and engineering. But on a broader scale, men in public
universies have become increasingly underrepresented. By tracing the GPI of Malaysian public
universies over a period of ve years, we can see the trend of increasing gender disparity over me.
Table 2. Comparison of Malaysian IPTA’s GPI, 2009 to 2013
Comparison of Malaysian Public Universies GPI (Undergraduate)
University/Year 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
UM 1.58 1.6 1.56 1.6 1.63
USM 1.57 1.58 1.59 1.65 1.67
UKM 2 2.11 1.99 2.13 1.94
UPM 2.2 2.2 2.11 2.17 2.18
UTM 0.85 0.83 0.8 0.77 0.81
UUM 2.3 2.06 2 1.98 1.91
UIAM 1.68 1.57 1.53 1.5 1.48
UniMAS 1.85 2.01 2.15 2.1 2.1
UMS 1.66 1.86 1.91 1.91 1.76
UPSI 2.49 2.59 2.66 2.94 2.89
UITM 1.91 1.93 1.91 2 2.01
UniSZA 2.96 2.79 2.76 2.65 2.68
UMT 2.29 2.3 2.42 2.52 2.68
USIM 2.84 2.76 2.44 2.58 2.57
UTHM 0.93 0.87 0.88 0.98 1.03
UTEM 0.64 0.71 0.77 0.74 0.75
UMP 0.85 0.97 1.07 1.09 1.1
UniMAP 0.8 0.83 0.91 0.92 0.98
UMK 1.85 1.93 2.18 2.34 2.61
UPNM 0.17 0.26 0.33 0.41 0.4
All Universes 1.66 1.65 1.66 1.7 1.71
Sources: Ministry of Higher Educaon Malaysia (2011; 2012) and Ministry of Educaon Malaysia (2013)

Journal of International and Comparative Education, 2017, Volume 6, Issue 1
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Jonathan Yong tienxhi
Table 2 above tracks the GPI rao for all 20 IPTAs from the year 2009-2013.The data reveals that
overall gender disparity has worsened across these years, as the GPI has shied from 1.66 to 1.71
in the space of ve years. While UM shows an increase in disparity across this period (from 1.58-
1.63), this is actually below the naonal average of 1.71. This trend will undoubtedly be amplied
if we use data going further back in history, or over a longer period. The gender parity in Malaysian
IPTAs is high even by internaonal standards- 55% of undergraduates in the UK were female in 2011,
while women consisted of 56.4% of public university students in the U.S in 2010 (Borzelleca, 2012).
At the same period, female undergraduate enrolment in Malaysian IPTAs was at 62% and rising.
While there remain a few universies which possess disparies against women, there are
reasons to be opmisc about this problem based on the trends of the data shown. Only two
universies (UPNM and UTEM) possess a GPI in favour of men which UNICEF would consider ‘far
from goal’ of gender parity (less than 0.8) as of 2013. Both universies show a trend of improving
gender parity from 2009-13, with UTEM going from 0.64-0.75, while UPNM gender parity increased
from 0.17-0.4. The same cannot be said of the universies at the other end of the spectrum, as 8
out of the 13 universies classied as having extreme disparity in favour of women worsened in
terms of GPI during this period, such as UPSI (2.49 to 2.89) and UMK (1.85-2.61). This indicates that
the underrepresentaon of men in Malaysian public universies will connue to be an underlying
problem for the foreseeable future, and could plausibly worsen over the coming years.
Figure 1. Male and female enrolment trends at IPTAs 2009-13
Sources: Ministry of Higher Educaon Malaysia (2011; 2012) and Ministry of Educaon Malaysia (2013)
The gender gap in Malaysian IPTAs is substanal and worthy of further study. Figure 1 shows
the dierence between male and female enrolments in the year 2013 amounted to 86,798 students,
a gure which is itself equal to 26% of Malaysia’s enre undergraduate student populaon in public
universies. Furthermore, the numerical gap between male and female enrolments has been steadily
increasing from 2009-2013. In 2009, the gap between male and female students was 67,734 students.
102159 103483 112273 112748 122306
169893 171207
186285 192393
209104
0
50000
100000
150000
200000
250000
2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Male and Female Undergraduate Enrolment Trends at IPTAs 2009-13
Total Male Enrolment Total Female Enrolment

Journal of International and Comparative Education, 2017, Volume 6, Issue 1 7
The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
In 2011, this had increased to 74,012 students, before culminang to a gap of 86,798 students in
2013. This shows a worrying trend of expanding gender disparies in public universies. One posive
trend which can be discerned is that while the gender gap is widening, male enrolments overall are
sll increasing, albeit at a much slower pace. If male enrolments begin to stagnate or decline, these
trends will be greatly exacerbated.
Comparing the Gender Gap of Public Universies in Malaysia with the Private Sector
This secon focuses on the gender gap within Malaysian public universies, but it may be instrucve
to consider how this gender parity compares to Malaysian private universies (IPTS). As of March
2015, 509 acve IPTS campuses are operang in Malaysia. These include universies (61), colleges
(405), university colleges (34) as well as branch campuses of foreign universies (9) (Ministry of
Higher Educaon Malaysia, 2012). With regards to total student enrolment in 2013, IPTS instuons
in Malaysia have a slight disparity in favour of women, with a GPI of 1.06; much closer to aaining
gender parity compared to total student enrolment in IPTA instuons which have an average GPI of
1.57 (Ministry of Higher Educaon, 2012). Focusing on undergraduate students further widens the
dierence in GPI, as IPTA universies have a GPI of 1.7 as compared to the IPTS instuons, which
aain gender parity at 0.98. The numbers show that the gender gap in Malaysian higher educaon
mainly pertains to public universies.
Of course, an overall GPI which is close to parity may obscure inequies within parcular
instuons, parcularly as there are over 500 IPTS campuses within Malaysia. Among some of the
more prominent IPTS universies, there exists a wide spectrum of gender disparies. For example,
Limkokwing and Nongham Universies had intermediate disparity against women, with GPI
between 0.5 and 0.89 (Ministry of Higher Educaon Malaysia, 2012). Meanwhile, Sunway University
and HELP University had intermediate disparity in favour of women, with GPI between 1.11 and
1.5 (Ministry of Higher Educaon Malaysia, 2012). It should be noted that none of the instuons
I examined had extreme disparies in favour of men or women, and all had GPI below the average
of IPTA universies. This is in stark contrast to the GPI of public universies, where over half had GPI
that could be considered extreme disparity. This arms the noon that the gender gap between men
and women is parcularly large in Malaysian public universies as compared to the private sector.
It is not immediately clear why IPTS universies have far less of a gender gap compared to IPTA
universies in Malaysia. The evidence for the relaonship between private instuons of educaon
and gender parity is mixed and oen contradictory. In countries in which women form a minority
of terary student populaon, private universies can oen be more equitable in terms of gender
parity, such as the case of Kenya where women consist of 54% of private university students compared
to 32% of public university students (Onsongo, 2011). However, in the U.S, it has been argued that
private universies discriminate against women in order to maintain gender balance; while public
universies are more meritocrac in terms of admissions (Birger, 2015). One plausible explanaon
for disparity in Malaysia is that the boys and men who are le behind due to the gender gap consist
primarily of those from lower income families, and thus has a stronger impact on IPTA universies
which are far cheaper in comparison to IPTS universies.
The Gender Gap by Subject Segregaon
The gender gap in Malaysian higher educaon needs to be understood in the context of gender
segregaon by subject in universies. This refers to the phenomenon in which male and female
students tend to enrol in dierent facules and courses at university; hence an overall increased
female parcipaon rate does not automacally lead an increase in gender parity across dierent
facules. This segregaon has been said to account for between 15% to 25% of the gender income
gap among college students (Bobbi-Zeher, 2007).

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Jonathan Yong tienxhi
The segregaon of gender in Malaysian higher educaon needs to be considered in order to
understand the gender gap. In which elds of study, if any, has gender parity been aained? And how
does this compare to global norms? These are the quesons we consider in the following secon:
Figure 3. GPI according to eld of study in Malaysian IPTAs 2010-13
Field of Study/ Year 2010 2011 2012 2013
Educaon GPI 2.26 2.33 2.66 2.37
Arts & Humanies GPI 1.7 1.7 1.69 1.65
Social Science, Business & Law GPI 2.05 2.03 2.07 2.04
Science, Mathemacs & Computers GPI 1.63 1.62 1.66 1.69
Engineering, Manufacturing & Construcon GPI 0.72 0.73 0.73 0.75
Agriculture &Veterinary GPI 1.44 1.26 1.27 1.3
Health & Welfare GPI 2.33 2.36 2.52 2.51
Services GPI 1.46 1.54 1.58 1.53
Source: Ministry of Educaon Malaysia (2013)
Table 3 shows the enrolment in the eight major elds of study in Malaysia according to gender
for the years 2010-2013. We nd that women outnumber men in seven out of the eight elds of
study, including areas in which women are tradionally underrepresented such as mathemacs and
science. This is shown by the GPI which is consistently higher than 1.0 with the excepon of one
eld of study. The only eld of study in which men connue to outnumber women is in engineering,
manufacturing and construcon. How does this compare to internaonal norms? Women in
Malaysian public universies have higher representaon in each eld on study in comparison to other
countries within the East Asia and Pacic region (UNICEF 2009, p.32). While the regional average for
female representaon in social sciences, business and law is slightly less than 50%, women comprise
67% of students in the same eld of study. In elds of study where women consists of a majority,
such as health and welfare (about 64%), the trend is even more pronounced in Malaysian public
universies (71%). While women in the same region are underrepresented in the elds of science
and mathemacs, women in Malaysia make up 62.8% of the student populaon in those elds.
Finally, even in the eld of engineering, manufacturing and construcon where women in Malaysia
are sll a minority, they come much closer to gender parity compared to the regional average, which
is less than 20% compared to 43.1% in Malaysia (UNICEF, 2009).
These gures are noteworthy because degrees in STEM elds have oen been an excepon
to the global trend towards increasing women enrolment in universies. A recent report from the
Naonal Student Clearinghouse looks at degrees in STEM elds and nds that the share of STEM
bachelor’s degrees going to women in the U.S has actually decreased over the past decade (Naonal
Student Clearinghouse, 2015). While overall parity in undergraduate enrolment has increased
worldwide, this has not been the case in STEM disciplines where there are more male than female
students in 91% of countries examined (UNESCO 2015, p.3). Furthermore, the OECD (2011) found
that STEM elds have become increasingly unpopular for women as they progress in their academic
elds, with declining rates of women opng to study past a Bachelors’ degree to Masters and then
PhDs. A closer examinaon of the degree choices within those elds of study can reect the extent
to which Malaysian public universies dier from these trends.

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The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
Table 4. GPI and Percentage of Women in STEM Subjects (Public Universies)
Degree Men Women All GPI % of which are women
Engineering Bachelors 42309 34615 76924 0.82 45
Masters 6543 6377 12920 0.97 49
Doctorate 4380 2607 6987 0.6 37
Mathemacs Bachelors 1512 4450 5962 2.94 75
Masters 264 709 973 2.69 73
Doctorate 313 369 682 1.18 54
Science Bachelors 3286 8275 11561 2.52 72
Masters 3909 7121 11030 1.82 65
Doctorate 2102 2506 4608 1.19 54
Technology Bachelors 2581 4098 6679 1.59 61
Masters 534 540 1074 1.01 50
Doctorate 333 180 513 0.54 35
Source: Malaysian Higher Educaon Stascs, 2013
Table 4 above shows that in the tradional STEM elds, women have overtaken men in every
degree with the excepon of engineering. In the elds of science and mathemacs, this true at every
level of academic qualicaon from bachelor degree to doctorate. With regards to engineering,
Malaysia has aained an impressive degree of gender parity, with women comprising of 45% of
undergraduates. This is indeed surprising considering that global underrepresentaon of women in
engineering courses. For an instance, female engineering undergraduates in the US comprise a mere
17% of the student populaon according to the Naonal Student Clearinghouse (2015). In Canada,
the University of Toronto recently celebrated the fact that their engineering courses had 30% female
enrolment, higher than any other university in Ontario (Engineering Strategic Communicaons,
2015). Closer to home, 19.5% of engineering undergraduates in the Republic of Korea were female
in 2011 (UNESCO 2015, p.4). A more detailed breakdown of the degree choices would be required
to examine whether or not further inequies exist within these subject choices.
Malaysia’s achievements in aaining gender parity for women in STEM elds are worthy
of emulaon, and serves as a convincing counterpoint to former Harvard President Lawrence H.
Summers’ comments that the underrepresentaon of women in science elds at universies may be
due to innate dierences (Hemel, 2005). In a paper entled ‘Why is Computer Science in Malaysia
Dominated by Women?’, it is argued that ‘The fact that in Malaysia, women’s educaon, and their
posions in computer science departments and soware employment being equivalent to those of
men, undoubtedly contributes to such relave opmism about gender and technology relaons in
developing countries’, showing that women are able to compete equally when they are not faced
with cultural and instuonal stereotyping (Mellstrom 2009, p.887) The queson that arises in the
Malaysian context is whether or not men have been at the receiving end of some of these negave
stereotypes and instuonal barriers, parcularly when they comprise a mere 25% of undergraduates
in mathemacs. In the same paper, one female computer science professor expressed the view that
the boys in her department ‘don’t seem movated enough and we also have problems with young
men dropping out of class.’ (Mellstrom 2009, p.897) We will consider these and other explanaons
for the gender gap below.

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Jonathan Yong tienxhi
Causes of the Gender Gap
The causes of the gender gap in Malaysian public universies undoubtedly involve a complex array
of factors. The rst possible cause we will consider is that men are underrepresented in public
universies because they pursue alternave terary pathways, including polytechnics, community
colleges and overseas universies. We also consider the other explanaons typically ascribed to
explain the higher educaon gender gap, and examine them in the Malaysian context. This would
include higher returns to educaon for women, beer performance in secondary schooling, and
negave socialisaon of men.
The dierence between the number of men and women enrolled in undergraduate IPTA
programmes in 2013 was 86,798 students. Given that there are marginally more men than women
in the Malaysian populaon (CIA, 2016), this suggests that there could be potenally over 86
thousand more men in Malaysian public universies. Where have these missing men gone to?
We have already seen that men are overall marginally beer represented in IPTS universies,
thus it is clear that the absence of male students in IPTA universies cannot be explained by their
proliferaon in the private sector of higher educaon. This secon considers the possibility that male
youth have entered alternave pathways to higher educaon, and thus are underrepresented in
Malaysian public universies. One possibility is that men have chosen alternave routes for career
advancement by enrolling into polytechnics & community colleges. A second possibility is that male
students are suciently privileged to enter higher quality instuons than IPTAs, and are sent to
overseas universies. Both of these possibilies will be examined to idenfy the extent to which
they can explain the gender gap.
Men at Polytechnics and Community Colleges
From 2009-2013, male enrolment in polytechnics was consistently higher than the rate of female
enrolment (Ministry of Educaon Malaysia, 2013). For example, in 2013 there were 48114 male
students enrolled in polytechnic colleges compared to 41389 female students. This dierence
amounts to 6725 students, and a GPI of 0.86. However, this gap itself narrowed from 2009-2013. The
disparity in favour of male students is even more pronounced in local community colleges, where
the GPI has steadily worsened in terms of disparity in favour of males. In 2013, the GPI for enrolment
into community colleges in Malaysia was 0.56, with 13738 male students enrolled compared to
21468 female students (Ministry of Educaon Malaysia, 2013).
However, due to the relavely small size of student enrolment, the gap between male and
female students is slightly smaller than compared to the gap of polytechnic students at 6008
students. The relavely small student enrolment size and increasing GPI in polytechnic colleges
means that the gender gap among undergraduates in IPTAs cannot be sasfactorily explained by
male enrolment in polytechnic instuons and community colleges. The ‘missing’ number of male
students at IPTAs dwarfs the gender gap in these instuons in terms of size, as the dierence in
number between male and female students in polytechnics and community colleges in 2013 consists
of 12733 students, about 14% of the gender gap in IPTA undergraduate programmes for the same
year. Furthermore, this does not address the underlying issue of why boys are choosing to enter
polytechnics or community colleges rather than undergraduate programmes, thus lowering their
potenal future incomes.
Men in Overseas Universies
Given the dominance of men in the political and economic spheres of Malaysia, it may be
posited that male youth are given a privileged posion by their families and are sent abroad to
receive higher educaon from more recognised instuons in places such as the UK or the US.
Is there a preference for families to send their sons abroad, and can this explain the gender gap?

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The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
According to the UNESCO Instute for Stascs (2016), there are currently 56, 260 Malaysian
students studying abroad. Most of these students are in the UK (15, 583) and Australia (15, 357), the
next closest being the US (6, 486). Given these numbers, it is clear that the size of the gender gap in
Malaysian public universies is larger than the enre number of Malaysian overseas students put
together. This makes it unlikely that the overseas student populaon can explain the gender gap of
Malaysian IPTAs to a signicant degree. Furthermore, the overseas student populaon of Malaysia
is far from male dominated. In Australia, the number of male and female students from Malaysia
in 2014 was praccally equal, with a 49.3% female and 50.7% male student populaon (Australian
Government, 2015). In the UK, there is no data available as to what percentage of Malaysian students
are male. However, male students studying in the UK from Asia are actually underrepresented, with
only 47.21% of students from Asia studying in the UK being male (HESA, 2016) This would indicate
that the Malaysians students studying in the UK are unlikely to be strongly male dominated, and
thus overseas students cannot explain the lack of absence of male students in public universies.
Women have Higher Returns for University Educaon than Men
One explanaon to why women outnumber men in public universies is due to the fact that they
receive greater economic incenves for entering higher educaon. This explanaon is grounded in
Human Capital theory, an inuenal economic theory advanced by economists from the Chicago
School of Economics such as Gary Becker. It posits that human decisions are based on the economic
self-interest of individuals operang within a free market. Hence, enrolment in university educaon
is primarily an investment decision, and women’s increasing enrolment in public universies must
be due to expanding returns within the labour market. Another Chicago School economist, Francisco
Paro, found that ‘studies empirically show that the college wage premium for women is higher than
the college wage premium for men and has been for at least 40 years’, adding that the comparavely
high nancial returns for women could potenally explain the gender gap (Parro 2012, p.158).
However, other examinaons of Current Populaon Survey (CPS) have found that while women’s
wage returns to higher educaon have indeed increased, men’s returns have increased even more
rapidly because jobs for those employed straight out of high school have become increasingly low
paid (Diprete and Buchmann 2006, p.2).Overall, it has been found that the human capital theory
‘does not provide a parcularly convincing explanaon’ for the gender gap in countries such as the
United States and Japan (Vincent-Lancrin 2008, p.282). Does this approach make beer sense in
the Malaysian context?
Due to the wage gap between men and women in Malaysia, Malaysian women earn 8.4%
less than their male counterparts on average (Lee, 2015). However, it is important to note that this
alone does not refute the idea that women can get higher returns for university educaon; what
is important is not the wage gap between men and women but the gap between the earnings of
terary graduates and non-terary graduates. According to the 2012 Salaries & Wages Survey Report,
women with a terary degree on average earned more than double the salary of women with just
a high school cercate; a premium of 1545 Malaysian Ringgit (RM) on average. However, men
with a terary degree earned an even larger premium: male terary graduates earned an average
of RM 3542 as compared to men with a high school cercate who earned an average of RM 1554.
This amounts to a premium of RM 1988 on average. Hence, it is clear that men have equal, if not
more economic incenves for pursuing higher educaon and this cannot explain the gender gap in
Malaysian public universies.
Girls Perform Beer in Secondary School Educaon
Girls can outperform boys in secondary school education in two ways: they score better in
standardised tests, and they drop out at a lesser rate. There is a posive associaon of performance
in standardised tests, overall marks, and good study habits with university enrolment (Frenee and

Journal of International and Comparative Education, 2017, Volume 6, Issue 1
12
Jonathan Yong tienxhi
Zeman, 2007). Obviously, a lower dropout rate among girls would increase their chances of making
the transion to higher educaon. These are the two measures of secondary school performance
examined here.
The beer performance of female students compared to male students has been the most
common explanaon for the gender gap, both in Malaysia and abroad. “More female applicants had
beer academic results and performance, which explains the increase in the gender gap,” said UKM
Professor Othman A. Karim (Kapoor and Au, 2011). The then deputy Vice Chancellor of Universi
Putra Malaysia, Professor Mohd Fauzi Ramlan also insisted that “the female students were just more
qualied than the males” (Kapoor and Au, 2011), poinng out that UPM were forced to allocate
more residenal colleges for women even while vacancies for men sll existed. Is there empirical
proof that Malaysian women achieve beer academic results than Malaysian men?
In 2010, one UNICEF report entled ‘Why are Boys under-performing in Educaon? Gender
Analysis of Four Asia-Pacic Countries’ examined naonal school examinaon results and educaonal
data from Malaysian Educaonal Stascs, and found that girls outperformed boys academically
in four key subjects (English, Mathemacs, Science and Bahasa Malaysia in the years 2005-2007.
(Hepworth 2013, p.14) Furthermore, the performance gap between boys and girls in Malaysian
government schools began in primary school, and only widened as they progressed to lower
secondary and then upper secondary. Another form of standardised tests which we can consider is
the Programme for Internaonal Student Assessment (PISA) which is a global study carried out by
the OECD. Malaysia rst parcipated in the study in 2009. In the 2012 PISA study, 34 OECD countries
and 31 partner countries parcipated the tesng of mathemacs, reading and science. Overall,
there was a small gender gap in favour of boys in science, a large gender gap in favour of boys in
mathemacs and a large gender gap in favour of girls in reading (OECD 2014, p.66). Malaysia was one
of the ve countries out of the 65 tested countries in which girls outperformed boys in mathemacs,
to a stascally signicant degree (OECD 2014, p.73). Malaysian girls also outperformed boys in
science and reading. The underachievement of Malaysian males in terms of examinaon results is
in accordance to global trends. In the UK, the gender gap between boys and girls in their General
Cercate of Secondary Educaon (GCSE) examinaons was the highest in over a decade in 2014,
as girls outperformed boys by 8.8 percentage points (Arne, 2014).
Girls also perform beer than boys at staying in school. The drop-out rate for Malaysian school
children is very low at primary school levels (0.8% in 2014) but rises signicantly in secondary school
(10% in 2014) (United Naons Malaysia 2015, p.10). The dropout rate among students transioning
into lower secondary is low for both genders, although female students have a marginally lower
dropout rate. However, dropout rates rapidly increase as students enter secondary schooling.
Goolamally and Ahmad (2010) found that 9.96% of boys and 8.02% of girls dropped out while
transioning into secondary school in the 2005 cohort. They also noted that the rate at which girls
dropped out of school from 2006 to 2009 actually decreased, while the rate at which boys dropped
out had the opposite trend. This provides evidence for the proposion that girls not only perform
beer than boys academically while in secondary school, but also drop out at a lower rate. This will
undoubtedly have an impact on overall gender parity in universies.
Nevertheless, the gap in secondary school performance in itself does not provide a sasfactory
explanaon for the enrolment gap in Malaysian universies. It merely shis the queson to why are
women systemacally performing beer than their male counterparts in terms of their examinaon
results, or staying in school at a greater rate. Insofar as we reject naturalisc explanaons for gender
dierences, these factors are a symptom of a deeper, underlying problem. There is research which
indicates the size of the gender gap among students is not stagnant, but changes over me, in
parcular decreasing with regards to career aspiraons and degree aainment (Chamberlain, 1988).
This suggests that the gender gap is not caused by inherent or genec disposions, but caused by
wider social phenomena.

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The Gender Gap In MalaysIan publIc unIversITIes: exaMInInG The ‘losT boys’
Socialisaon
Socialisaon is a broad term used to refer to the lifelong processes in which individuals acquire
norms, customs, values and ideologies from their environment, which in turn inuences how they
interact with society. It suggests that a person’s upbringing can heavily impact his or her biological
traits, to the extent that dierent genders may systemacally behave dierently. This can be caused
by interacons during childhood, parental role models, peers or schooling (Sax and Harper 2007,
p.4). In the context of the gender gap in Malaysian higher educaon, it is possible that boys have
become socialised to accept unhealthy gender stereotypes, which inhibits their ability to fully partake
in academic life and enrol into universies. This socialisaon can occur across dierent aspects of
society, such as in parenng, peers and schools.
We can nd limited evidence for such socialisaon in research done through focus groups
surveys of Malaysian undergraduate students. When asked for reasons why boys performed worse
than girls in the Malaysian context, parcipants’ felt somewhat strong or strongly in agreement with
statements such as ‘Boys have to hide their fears’, ‘Girls are ambious’, ‘Girls have a clear vision of
the future compared to boys’, ‘Girls are more disciplined’, and ‘Girls are hardworking’ (Goolamally
and Ahmad 2010, p.17) These answers indicate that girl’s benet from posive stereotypes which
encourage them to go to university, while conversely boys are given negave stereotypes; implying
that masculine aributes include being undisciplined, lazy, lacking in ambion and without vision.
This makes it dicult for boys to fully parcipate in the kinds of acvity which will ulmately be
essenal for ourishing in higher educaon; for instance, reading is oen perceived by boys as a
feminine acvity (UNICEF 2004, p.63).
Even nominally posive traits associated with boys can be damaging. One of the statements
which parcipants agreed with in the focus group was ‘Parents trust a boy’s capability to secure a
job’, which can inuence a parent’s decision to withdraw their son from school as they are more
capable of nding work with compeve wages. This concurs with labour force stascs which nd
that 33% of women aged 15-24 parcipate in the labour force, as compared to 48% of men at the
same age group (Ministry of Women and Family Development, 2013).
Conclusion
The paper has found that 13 out of 20 of Malaysian public universies fall under UNESCO’s
classicaon of ‘far from gender parity’, with a GPI higher than 1.5. This includes the University of
Malaya, which has signicantly higher GPI compared to foreign counterparts in developed naons.
We also nd that this phenomenon is not replicated in Malaysia’s private sector of higher educaon,
where the GPI is much more balanced. The gender gap in terms of public university enrolment extends
to every eld of study with the excepon of engineering, manufacturing and construcon; we nd
in the laer eld that Malaysia has succeeded in achieving much closer gender parity compared to
other countries in the Asia pacic region and also more developed naons like the US and the UK.
Gender parity is much more equal in Malaysian private universies, and among Malaysian overseas
educated students. However, there remains a signicant gap in Malaysian public universies, as the
number of men enrolling into community colleges and polytechnics are insucient to explain this
gap. We nd that there is a trend of male underperformance in secondary schooling level which
undoubtedly contributes to the gender gap in higher educaon, as boys aain lower academic
achievement and drop out at higher rates overall. This does not suce as an explanaon by itself,
without considering how boys and girls are socialised dierently from a young age.
Much more research needs to be done in order to produce informed recommendaons
on how to reduce or migate the gender gap at Malaysian public universies. Part of the purpose
behind this paper is to open a dialogue among policy makers and academics to focus more aenon
on the issue of male enrolment in public universies, which has been scarcely discussed despite
being acknowledged in the Malaysian Educaon Blueprint. Based on the evidence reviewed in this
paper, we recommend that schools in Malaysia begin to consciously review their role in gender

Journal of International and Comparative Education, 2017, Volume 6, Issue 1
14
Jonathan Yong tienxhi
socialisaon, in terms of ‘curriculum materials, teachers’ expectaons, educaonal tracking, and
peer relaons [which] encourage girls and boys to learn gender-related skills and self-concept’
(Anderson 2000, p.38). Schools could implement awareness campaigns and work to increase parental
involvement in their son’s lives; research indicates that parents are usually less involved in their sons’
academic lives while daughters hold school discussions with their parents at a higher rate (Carter and
Wjtkiewicz, 2000). The gender gap in higher educaon is one that disproporonately aects males
from backgrounds of lower income, as acknowledged in reports from HEPI (Hillman and Robinson,
2016). This is why the gender gap is close to parity in private universies and overseas educaon.
Hence, social policies which target lower income families and communies should have the eect of
reducing the gender gap in Malaysian public universies too. This way, we can take steps to address
this disparity, while taking care not to roll back the impressive progress that has been made with
regard to increasing female parcipaon in all elds of study.
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