Research Article
Umesh B, Farzana R, Aminath
Abstract
Background: Students after receiving a Bachelor’s degree have myriad aspirations. Additionally the most frequent aspirations are further education, full-time employment and part-time employment while studying. Reasons and concerns to achieve these goals differ from student to student. Aim of the study: To investigate the most to least common aspiration among the four aspirations being studied, which are further education, full-time employment, part-time employment while studying, travelling and their reasons and concerns of choosing their aspiration? Firstly, the study aims to find out the most prevailing and least common aspiration within each faculty, and within Malaysians and non-Malaysians. Secondly, discovering whether private or government industries are more favored among the students coupled with their reason is an objective of the study. Further the study is aspiring on unearthing whether students prefer to sustain studies until Master degree or PhD. Method: A cross-sectional study was carried out on Bachelor’s degree students in their last two years of study from Malaysia and abroad. Results: Most prevalent aspiration among both Malaysians and non-Malaysians was full-time employment, followed by further education, part-time employment while working and traveling. It was observed that full-time employment along with the scope of further enhancement was the most universal aspiration among all the faculties except arts, social sciences and healthcare. On the other hand, students preferred to work in private industry rather than the government industry as it yields an agile carrier growth. Bountiful students desired to work full-time to cultivate work experience but at the same time were concerned about getting a good job. Most students wanted further education to increase their opportunities in the future, but were concerned about the course fees. Conclusion: The most to least common aspiration chosen by the students fluctuates from faculty to faculty. The most to least common aspirations as stated before were the same for both Malaysians and non-Malaysians. Not to mention, both Malaysians and non-Malaysians choose private over government industry for work and elected to study only until Master degree.