Liberal Education Management in Malaysia Public Universities: Educators’ and Students’ Perspective

The Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia began to strengthen Liberal Education among Malaysia public universities. However, there are some challenges in term of managing infrastructures and human resources. Therefore, this study examined the perceptions of students and lecturers towards Liberal Education. The target population is the lecturers and students from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Universiti Malaysia Sabah dan Universiti Malaysia Kelantan. For the quantitative research, Students Perceptions Questionnaire developed by Duke (2002) was used as the main instrument which consists of 35 items. The sample size of the students was 1,071. For qualitative, interview protocol was designed for the Dean, Deputy Dean and Lecturers. From this study, the students stated that the process of teaching and learning and the existing curriculum are still not able to assist them to improve their communication skills. In addition, infrastructure such as lecture halls and reading materials are still in deprivation. For lecturers, human resource management issues needs to be addressed immediately. This study had examined the current nature of Liberal education in Malaysian public universities, which is a relatively unexplored area in Malaysia. The findings are useful to the university administrators and government policy makers, notably The Ministry of Higher Education as a policy reference guide.