Citizenship Knowledge among Secondary School Students from Multiple Ethnicities in Peninsular Malaysia

The aim of this research which was carried out throughout the Peninsular of Malaysia is to identify the level of citizenship knowledge among secondary school students in Peninsular Malaysia according to gender and ethnicity. Citizenship knowledge among students which is under investigation is comprised of three aspects, namely the establishment of a sovereign country, democratization and ethnic diversity. The research design was a survey using a quantitative approach. The instrument used for this research was a questionnaire while the number of respondents recruited for this study was 1812 secondary school students from various ethnic groups in Peninsular Malaysia. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and inferential analysis of Manova by using SPSS software. The findings show that the level of citizenship knowledge among the students based on two of the aspects studied, namely the establishment of a sovereign country and democratization, are at a moderate level while the ethnic diversity aspect is at a medium high level. Overall without citizenship knowledge, students are at a moderate level. The findings also show that there are significant differences in citizenship knowledge of students based on gender and ethnicity. With regards to gender, it is found that male students show higher levels of citizenship knowledge with regards to the aspect of the establishment of a sovereign country and democratization compared to female students. In the meantime, female students showed higher levels of knowledge in terms of ethnic diversity than male students. With regards to ethnicity, Malay students showed higher levels of citizenship knowledge on democratization and ethnic diversity compared to Chinese and Indian students. Meanwhile, Indian students show the highest level of knowledge in terms of the establishment of a sovereign country compared to Malay and Chinese students. The findings of this study can affect the education process of the country in producing knowledgeable and skilled citizens in line with the aspiration of the National Education Philosophy in Malaysia. Hence, the implementation of citizenship education needs to be improved in order to increase the level of students’ citizenship knowledge.