Contributing Factors for Academic Success in this Globalised Era: Voices from the Successful Orang Asli in Malaysia

While the Orang Asli or the Indigenous People of Malaysia have been in existence since approximately 5,000 years ago, they are still lagging behind as compared to all the other mainstream ethnics, particularly the Malays, Chinese, and Indians. This study aims to listen to the voices of successful Indigenous People of Malaysia and thereafter, crystallise the contributing themes or factors from these voices. Accordingly, the research design employed is that of a phenomenology given that the research problem requires a profound understanding of a particular phenomenon -- the experiences of academic success -- common to the Indigenous People of Malaysia so as to distil individual experiences to an essential concept. Seven successful Orang Asli students willingly participated in the on-line interview by responding to the question in the Interview Protocol. Thematic analysis, performed through the process of coding in six phases to identify patterns across data sets, indicates two main themes which contributed to academic success. The first theme is that of Aspiration, the ardent wish or desire to become educationally and academically successful. The first theme on aspiration seems to be contributed by a further four subthemes, namely self-induced aspiration, family-induced aspiration, community-induced aspiration, and friend-induced aspiration. Meanwhile, the second theme is that of support and such a support is family-based, friend-based, school-based, community-based, government-based, and faith-based support, hence the six subthemes. The findings are discussed in the context of previous findings of academically resilient students.