A DEVELOPMENT OF CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK IN
RESEARCHING SCHOOL ADMISSION PREFERENCE IN A
MULTI-ETHNIC SOCIETY
Mohamad Iskandar Shah Sitam1, Abdul Razak Ahmad2, Mohd. Mahzan Awang3
1,2,3
1
Fakulti Pendidikan, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia
shahiskandar8686@yahoo.com, 2razaq@ukm.edu.my, 3mahzan@ukm.edu.my
Abstract
Parental involvement in making decision for their children schooling is a common situation in many
countries. This is because children have limited knowledge and experience in making decision for their
future. Meaningful discussion of parents’ preferences in choosing the most appropriate education for their
children can take place only in the context of the difficult social and cultural conditions facing primary
school families in modern world. The discussion paper seeks to identify issues on school choice in multiethnic schools, challenges of multi-ethnic school choice, and theories on school choice and construct
appropriate conceptual framework. It is based on literature reviews to identify the relationship between the
issues, policies and theories for the purpose of building a conceptual framework that involves school choice
among multi-ethnic parents in Malaysia. The document as source of reference includes journals, theses,
books, proceedings and dissertation reports from Malaysia and overseas. Overall findings show that factors
affecting choice of schools are information, socio-economic and parents' expectations. The review also
found the suitability of rational choice and Bronfenbrenner’s theory to understand school choice; that
highlight environment aspects towards school choice. The concept paper was developed for advanced
research related to environmental influences on school choice and its relations with ethnic unity and
national harmony.
Keywords: school preferences, choice, multi-ethnic society, schooling, decision making