Attitude and Perception towards Microcontroller Education among Rural Area Students in Malaysia

Abstract

The statistic of student enrollment in the field of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) in Malaysia is declining every year.  This scenario is quite worrisome by many stakeholders. One of the initiatives taken to increase students’ interests in the field of STEM is by using microcontroller in the school curriculum. However, schools in rural area might not have the appropriate kit for the purpose. Thus, the aim of this study is to investigate the relationship of attitude and perception of students in rural areas of Malaysia towards the microcontroller education. 200 students from 16 secondary schools located in rural areas of four districts of four different states had attended the microcontroller workshops conducted, namely, Arau, Perlis; Machang, Kelantan; Raub, Pahang; and Dengkil, Selangor. The instrument used in measuring the students’ attitude and perceptions is a questionnaire using five-point Likert scale, which was answered after the workshop completed. The result showed that the attitude and perception of rural area students towards microcontroller education are at a high level. Pearson correlation result obtained in attitude and perception of the students in microcontroller education poses the positive relationship with moderate strength. These findings reveal that when appropriate microcontroller kit is made available to students, this will promote students’ interest in STEM education and could mitigate the lack of enrollment in STEM related field in higher education.