Local students' fees in public universities among lowest globally

Fees for local students in public universities are among the lowest in the world, according to Higher Education Ministry.

Its Secretary-General, Datuk Seri Dr Zaini Ujang said the government was subsidising at least RM16,000 per student annually for the duration of their studies.

"For example, students of University of Malaya (UM) and Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) pay around RM2,000 in tuition fees per year for engineering degree courses, and around RM1,500 per year for business degree courses," he said in a statement here, Friday.

The statement was in response to an article entitled 'The 11 Most Expensive Countries For A University Education' published in Businessinsider.com, Friday.

Citing data on monthly household income from Department of Statistics, Zaini said with a mean monthly household income at RM6,141 or RM73,692 annually in 2014, it showed that a household in Malaysia would spend only about three per cent of their annual salary on university tuition fees in public universities.

"This is in contrast to the report written in the website, which referred to Malaysia’s 20 public universities, and states that an average household in Malaysia spends about 55 per cent of their stated salary of only RM2,052 (£310, $61) per month on public university tuition fees, and that parents will lose over half their wages in tuition fees without scholarship," he said.

Additionally Zaini said the Public Higher Learning Institutions (HLIs) enrolment rates had seen consistent growth in full-time equivalent enrolment, from 376,000 in 2004 to 698,000 in 2014, which has been published in the Malaysia Education Blueprint 2015-2025.

He added that the National Higher Education Fund (PTPTN) provides generous study loans, of which 75 per cent of Malaysian students in public universities benefitted to cover their fees and living expenses in 2013 and 2014.

The loans are automatically converted into scholarships for students who graduated with a Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA) of 3.67 or higher, he added.

Zaini said Malaysian students also benefited from a wide range of scholarships from foundations and government agencies, and are eligible for the government's MyBrain15 scholarships to promote human capital growth through the pursuit of postgraduate education.