PUTRAJAYA, April 24 — The increasing number of students working part-time jobs, especially at night in urban areas, has been identified as a major factor contributing to the rise in candidates failing all subjects in the 2024 Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) examination.
This was revealed during a presentation of the 2024 SPM Results Analysis by the Education Director-General Datuk Azman Adnan at the Ministry of Education (MoE) here, today as reported by Berita Harian (BH).
Additionally, lack of focus on the learning process was also cited as a contributing factor.
Records show that 1,789 candidates, or 0.5 percent of those sitting for the 2024 SPM, have failed all their subjects, including Bahasa Melayu and History, and are therefore not eligible to receive their certificates.
This marks an increase from the 2023 SPM, where 1,467 candidates, or 0.4 percent, failed all subjects.
In addition to the issue of focus, including the factor of working at night, Azman stated that an initial analysis by the ministry found that some candidates were also facing issues related to literacy and numeracy, which had not been addressed earlier. Furthermore, there was a lack of support in terms of the learning environment at home.
“That is why I mentioned that family issues have an impact on students’ performance,” he told BH during a press conference.
He added that the ministry will conduct a post-mortem analysis to investigate the significant increase in the number of candidates failing all subjects, in order to identify the key factors behind their failure.
“Although the overall results of the 2024 SPM show significant improvement in various aspects, particularly in students’ academic performance, the MoE is also taking the rise in candidates failing all subjects seriously,” he was quoted as saying.
He also highlighted that the ministry is strengthening recovery programmes to better prepare students for the 2025 SPM and that MoE is taking proactive measures to prevent student failure from becoming a recurring issue.
