The Engineering Undergraduates Industrial Training Programme in Malaysia: Issues and Resolutions
Aini Najwa Azmi1, Yusri Kamin2, Ahmad Nabil Md Nasir3, Muhammad Khair Noordin4
1Aini Najwa Azmi, Department of Technical and Engineering Education, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor Bahru, Johor Darul Takzim Malaysia.
2Yusri Kamin, Department of Technical and Engineering Education, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor Bahru, Johor Darul Takzim Malaysia.
3Ahmad Nabil Md Nasir, Department of Technical and Engineering Education, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor Bahru, Johor Darul Takzim Malaysia.
4Muhammad Khair Noordin, Department of Technical and Engineering Education, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor Bahru, Johor Darul Takzim Malaysia
Manuscript received on 01 September 2019 | Revised Manuscript received on 10 September 2019 | Manuscript Published on 23 September 2019 | PP: 405-419 | Volume-8 Issue-5C, May 2019 | Retrieval Number: E10580585C19/19©BEIESP | DOI: 10.35940/ijeat.E1058.0585C19
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© The Authors. Blue Eyes Intelligence Engineering and Sciences Publication (BEIESP). This is an open access article under the CC-BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

Abstract: Electrical and electronics is one of the sectors that have led in the process of moving to Industry 4.0 and an important contributor in Malaysia’s economy as it is one of the twelve National Key Economic Area (NKEA) in the country’s Economic Transformation Program (ETP). Globalization era needs human capital resources with competency, competitive and multi-skilled to lead a country to be a developed country. Malaysia is one of developing country in the world that is facing the unemployment issue among engineering graduates. The delayed of education transformation will affect the graduates’ skills developments which can lead to unemployment among them because the demands of today’s industries cannot be met. Many employers admit that our engineering graduates lack in non-technical skills, but they seem fine in technical skills. Industrial training is a platform for students to develop non-technical skills in the real workplace which difficult to be learned in the classroom. All bachelor’s engineering students need to undergo industrial training for at least 8 weeks as stated in Engineering Accreditation Council (EAC) manual. This paper presents the issues arise and resolutions done by faculty in minimizing the issues. A qualitative study has been done to twelve industrial training coordinators in 8 public and private universities to find the experts’ opinions. Many issues have been highlighted with resolutions to minimize the issues. This is very important to assure students can gain valuable industrial training by effectively developing their non-technical skills to meet the industries demands.
Keywords: Industrial Training, Engineering Graduates, Non Technical Skills, Unemployment, Issues.
Scope of the Article: Industrial Engineering