A study on perception on students toward absenteeism in UiTM Pahang / Annatasia Anak Ambang, Mahfouzyana Mahusin and Sharifah Shahima Syed Khairuddin

Nowadays, absenteeism had become serious issue in our country. This issue happens not just in the educational institution, but also in the working organizations. Lots of people work only for the money and not for their satisfaction. So, these people tend to not come to work by buying medical certificates or by making excuses so that they can work less but still can get their pay. These kinds of people are not really care about their working performance, therefore, they attempt to absent. Students in tertiary level such as students in University Technology Mara (UiTM) are also involved in this issue. Students might absent intentionally or unintentionally. Though, the institution has made the punishment for those who always absent, this absenteeism issue is still continuing. Absenteeism is not only can affect the attending classes but also can affect the students' performance in their study. Sometimes students have their own reasons for not coming to class, such as; medical leave, family problems, or personal problems. There are also students that are not coming to class by skipping the class scheduled. These kinds of students are not interested to attend the class session and will skip the class. UiTM is established to give chances for the Bumiputera to be educated. When thjs issue happens, UiTM might lose about RM 8000 per student for each semester. So this issue can be serious if there are no actions taken. Absenteeism in one angled point of view is one of the most common causes in degrading students' performances, especially to those who are included in the advanced intelligence curriculum, absenteeism causes a great lose and may result to give up an aimed position. It can also cause social repletion especially when a class is composed of a great number of students. This habit can cause a dilemma to the school administration when big figures are involve and may decrease the school's performance. On the other hand, contan1ination of sickness and disease can be avoidable because of the absences of a person (Marbuger, D., 2001) According to the K. Sharon (2011), student absenteeism is a concern in higher education as it results in inadequate learning and poorer academic performance on the part of those missing class. Absenteeism also has an impact on those students who consistently are present by disrupting the way classes are conducted. The consequences of absenteeism are more far reaching than students' academic performance and disruptions in the classroom. Students who frequently miss classes often do not recognize that the classroom is a community to which they belong and that when they are absent, learning declined, student and teacher morale decreased, and academic standards are compromised. According to Richard C. Schiming (2011), one of the most common areas where classroom practiced of individual faculty members differed is attendance policy. Some faculties require attendance. Some faculties count attendance positively in grade determination while others count the lack of attendance against students' grade. Even most faculty who don't require attendance by their students encouraged attendance in a variety of ways. Inherently most faculty probably believes that attendance is important in students' success but most of us can provide only anecdotal evidence to support our belief.