Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia

In a nutshell

The Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM), or the Malaysian Certificate of Education, is a national examination sat for by all Form 5 secondary school students in Malaysia. It is the equivalent of the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) of England, Wales and Northern Ireland; the Nationals 4/5 of Scotland; and the GCE Ordinary Level (O Level) of the Commonwealth of Nations. It is the leaving examination of the eleventh grade of schooling. The SPM is sat for by secondary school students before further studies in foundation, STPM, matriculation or diploma. The examination is set and examined by the Malaysian Examinations board. For students attending international schools, the equivalent exam they take is the International General Certificate of Secondary Education (IGCSE) exam, and the Unified Examinations Certificate is equivalent to Advanced Level. All SPM examination papers are considered official confidential property and are protected under the Official Secrets Act 1972 of Malaysia.

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Through Muslims

In 2021, the Malaysian Ministry of Education introduced a new SPM format for the new KSSM syllabus, which replaced the old SPM format for the old KBSM syllabus. For English, the GCE O Level grade was discontinued, the Common European Framework of Reference syllabus was implemented for the English paper, and the result statement is handed out with the SPM Certificate.

History

The SPM allows Malaysians to continue their studies to the pre-university level. Originally there were two versions of the SPM, which were introduced in 1964: the Malaysian Certificate of Education taken by students studying in English schools and SPM (Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia) taken by students studying in national schools. The difference between the two was that the SPM was conducted using the national language (Bahasa Melayu), while the MCE was conducted in English. The MCE was discontinued in 1976 when the Ministry of Education took over the examination from the University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES) and merged it with the SPM. The predecessors of this exam were SPPTM (Sijil Pelajaran Persekutuan Tanah Melayu, which was started in 1962) and FMC (Federation of Malaya Certificate, which started in 1957) before the formation of the Federation of Malaysia.

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Subjects

Compulsory subjects

Certain subjects are mandatory for students. They are:

^a Compulsory for all Muslim students except for students in the Islamic Science stream, who are required to take their respective electives in lieu of this subject.

^b for all non-Muslim students.

^c Compulsory for students in the Commerce, Literature and Arts streams only. Students in the Pure Science, Islamic Science, and Humanities Science streams are required to take their respective Science electives in lieu of this subject.

Elective subjects

At the end of Form 3, Form 3 students are required to sit for the final exam — Ujian Akhir Sesi Akademik Tingkatan 3. Based on their result, performance and interest, students will be streamed into the streams that suit them the most for the following 2 final upper form years of schooling.

Science and mathematics

In 2003, the medium of instruction for the science and mathematics subjects was switched from Malay to English. Due to this transition, students taking science and mathematics subjects can choose to sit for the exams in either English or Malay.

Languages and literature

*Chinese Language is compulsory for all National-type Chinese secondary school (SMJK) students (Bahasa Cina)

Economics and business

Arts and health

Technical and vocational

Removed subjects

Due to the switch from the KBSM syllabus to the KSSM syllabus in 2017, some subjects were removed. The list does not include courses that have minor changes in name only.

Results

When releasing the results, only the letter grades (and not the actual scores) are revealed to the candidates. Candidates may request a remarking (regrading) if they suspect errors in the original marking. Although no list of rankings is released to the public, the names of the top-ranked students in the country and in each state are released to the press.

Since 2010, the Ministry of Education has imposed a ten-subject limit on every candidate while lowering the minimum number of subjects from eight to six. Students are allowed to take two additional subjects (from Arabic, Chinese, Tamil, Iban, Kadazandusun languages and Bible Knowledge) but they will not be considered for government scholarships.

Grade system

Candidates are assigned grades based on their scores in each subject. The exact grading scale used every year has never been made public.

Since 2009, the grading system ranged from A+ (the highest grade) to G (for gagal or fail; F is not used). The previous system assigned a grade point and a letter to each range, with 1A ("1" being the grade point and "A" the letter grade) as the highest and 9G the lowest. The Kepujian (Pass-With-Credit) grade is equivalent to the UK GCSE Pass-With-Credit grade as stated on the back of the certificates.

Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia Ulangan (SPMU)

The Malay language (Bahasa Melayu) was slowly introduced into the national school system from 1960 but was only made a compulsory subject in 1970. Furthermore, a credit in Bahasa Melayu is essential in order to secure a seat in sixth form. One of the many problems associated with this change is that many "good" students were unable to continue their post-secondary education because of their examination result in Bahasa Melayu. In 1972, the BM failure rate was nearly 40%, and the July Paper was introduced as a solution so that students would be given a second chance to retake the paper.

As time passed, changes were made in education policy and from the higher education institution standpoint. In 2013, history became the second compulsory subject. Many universities also required students to achieve at least C in Mathematics or, in some colleges, to achieve at least a passing grade. Because of this change and demand, the examination syndicates announced that the history and mathematics papers would become available to retake along with the Bahasa Melayu paper in the SPMU.

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