The author of this policy paper is Nina Adian Disney. She is a Malaysian with a transnational educational background (the US, Australia, Switzerland, Korea and the UK). She studied Law at the London School of Economics and is a barrister by training. She started her career in international tax with PwC but for the past 23 years, her professional focus has been on the Malaysian education sector – as a lecturer, administrator, publisher, researcher, consultant and mother of three.

This paper takes a look at the notion of autonomy for schools.Two private schools were selected and their use of autonomy was studied. The four areas in which both schools seem to freely practice autonomy are : curriculum, teaching methodology, staffing , financing and governance structures. The author observes that their autonomy allows for the schools to respond to the demand of parents.