RI, U.S. universities strengthen ties
Theresia Sufa, Depok
More than 100 university leaders and professors from 80 higher education institutions in Indonesia and the United States met to discuss how they could strengthen ties and continue to build relations between their respective organizations in a forum that ended on Friday.
The two-day forum, called "Indonesia-USA Bilateral Forum on Higher Education Partnerships: Future Directions," was held at the University of Indonesia's (UI) campus in Depok and hosted by the Ministry of Education's Directorate General of Higher Education.
During the forum, participants discussed successful models of existing Indonesian-international cooperative programs, opportunities for and constraints to cooperation and ongoing initiatives such as the Nusantara International Scholarship, which aims to support 400 Indonesians annually to study for PhDs in the United States.
UI rector Usman Chatib Warsa, who chaired the forum's organizing committee, said most of the funding for the scholarships, estimated at $25 million annually, would not come from the Indonesian government.
"We all know the government doesn't have enough money for that," said Usman. "That's why individual partnerships between universities are essential, especially now that (Indonesian) universities are independent."
He added that the forum hoped to establish a consortium of international donors, possibly from Japan, Australia, Europe and the United States, to finance the project, which aims to increase the number of top-notch scholars in Indonesia. It is estimated that out of around 220 million people in Indonesia, currently less than 7,500 hold PhDs.
The project was first proposed during last year's inaugural forum, held in Washington DC, by Prof. Karl Jackson of the Johns Hopkins University's School for Advanced International Studies.
Throughout the forum, discussions between individual universities also took place on the possibility of implementing concrete academic cooperation in the near future, possibly by establishing joint-degree programs, where a student could obtain U.S. and Indonesian degrees simultaneously.
The forum also sought to establish closer relations between researchers in Indonesia and the United States as part of efforts to increase mutual understanding between the two countries.
Specific attention was also given to formulating concrete assistance for higher education institutions in tsunami-torn Aceh, which was represented by the University of Syah Kuala.
The forum, which was also sponsored by the United States Indonesia Society and the Indonesian Embassy in the United States, was attended by representatives of about 50 universities from all over Indonesia and 30 from the United States.
U.S. universities participating included, among others, the University of Michigan, Johns Hopkins University, Ohio State University, the University of Southern California, the University of Hawaii, the University of Cincinnati and the East-West Center.