FEB UNS Welcomes UiTM Malaysia Visit, Discussing Partnership
Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), Universitas Sebelas Maret (UNS), received a visit from 10 lecturers from Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM) Malaysia on 29-30 April 2024. On the first day of the visit, the lecturers from UiTM carried out two main agendas, namely teaching and community service. The members delegates from Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM) are Dr. Wan Normila Mohamad, Nur Aila Amirnordin, Hilwana Abd Karim, Maziah Mohamed Arif, Nooraza Tukiran, Norhaniza Md Akhir, Tengku Sharifeleani Ratul Maknu, Dr. Faridah Pardi, Nur Fadhilana Zainal Abedin, and Dr. Nurazilah Zaenal.
The UiTM lecturers teach in five classes at FEB UNS for several courses such as Digital Marketing, SME and Cooperative Management, Position Analysis, Business Communication, and Economic Mathematics II. In addition, the delegates from UiTM were also invited as speakers at an event discussing Financial Ratio and Analysis, which was held in the Konimex Hall and attended by students of the Digital Business Study Program.
In the afternoon, the representatives conducted community service at Pondok Pesantren Tahfidz Ibnu Mubarok Karanganyar.
On the second day of the visit, a discussion was held on the MBKM partnership between FEB UNS and UiTM in the Assembly Room 1 FEB UNS. The activity was attended by the Dean and also the Head of the Study Programs at FEB UNS.
In the forum, Tastaftiyan Risfandy, Ph.D., Vice Dean of Planning, Business, Partnership, and Information conveyed several collaborations that had been carried out between FEB UNS and UiTM, where in the previous year FEB UNS faculty member had the opportunity to teach at UiTM, research collaboration with UiTM, and there was also an opportunity to create a business journal competition.
Prof. Djoko Suhardjanto, Dean of FEB welcomed the arrival of UiTM lecturers and at the beginning of his speech also delivered some of the achievements of FEB.
“FEB is ranked 4th for the best Economics Department in Indonesia. We continue to improve our international reputation through various collaboration and partnership activities, one of them being the collaboration with UiTM. We are very proud to be able to work with UiTM, hopefully in the coming year it can add more programs and activities, not only in teaching but also in publications, research, and community service. Hence, if today we have done a community service in Karanganyar, next time FEB faculty member can visit and conduct some activities in Malaysia, so we back each other up,” he explained.
Meanwhile, Prof. Irwan Trinugroho, Vice-Rector for Planning, Business, Partnership, and Information also delivered his welcome remark to lecturers from UiTM.
According to him, the culture in Negeri Sembilan and Bahasa Melayu is similar to Indonesian, thus, students can understand the language of instruction and there are no cultural barriers between Indonesia and Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia.
Prof. Irwan also emphasized that the cooperation between FEB UNS and UiTM shall really be implemented. “I don’t like it if we sign a cooperation agreement but there is no activity, the activity must be implemented, in one year I will evaluate to see to what extent the agreement program implementation is and the extent of the real activity implementation,” he said.
Prof. Irwan also conveyed several cooperation schemes at UNS that could be implemented to support the agreement implementation, including international collaborative research, considering that funding from abroad institutions was one of the assessments for universities in Malaysia. Through this scheme, collaborative research can be carried out with funding from both UNS and UiTM.
In addition, visiting professors from UiTM can teach in UNS as visiting professors where the travel, accommodation, and honorarium costs are funded by UNS. This program is also important because becoming an ‘Invited professor at an overseas university’ is also a requirement to obtain the title of professor in Malaysia.
Then there is the scheme to send or delegate UNS lecturers to international universities through the outbound scholar scheme which is also a QS rating assessment point, whereas, UNS lecturers need international exposure to build a portfolio for each individual lecturer. Most importantly, when a FEB UNS lecturer teaches at UiTM or other international universities, the students taught by the lecturer can be categorized as UNS international students.
Furthermore, under the joint supervision scheme, lecturers from UiTM can be part of the thesis/dissertation supervisory team for Master’s students at UNS. Lecturers from UiTM can also come to UNS through this scheme. After the discussion, a cooperation agreement was signed to develop, support, and enrich research development in the subject areas that will benefit both parties.