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Capitalise On Internationalisation Of Universities, Says NajSeptember 03, 2007 19:10 PM
Capitalise On Internationalisation Of Universities, Says Najib
PETALING JAYA, Sept 3 (Bernama) -- Local institutions of higher learning need to improve their own potential and strength and capitalise on the internationalisation of many universities abroad which are coming to Malaysia, Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said today.
The deputy prime minister said many universities, especially those from the United Kingdom, United States and Australia, were transforming themselves into global players, establishing new campuses and exporting their educational programmes.
"The internationalisation effort is advantageous to Malaysia in a number of ways. It provides high quality education within the country in a cost effective manner for our own young people whilst attracting international students to our shores as part of the educational offerings of Malaysia.
"The presence of foreign campuses should inspire local institutions of higher learning to improve their own potential, strength and calibre of students," he said when opening Monash University's Sunway Campus here.
Najib said the development of higher education was moving forward through an increasingly globalised environment, thus presenting new opportunities and challenges to all nations on the wide landscape of higher learning.
Najib said one way of meeting the challenge of the growing demand was to encourage and develop privatised education.
"While we can only set up a certain number of public universities, we should support and encourage the growth of private institutions of higher learning.
"The demand for higher education grew in a phenomenal manner making it imperative that we do something about the rising demand, otherwise we would fail in the duty of the government," he said.
He said that while in the past Malaysians sought education abroad, today foreign students are a regular feature of the educational enrolment. So the role had changed from providing educational opportunities to students at home to providing education for thousands of students from abroad.
He said there was a general surge for Malaysia to become a regional hub for educational excellence providing educational opportunities for large numbers of students.
Monash University itself had one third of its 3,000 students coming from 50 countries outside Malaysia and could play a leading role in helping the Higher Education Ministry achieve its target of having 100,000 foreign students in Malaysia in 2010, he said.
The RM200 million facility, completed early this year, is one of eight campuses operated in three countries by Australia's largest and most internationalised university which is also a member of Australia's eight research-intensive universities.
There are more than 3,300 students on the campus taking courses like biotechnology, medicine, science, arts, business, economics, information technology and engineering.
The first phase of the Monash Sunway campus comprising six buildings can accommodate 5,000 students and the next phase, which will begin next year, will double the capacity.
-- BERNAMA
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