ICBT Campus partners with RMIT University to provide Foundation program in Sri Lanka
Pursuing higher education is a goal in any student’s life. While many travel abroad, some would want to be in their home country for their degree. In Sri Lanka, there are many private higher education institutes that promise the best education for students. Out of them, ICBT Campus has been around as a potential higher education institute, providing state-of-the-art facilities for students and sharing the expertise from their highly qualified netwo rk of a c a d e m i c s. Identifying the quality of education they provide for the s t u d e n t s, RMIT University, Melbourne has come aboard to maximise this experience. On a more personalised note, students can now opt to pursue a foundation course just after their O/ Ls and follow their degree path.
Speaking to the Mirror Education, Rachele Zito Relationship Manager RMIT
Training Australia shared their thoughts about partnering with ICBT Campus.
Q: What is RMIT University?
A : RMIT Training is a part of the RMIT University and the University is over 120 years old. It currently has around 85,000 students out of which 45,000 of them are undergraduates, 12,000 are postgraduates and 26,000 vocational training students. The beauty of our university is that it has vocational training and higher education in one organisation. It’s in the heart of Melbourne and we have campuses across Vietnam and Barcelona.
Q: When RMIT is affiliated to a foreign higher education institution, what are the benefits that are offered to the students?
A : In terms of affiliating with offshore partners, it creates that combination with both having the environment and study- feel of Australia to the host country. Students get to experience the same kind of learning experience that students have in Melbourne. It also gives the opportunity that students can continue working or living with parents in their host country without having to sacrifice more in a foreign country. It’s actually an investment. RMIT Training is proud to bring foundation studies internationally and it allows the students to spend the first years with their families in their own country, working and saving more money. It also takes into consideration the age of the students. They will be 16- 17 years old when they do foundation studies and this means they will need a bit more guidance from their parents and a bit more security before they come over to Melbourne. Once they are enrolled in our foundation studies course here at ICBT for example, we already consider them part of our university. Therefore, there’s a direct link for them to Melbourne but it’s a gradual pathway for them. They become our students and we work in partnership with ICBT. We don’t just give the programme to ICBT and ask them to do it. They in turn get the knowledge they need to succeed in higher education and the foundation studies course was written with that in mind. A lot of international students want to come and study in Australia and we have common requirements for our university studies. Foundation studies give international students to get those entry requirements plus build the skills they need so that they could succeed in their higher education. RMIT University is linked with the industry so they can do internships with industry when in Australia. They will get a lot of good personal experiences and student experiences are something that we focus on. The University provides a lot of support services to the students. When RMIT goes into a partnership, we are one partnership. So teachers and students interact with those at RMIT in Melbourne. Students also don’t feel isolated and they are put into a community where they can learn and support each other. We introduce community forums and discussion blogs so that they know that there are Sri Lankan students coming on board so they are ready to share their experience with each other.
Q: Why did you choose Sri Lanka?
A : Sri Lanka has two major cities, which are Colombo and Kandy. The third biggest city in t e r ms of t he Sri Lankan population is Melbour ne. So there would be no better partnership to really look for than bring in Sri Lanka to Melbourne as an educational partnership. It’s therefore good for Sri Lankans to learn about the Sri Lankan culture because Australia is built on multiculturalism and one of the benefits of having international students is that it gives us strength in learning from other cultures. That’s one of the best growing elements which we can offer to students at RMIT University.
QQQ: What is RMIT Training and the RMIT Foundation?
A : RMIT Training is a subsidiary of the University and we belong to the University.
We are the training arm and we look after the English proficiency mainly for Sri Lankan students. We have a number of services including the English Academic Passport and Professional English. There are teacher and trainer qualifications. We also l ook after Aviation as well and RMIT Training has been around for 50 years and we have now taken on foundation studies. This year we started it in offshore institutions in China, Sri Lanka, Cambodia and Malaysia. That for us is a benefit because the whole idea of building a foundation studies community has j ust broadened. Therefore we have a community of teachers working together and it is shared expertise in order to strengthen the programme and in turn it strengthens what students could achieve as well.
: The foundation studies community is quite new to Sri Lanka. What are the advantages of doing a foundation course?
A : A foundation course is more focused on their higher education. O/ Ls is general education but a foundation is focused to prepare a student to build all the skills and the knowledge that they need to pursue the higher education that they want. Once they are enrolled in foundation studies they have a conditional offer to go directly to higher education providing that they achieve the results they need in the foundation course. It’s a more direct and specific path and prepares them on a personal level.
: Why should a student choose ICBT to pursue his or her higher education?
A : When we did our research in Sri Lanka we too found out that there are many institutions that have partnered with Australian universities. We look for a partnership which has an infrastructure; that is solid and has its presence in the market. ICBT has been around since 2000 and they have over 7000- 8000 graduates. Their faculties are of high standards and as a University we have to ensure that a student experience the same quality of education and lifestyle that they would experience in Melbourne. We have to feel really confident that our partners could provide the same standards of education we would provide in Melbourne. ICBT is a massive company here and their goal is to ensure that the students get the best education. They are equipped with the latest technology and infrastructure facilities and therefore it was a perfect match for us. ICBT has expanded to six different venues around Colombo and they are also based in Kandy.