No stopping public unis

PUBLIC varsities are not resting on their laurels, but instead are on full throttle soaring upwards.

Achievements of note include Universiti Malaya’s (UM) climb up the QS World University Rankings for the third consecutive year, reaching a rank of 133, as well as Universiti Putra Malaysia’s (UPM) impressive jump, by 61 spots last year.

If the trend continues, two of our universities are set to surpass the top 100 universities mark by 2025, Higher Education Minister Datuk Seri Idris Jusoh said during his Amanat 2017 speech at the Putrajaya International Convention Centre on Thursday.

While UM reached the 133th spot, UPM was rated 270th last year.

Also, six of Malaysia’s academics have been included in The World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds by Thomson Reuters.

Public universities are not stopping here. With the launch of the University Transformation Programme last year, the Higher Education Ministry has set plans to help universities generate income, increase academic productivity and support student development, among others.

Instead of sticking to old funding methods, input-based funding from the Government will soon be implemented to improve productivity.

Set to start in 2018, operational grants will now take into account of the number of students, their cost and level of study.

Meanwhile, the private sector will be involved in designing uni- versity programmes aimed at reducing skills mismatch between graduates produced and industry requirements, helping them secure talents who have the right knowledge, and skills that a particular industry needs.

Idris, in his speech, pointed out that the ministry had target to raise graduate employability to 80% and above by 2025.

Since 2012, it has already risen from 74.4% to 77% last year, which has passed the halfway mark in hitting the target set. These graduates were hired within three to six months upon graduation.

To improve the chances of public universities’ undergraduate talents being picked up by the private sector, an “integrated curriculum” with off-campus industry-based learning is encouraged via the 3+1 or 2+2 programmes.

In fact, two of these programmes have kicked off, starting with the ‘Two Universities + Two Industries’ (2u2i) programme in September last year, which requires undergraduates to study on campus for two years and gain working experience in industries in the remaining two.

Some eight 2u2i programmes were rolled out in five universities last year, with eight more in two universities in 2017.

“The 2u2i concept has received positive responses from the industry, which shows that the ministry’s efforts in re-designing Higher Education are on the right track,” Idris said.

A total of 60 business leaders will also serve as advisers in designing university curriculum via the CEO Faculty Programme.

They include prominent names including Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation CEO Datuk Yasmin Mahmood, Air Asia Bhd Group CEO Tan Sri Tony Fernandes and PKT Logistics Group CEO Datuk Michael Tio.

So far, they have spent more than 400 hours lecturing and had been involved in 30 guidance sessions, nine meetings with more than 60,000 students and staff, all done for free. These measures help universities to optimise cost while leveraging from private sector resources, attesting to the call by Idris to improve on “expenditure efficiency”.

Public expenditure in higher education had tripled in just over a decade, rising from RM4.3bil in 2014 to a peak of RM15.7bil in 2015, before being reduced the following years.

In spite of that, Malaysia has remained one of the top spenders in higher education, comparable to those of Singapore and Hong Kong (see bar chart).