FoE Hosts Onsite Public Guest Lectures with Australian, American Scholars

UIII.AC.ID, DEPOK - Two guest lecturers from American and Australian universities were invited by the UIII’s Faculty of Education (FoE) to speak about the current topics on educational field, in hope to increase exposure of its students towards international scholars. Taking place at its Faculty A Theater Hall, this two day-event presented Professor Liz Johnson of Deakin University, Australia and Associate Professor Rachel Rinaldo of University of Colorado Boulder, United States of America.

Speaking on the first day of the event, Professor Johnson discussed about “Learning and Teaching in a Digital World” in which she shared about her university’s experience in managing in-person and online courses. She said that currently, Deakin University is adopting two modes of teaching and learning, which are 70 percent in-person mode on campus and 30 percent online via cloud. 

Professor Liz Johnson (left) sits next to Professor Nina Nurmila, the Dean of the Faculty of Education (right)

“Increasing participation [automatically] increases the diversity of learners and the need for flexibility. Digital delivery increases flexibility and can remove geographic and time constraints” Professor Johnson explained during her presentation on Wednesday (09/11/2022). “The principles for good learning are universal. [Thus] they should guide learning design in every mode of learning,” she added. 

Professor Jamhari Makruf as the representative of UIII officials highlighted on his welcoming remark that as a newly-established university, it is crucial for UIII to learn from Australian universities on how to manage an international quality university. He hoped that, as the name it has, UIII (stands for Indonesian International Islamic University) will be a university with an international quality, as expected by its founding fathers. 

Conveying her impression on attending the event, Professor Johnson is optimistic about UIII’s future. “This is very an exciting campus full of promise for the future. I’ve just had a pleasure of talking to some of the students of the university in a discussion about lifelong digital learning and they asked some great questions, so I can see that the future of the university is in great hands,” she told UIII’s media team after the event. 

On the second day of the event, Associate Professor Rachel Rinaldo of University of Colorado Boulder spoke about “Writing Theoretical Framework for Your Thesis” which was held to assist the universities first-cohort students as they are currently starting their research thesis proposal, and are expected to graduate in 2023. 

Albeit the session was specifically intended for the FoE students, the enthusiasm from other students in the other faculties was also high. And being asked about the current development of research capacity in Indonesia, she mentioned that she is very impressed with the changes it has been made for the past two decade. 

Associate Professor Rachel Rinaldo gives public lecture at the UIII' theater room

“I have been very impressed within the past 20 years over the development of research capacity in Indonesia. Twenty years ago, it was lacking. Almost everybody got their PhD outside Indonesia,” she said, adding that there have been some changes following the modernization in universities over the last 10 years, in improving their research capacities. 

The Dean of FoE Professor Nina Nurmila highlighted that indeed, the objective of the two-day event was to expose the students towards international scholars. “We claim our university as an international university; therefore, the students need to have international exposure not only to their lecturers, who are graduated from reputable universities abroad, but also lecturers from reputable international universities abroad,” she said, adding that “the more exposure to international scholars the broader the knowledge that students can gain from various different perspectives.” 

Starting its academic year in 2021, UIII is currently having hundreds of students coming from different countries to study at its campus in Depok, West Java. The students are pursuing both master’s and PhD degrees. —   

Contributor: Supriyono

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