UPI, Bandung – Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia and Tongmyong University (TU), South Korea, signed a Momerandum of Understanding (MoU) for Dual Degree on Thursday, May 6th, 2021. The MoU signing ceremony was held virtually via Zoom Meeting. UPI congratulated Tongmyong University since this is the first MoU ceremony which marks their international collaboration. Both UPI and TU look forward to further collaboration.
The president of Tongmyong University, Prof. Ho Hwan Chun, felt honored to build relationship with UPI. He stated “As this is the first international MoU for us, we have a goodintention with a great pleasure and honor to build relationship with UPI. I hope we can together connect communication, collaboration, and relation. Our purpose is to change the current curricullum for easier learning as we are facing the challenge. We are hoping to meet soon for further talk”
The rector of Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, Prof. M. Solehuddin, also stated his speech to welcome them. “I feel so honored to host for the MoU Ceremony. As we all know, the globalization is inevitable. We are welcoming Tongmyong University as a part of our effort to improve our quality of educational services. With this collaboration, the students are expected to have academic, internship, and cultural experiences. Both campus also need to expand the knowledge and practical skill, and share different cultural background. I hope to have more collaboration in both universities. This ceremony will be an initial step for further collaboration.”
DIA’s coordinator for UPI’s school of Graduate Studies, Mr. Arif Hidayat, Ph. D., explained about the Dual Degree program. He stated that the first batch of the program will be joined by Management study program (for magister degree) and six study programs related to business and technology (for bachelor degree). The merits of this program are UPI’s students get opportunity to study at TU for 2 years, internship experience, and certificate from both UPI and TU. Meanwhile, the students from TU are able to study for one year at UPI, with internship program in Korean companies nearby Bandung.
Besides the rector of UPI and the president of TU, the other lecturers and staffs from both campus were attending the ceremony. The Vice Rector for Research, Internationalization, and Partnership, Prof. Adang Suherman and Dr. Nia Nafisah (Division of International Program Development, DIA) were also present at Partere Building to join the Rector and Mr. Arif Hidayat, Ph.D. This signing ceremony were also attended virtually by Mr. Ahmad Bukhori, Ph.D. (Director of DIA), the Deans and Deputy Deans from Faculty of Mathematics and Science Education, Faculty of Technical and Vocational Engineering, and Faculty of Economics and Business Education, the Director and Vice Director of School of Graduate Studies, along with heads of the six prospective study programs for the dual degree: Computer Science, Physics, Electrical Engineering, Accounting, Management, and Logistic Engineering.
For UPI, this collaboration is significant. First, UPI’s international collaborations with Korean Universities have been strongly held, as proven with some international faculty from other Korean universities teach at UPI. Second, this partnership with TU comes timely to meet Kampus Merdeka: Merdeka Belajar policy from Indonesia Government. This program purposes for the student to be more flexible in learning to pursue the degree in different places.