KOTA KINABALU: Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) can be on par with other public higher learning institutes (IPTAs), said its new vice chancellor, Professor Dr Mohd Harun Abdullah.
Speaking in his mandate following his recent appointment, Dr Mohd Harun said the aim is achievable if its communities were always thinking positively, were creative and innovative as well as opened to changes.
He urged the UMS community to come out of their comfort zone and to meet with the challenges that are presented to them for the good and excellence of the university.
Dr Mohd Harun outlined six aspects that would be focused on during his tenure as vice chancellor.
The six issues that would be focussed on would be to inculcate the love for knowledge, to strengthen the university’s human resource, team work, relevancy in academic as well as excellence in research and innovation and to increase its income generation capacity.
Under his focus to inculcate the love of knowledge, Dr Mohd Harun stressed the importance of knowledge and for the adoption of continued learning by all members of UMS.
“A lecturer or professor is only a specialist in his own field and is not perfect in his knowledge of other fields. As one who loves knowledge, he has to be ready to admit his deficiencies,” he said.
He also urged those knowledgeable at UMS to use their knowledge for good and not for agendas that are wrong in the sight of God.
As for his focus to strengthen the university’s human resource, he urged the UMS community to undergo mind transformation.
“I believe the UMS workers are its biggest assets. They are capable of thinking creatively and to implement their jobs with honesty and earnestness, to put the needs of the organisation first before their own personal needs, to speed up the processing of their work, to work independently, to add quality to their work and to improve the quality and excellence of the organisation,” he said.
The fourth vice chancellor of UMS also called for the creation of a conducive working environment that would generate excellence for the university.
“The challenge for UMS is to create thinkers who are capable of shaking the world,” he said.
At the same time, he also encouraged the UMS community to be ethical in carrying out their work.
“Being honest and sincere are qualities that must be inculcated within all of us. Integrity is not a regulation that is forced. It begins within the core of every human being. We don’t want to create individuals who are good at acting and who only pretend to be good when they are in front of their bosses but act differently when the bosses go away,” he said.
Dr Mohd Harun also urged the UMS community to be professional, dynamic, helpful and progressive.
“We are not professionals if we keep on harping on the mistakes made by others in order to make ourselves look good. Only the weak look for others’ weaknesses for their own benefit.”
He said that instead, the UMS community should strive to help ease the work of others.
“If you help light up the candles belonging to others, it will not extinguish our own lights,” he said.
In his mandate, he also urged academicians to study the relevancy of courses that are offered by the university.
He added that UMS goals are aimed at helping Malaysian children excel in their fields of their choice, and serve as a long-term investment.
And in the issue of research and innovation, Dr Mohd Harun said that researchers have to stop their dependence on funding from the university and the government.
“You have to endeavour and find funding from industries, particularly the local ones such as those attached with oil palm. Research could also be done with things that are close to us such as our environment, and we can expand from there,” he said.
“We as the academicians of UMS must endeavour to make UMS as the pioneer in research and innovation based on our local environment,” he added.
At the same time, he also urged them to identify researches that have the potential to be developed commercially such as marine products, as well as those in the creative industry.
The vice chancellor also said that he aimed to turn the university into an eco-campus that would benefit the eco-tourism in Sabah.
“We can work with tourism players to help place UMS on the tourism map,” he said.