Grand prize winners in The Best Faculty Initiative category from Faculty of Resource Science and Technology receive their prize from Mohd Fadzil (sixth left). Also in the picture are Shanti (left), Hamimah (fifth right) and Abd Karim (seventh right).
KOTA SAMARAHAN: The Malaysian Education Blueprint 2015-2025 (Higher Education) highlights the need to develop more holistic and integrated curriculum and enhance the ecosystem for student development.
Unimas deputy vice chancellor Prof Datu Mohd Fadzil Abd Rahman said one of the key initiatives is to enhance student learning experience by diversifying the design and delivery of academic programmes such as the use of experiential and service learning to develop future-ready skills and leveraging technology-enabled models to encourage more personalised learning.
“I would like to highlight that one of the initiatives that Unimas spearheads aims at producing holistic, entrepreneurial and balanced graduates as inspired by the Ministry of Education in the enhancement of student experience through curriculum transformation.
“Some of our initiatives include the development of University Electives Module that consists of six main clusters including Science and Technology, Social Science and Humanity, Business and Management, Creative Arts and Design, Communication and Linguistic and Free Electives,” said Mohd Fadzil.
He was speaking at the closing of Curriculum Innovation and Learner Engagement Exhibition (CILEx) 2019 themed ‘Nurturing Future Graduates’ at Dewan Delima, DeTAR here yesterday, which was jointly organised by Unimas Centre for Academic Development and Management (PPPA) and Division of Academic Quality Assurance (BJKA).
Through this new electives module, Mohd Fadzil added, discipline specific knowledge will be offered to ensure students undergo meaningful learning experience and prepare them with new skills and competencies.
“We are heading into the direction of improving the quality of Unimas academic programmes because we want to remain relevant and become future-ready,” he highlighted.
Unimas is also embarking on the ‘2u2i programme’ in their effort to create future-ready graduates.
The ‘2u2i’ stands for two years in university and two years in industry. It is a work-based learning programme in which students spend two years in the university to gain knowledge; and two years of hands-on practices in the industry.
“I believe exhibitions such as CILEx 2019 are important and an important venue for Unimas to plan and execute future-ready academic programmes and to enrich the quality of our students.
“I hope the outputs obtained and presented during this exhibition would shed some light on the issues and opportunities related to curriculum transformation and student learning experience,” he said.
Yesterday’s programme was the first organised by PPPA and BJKA with the aim of providing a platform for exchanging ideas on developing innovative curriculum between the faculty members and students as the curriculum designers and formulating the synergy between lecturers’ teaching style and student engagement.
One of the competition categories held for the undergraduates is ‘How Do I Learn Best?’, where students were given the opportunity to propose brilliant ideas on how to create exciting learning environment and the best learning strategies, and utilise apps and technologies in enhancing their learning experience.
A total of 42 groups of students participated in ‘How do I learn best?’ competition and 16 academic programmes were involved in the Innovative Curriculum Category CILEx 2019 this year.
Among those present were CILEx programme chairman and Unimas Academic Management (PPPA) & Development Centre director Associate Professor Dr Shanti Faridah Salleh, Unimas Quality Assurance Academic Section director Dr Hamimah Ujir and Centre of Development of Academic Excellence (CDAE) of Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) director Professor Abd Karim Alias.