Malaysia ready to become education hub for students from war-torn countries

Malaysia is ready to be a hub to provide accessible and quality education opportunities for less fortunate students from war-torn countries, said Higher Education Minister Idris Jusoh.

He said Malaysia was capable of doing so because of various initiatives being implemented by the government to transform its higher education which saw the improvement of ranking for local universities in rating lists locally and globally.

Idris said these students could access such education by coming to Malaysia and studying at the universities or pursuing their studies online, which very much depended on the funding from their sponsorship and accessibility to basic facilities such as the Internet.

"We do education differently in Malaysia as how our integrated cumulative grade point average (ICGPA) will ensure universities produce balanced and holistic graduates.

"With our ranking and achievement, we can certainly play a role to provide inclusive education for the less fortunate students from these countries such as Yemen, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon and the Rohingya,” he told reporters after launching the International Education Scientific and Cultural Organisation (IESCO) conference in Putrajaya today.

IESCO is an independent Malaysia-based non-profit organisation that aims to support and develop the educational, cultural and scientific sectors of the Arab and Muslim worlds in general and mainly in underprivileged areas.

Regarding the two-day conference which was attended by 250 participants from 35 countries, Idris hoped it could attain its objective of assisting and opening up opportunities in education, cultural and scientific sectors of the Arab and Muslim worlds through sponsors and donation for students from underprivileged, conflict zones and refugees.

Among the topics discussed at the conference were on the challenges and reality of education in Middle East conflict zones, the future of education sector development and studying successful international education modules.

Meanwhile, IESCO's board of trustee chairperson Mohd Azraai Kassim said the organisation was currently sponsoring 100 students from war-zone countries, and hoped to sponsor another 500 students in the next few years.

"As of today, we have about RM2 million in our fund from fixed donors of several organisations in Malaysia,”he said.

At the same event, Idris also witnessed the Memorandum of Understanding signing ceremony between IESCO with four institutions of higher learning, namely International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM), Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI), Universiti Tenaga Nasional (Uniten) and Universiti Islam Gaza (IUG).

The collaboration was, among others, to provide financial support to help students from conflict countries, conduct student exchange activities as well as research and studies on educational development of the students.

- Bernama