Pre-departure Briefing Indonesia attracts more than 300 students
Indonesian government announces intention to cooperate more closer with Neso Indonesia
The Netherlands Education Support Office (Neso) Indonesia held a Pre-Departure Briefing last Saturday at the Erasmus Huis Jakarta and simultaneously at its branch office in Surabaya. Besides the Stuned awardees (166 students), several professionals and Indonesian students also received other Dutch scholarships such as NFP (10 awardees), Huygens Scholarship (10 students), and the Indonesia’s Young Leader Programme (12 students). Also present were 4 awardees of the Erasmus Mundus scholarship program, 10 students out of 70 that received the DIKTI scholarships, 19 awardees of the Ministry of Communication and Information scholarship programme and more than 70 students financing the study themselves. Another 20 students attended the briefing in Surabaya. Overall, around 500 Indonesian students will pursue their higher education in the Netherlands this year.
The Pre-departure Briefing in Jakarta was attended by the Chargé d’Affaires of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Dr. Ad Koekkoek, the Chargé d’Affaires of the Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia in the Netherlands, Mr Djauhari Oratmangun, Prof. Wardiman Djojonegoro, the former Indonesian Education and Cultural minister, Mr Muchlas Samani from the Directorate of Higher Education, and many other VIP’s.
The event began with a performance by the famous Indonesian artist Mr. Butet Kertarajasa who a reflected in a humorous way on what it means to be an international student and the hopes set on the audience as the potential future leaders for Indonesia. Mr Muchlas Samani, Director at the Ministry of National Education, announced in his speech that the Ministry aims to intensify the cooperation with Neso Indonesia with regards to the implementation of the scholarship programme of the Ministry. This so called DIKTI scholarship programme is aimed at improving the quality of Indonesian university lecturers by awarding post graduate and PhD scholarships to study abroad. The current number of DIKTI scholarships will be increased to 1,000 in 2009. Mr Samani expressed his hope that the collaboration with Neso will result in more lecturers being able to pursue a study programme in the Netherlands.
During the Pre-Departure briefing, prospective students also received information on studying and living in the Netherlands, such as how to deal with culture shock, and other practical information. A special part of the programme was the Q&A with the alumni representing the Dutch Higher Education Institutions who were very keen to share their experiences and impressions when they were in the Netherlands for their study.