CHIANG MAI (THAILAND), June 2015 – The Supreme Council of the Asia-Pacific University-Community Engagement Network (APUCEN) which convened here recently has agreed to establish an APUCEN Student Chapter at each of its member universities.

This was declared by the Vice-Chancellor of Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) Professor Dato’ Dr. Omar Osman who chaired the Sixth Regional Meeting of the APUCEN Supreme Council at Chiang Mai University, which was attended by 23 delegates from 11 institutions of higher learning.

“This is the first time that the APUCEN council meeting has included student leaders with the inclusion of the USM Student Representative Council as observers, and we have agreed to establish the APUCEN Student Chapter to be more inclusive and holistic in community engagement while encouraging community learning and service learning,” said Omar. 

He elaborated that an APUCEN Student Chapter will be established at each of the APUCEN member universities (which total more than 70) in order to complete the ecosystem of community engagement from the perspective of the university.

“The establishment of the student chapter will enable students of the universities involved to interact at the international level through participation in programmes conducted or supported by APUCEN,” he said.

One of the international activities that is expected to be well received is the soon to be launched Universitas Andalas Students Community Programme which receives the support of the Indonesian Ministry of Higher Education and Research.

Omar who is also the APUCEN President stated that various agenda to chart the direction of APUCEN and to enhance international co-operation in community engagement were discussed during the meeting.

“APUCEN hopes to invite the participation of ministries of higher learning and agencies related to higher education from member countries for future meetings and other activities, as their participation would be an important indication of continued efforts and commitment to implement high impact university-community engagement projects,” he added. 

The meeting was attended by representatives from USM, Universiti Utara Malaysia (UUM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM), Universiti Sains Islam Malaysia (USIM), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), Thammasat University, Chiang Mai University, Seri Begawan Religious Teachers’ College, Australian College of Applied Psychology, Universitas Andalas Indonesia and Kyoto University of Foreign Studies, Japan.

A total of 12 agenda and community engagement projects, which included community-based research, plans for human resource development proposed by USIM to handle youth substance-abuse, as well as training of trainers (TOT) in university-community engagement leadership proposed by USM through a grant from the Higher Education Leadership Academy (AKEPT) were discussed at the meeting. - Translation: Dr Nurul Farhana Low Abdullah/Text: Mohamad Abdullah