Paramadina promotes civilization

Desy Nurhayati ,  The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Fri, 05/02/2008 1:46 PM  |  Focus

Since its establishment in 1998, Paramadina has followed its mission as a university that combines Islamic values and modernity.

Founded by the late prominent Islamic scholar Nurcholish Madjid, Paramadina aims to go level with world-class universities that produce graduates with leadership, entrepreneurship and ethics.

"We expect our graduates to be the country's future leaders, who are not only excellent in academics but also attain nonacademic proficiencies," said Totok Amin Soefijanto, deputy rector for academic and research at the university.

"Our main objective is becoming a center of excellence and civilization. This is reflected in the field of studies that we established."

The university offers eight fields of study for a bachelor's degree, including information technology, visual communication design and industrial product design.

"These three majors are expected to generate students with advanced skills in technology," said Bima Priya Santosa, deputy rector for operations and finance.

"To build individuals with entrepreneurial skills, we have the management major," he said.

Other majors consist of international relations, communications, psychology and philosophy and religion.

The university also has three master's degree offerings: Islamic business and finance, Islamic philosophy and Islamic mysticism.

Bima said the idea of establishing the majors did not follow the market demand but the university's mission.

To promote ethics, the university incorporates ethics and corruption eradication as compulsory subjects in the syllabus.

The university highlights three aspects of ensuring good education: curriculum, human resources and information systems.

Despite its vision to build a world-class university, Paramadina does not adopt any system or curriculum from overseas.

"We cannot just emulate the curriculum from an overseas university because there are many factors to consider regarding our condition here in Indonesia. A system or curriculum that is appropriate in other countries doesn't always work for us," Totok said.

Paramadina has been referred to by foreign scholars interested in Islamic studies and acted as a host university for Islamic-related research.

In improving its human resources, the university applies certain requirements and methods both in the admission of students and the recruitment of lecturers.

The university admits students through interviews instead of conventional ways such as by test scores.

"By conducting interviews, we expect to obtain complete profiles of applicants, not only their cognitive aspects but also affective and psychomotor," Totok said. "Test subjects are only those relevant with the fields of studies chosen by the applicants."

For the upcoming academic year, the university has received about 1,200 applications, far greater than its capacity of about 300 students.

"Accepting a huge number of students is not our goal. That's why we limit the number of students to 35 in each class, so the lecturer can pay better attention to them," Bimo said.

Besides the regular admissions process, the university also provides full scholarships to some 20 percent of enrolled students annually. The scholarships are awarded in cooperation with private companies and the ministry of education.

Copyright © 2008 The Jakarta Post - PT Bina Media Tenggara. All Rights Reserved.