Aiming to bring access to higher education to those living in remote and impoverished regions, UT has become a leading cyber university in Indonesia.

The university demonstrates how to adapt to the so-called digital disruption. Instead of seeing the technology disruption as a challenge, UT sees it as an opportunity to expand its reach across Indonesia.

However, as the internet is not yet equally distributed across all remote regions in Indonesia, UT still provides face-to-face learning experiences in regions lacking the internet connection. The state-owned university, then, swears by its blended learning pedagogy.

At the same time, in the past few years, the digital revolution has prompted more universities to adopt digital and online learning. That means people will become more aware of the distance learning opportunities and have more options to access it.

UT, however, does not see the new trend as a threat. Instead, UT sees other universities developing distance-learning courses not as competitors, but as allies who seek to improve the human resources in Indonesia.

UT has built partnerships with numerous universities — both public and private ones — to help them integrate distance learning methods into the classroom in the digital era.

The partnerships include some online classes from UT for college students from other universities to take compulsory courses, like religion, English, Indonesian language and Pancasila. This aims to reduce the dependence on face-to-face classrooms. Moreover, UT also gives training on how to lead both online and face-to-face classes for lecturers from partner universities.

Established on Sept. 4, 1984, UT recently celebrated its 35^th anniversary by holding numerous competitions, seminars and other events under the main theme “Strengthening the Unity of the Nation in the Digital Era”. After decades since its establishment, UT has 39 branches and one center for overseas student management and so far the university has produced over 1.7 million graduates.

Ismunandar, the director general of learning and student affairs at the Research, Technology and Higher Education Ministry, expresses his appreciation toward UT and its contributions to Indonesia. “35 years is a relatively young age for a university,” he says. “But UT has demonstrated how it can make an enormous contribution to the country by being the pioneer and the role model in distance-education.”

Ismunandar highlights how the university has helped to provide equal access to education to train bright students that can face global challenges.

The university has just begun a Ph.D program for management and public administration, making it the first university in Indonesia to provide distance education for a doctoral program. The new Ph.D program aims to accommodate aspiring Indonesian doctoral students so they do not need to take classes from open universities abroad.

To mark the milestone, UT also launched four books. Two of the books are written by its lecturers, one by Tian Belawati about online learning, and another by Hanif Nurcholis about village administrations. The other two books are about the notable tutors and alumni from UT.

Over the past 10 years, UT has preserved the tradition of launching its books every year during its anniversary celebration. The university seeks to publish more books on next year’s anniversary.

“Previously, we launched one or two books each year,“ says UT rector Ojat Darojat. “We plan to add more books for our next anniversary. Hopefully, [we can launch] five books.”

The four books are available for sale on UT’s digital bookstore. The university also promotes and sells the books at various book fairs.

The university, which currently has over 290,000 registered students, has set a target to expand its capacity. “We attempt to increase the number of our students, up to 1 million students, without sacrificing our education quality,” Ojat says, adding that UT had attracted more fresh high school graduates in recent years. In the past, UT was a common destination for workers to earn their university degrees.

“UT is determined to be a strategic player in improving human resources in Indonesia through distance learning services,” Ojat says.

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