Foreign Student Scholarships

Further to the earlier announcement by our Minister of Higher Education, Datuk Shafie Salleh, it was reported a day later at another press conference that "Malaysia will offer tertiary scholarships to 15 to students from foreign countries each year as part of the effort to position the country as a regional centre of excellence for higher education." The piece of news is carried in Bernama, the Star and the New Straits Times.

"We want the cream of the cream, meaning we want to select the best to come here and that is why 15 students will be given the scholarship annually. They will come here and study in some of the best private institutions we have to offer."

This measure of attracting top students to universities in Malaysia, and providing scholarships to 15 of them is a good move, and I fully support it. This way, we can ensure that whoever joins us at our campus will be able to contribute academically in conjunction with the local graduates.

The 15 scholarships is clearly a far cry from the announcement a day earlier, whereby 5% of seats in the local public universities will be allocated to foreign students. The two moves should however not be confused (as I was initially) as these scholarships, if I read correctly, is meant for studies at Malaysian private institutions and not at the local public universities.

The earlier announcement of 5% international students works out to as many as 3,000-4,000 international students per annum, and possibly as many as 12,000 foreign students in our undergraduate programmes at any point of time.

Hence not only is the 5% allocation to international students not favourable for Malaysians, it's also probably not practical as well. Where are we going to find 15,000 foreign students, when at this point of time, Malaysia is home to only some 40,000 foreign students (mainly in the private colleges)?

Once again, Datuk, fikir betul-betul.