BUKU APEX 2014 TOGETHER FOR UNIVERSITY'S EXCELLENCE

48 Pages·2014·1.68 MB·English

BUKU APEX 2014

TOGETHER FOR UNIVERSITY’S EXCELLENCE

“INCLUSIVITY, SUSTAINABILITY AND EXCELLENCE”

8.1.2014
Omar Osman
Vice-Chancellor
Universiti Sains Malaysia

1USM
WE LOVE USM
INTRODUCTION

Let me begin this New Year speech with the lafaz, Bismillahirrahmanirrahim and reminding us
of the verses of al-Quran from

i. Chapter of al-Maidah verse 8, mafhumnya:
“O you who believe, be steadfast for (obeying the commands of) Allah, (and) witness
for justice, Malice against any should not prompt you to avoid doing justice. Do
justice. That is nearer to Taqwa. Fear Allah. Surely, Allah is All-Aware of what you do.”

“Wahai orang-orang Beriman, hendaklah kamu menjadi orang-orang yang selalu
menegakkan kebenaran kerana Allah, menjadi saksi dengan adil. Dan janganlah
sesekali kebencianmu terhadap sesuatu kaum, mendorong kamu untuk tidak berlaku
adil. Berlaku adillah kerana adil itu lebih dekat kepada taqwa. Dan bertaqwalah
kepada Allah, sesungguhnya Allah Maha mengetahui apa yang kamu kerjakan.”

ii. Chapter of Adh-Dhariyat Verse 47, mafhumnya:
“And the sky was built by US with might. And Surely, We are expanding more and
more”

“Dan langit itu kami dirikan dengan kekuasaan kami (dalam bentuk binaan yang
kukuh dan rapi) dan sesungguhnya Kami adalah mempunyai kekuasaan yang luas
tidak terhingga”

1. Firstly let us give our sincerest and utmost gratitude to AllahSWT, the Almighty, that
with his continued blessings we are able to gather here today, to listen, comprehend and
adopt the contents of the USM Vice-Chancellor Annual Speech for the year 2014. This year’s
annual speech, titled BUKU 2014, is following the generic name of the past 2 years’ speeches
- BUKU 2013 and BUKU 2012. This year’s speech will focus on the planning, implementation
and outlook for Universiti Sains Malaysia in 2014 and APEX Phase 2 from 2014 to 2018.

2. This year we will also focus on the 1USM - We Love USM slogan. The trust that has
been placed on me to lead USM will continue with more earnest dedication and
commitment. I need to continue to guide the campus community, striving for excellence
together and once again I call upon the entire campus community, including all students and
staff of all categories (the academics, professionals and supporting staff) to continue our
unending journey towards our common goal and mission.

3. 1USM is what we strive for. We lead is how we do things. We love USM is what we
believe in. A friend asked me to remind us all and call upon everyone to improve ourselves
at least by one percent (1%) rather than relying on a few people to improve by a hundred
percent (100%).

4. 2014 will be another challenging year for USM and the nation. USM will be 45 years-
old since its establishment and will commemorate its 50th Convocation in September this year
and its graduates and thus Alumni will surpass 130,000. USM will be moving into the 6th year
of its APEX programme and the 1st year of the new Phase 2 programme, from 2014-2018.

5. The New Year speech will be deliberated in five segments: the theme; the 5 years of
achievements that have become the hallmarks of excellence of the university; the launching
of the APEX Phase 2; the outlook of 2014 and the implementation of the 2014 programmes.
The New Year outlook examines the Quality and Relevance for staff and students in talent,
financial sustainability, resources and institution.

THE THEME OF INCLUSIVITY, SUSTAINABILITY AND EXCELLENCE (ISE)

6. The theme of ISE adopted for this year’s speech is synchronised with the overall plan
of the university to include as many of its staff and students as possible to adopt two
important objectives: sustainability for tomorrow and excellence for today. Thus we will
progress into the next five years in our quest for both objectives with the participation of
everybody.

7. USM APEX University in its second phase needs to be engaged in the building,
empowering and enculturation of excellence through:
i. Doubling of achievements from our academics and researchers,
ii. Empowering our schools, centres and resources,
iii. Empowering talented students and lecturers,
iv. Transforming the minds of administrators and staff members to be more
productive,
v. Leading in sustainability and developing the transformation leadership,
vi. Transforming and transferring knowledge and technology,
vii. Building upon and improving on strategic linkages
The seven requirements will be consolidated into the strategic moves and their
implementation will be constantly monitored and reviewed.

8. USM APEX Phase 2 fundamental focuses on bringing equity, responsibilities and
excellence to the work place (PTJ) and organisation within USM. The APEX Programmes need
to be established on the following:-
i. Provide internal governing mechanism and autonomy,
ii. Self-driven administration and support, and
iii. Financial sustainability

9. The university is readying itself for a modus operandi that will focus on the theme of
inclusivity, sustainability and excellence (ISE) founded upon quality and relevance under the
labelling of Sustainable Led University (SLU). I would therefore reiterate my usual
encouragement and call upon all leaders in the university from heads of departments, the
supervisors to their assistants, the senior management, the heads of units, deans, directors,
administrators, to students society leaders, the Students Representative Council, and
Members of Students Parliament to adopt the theme whole heartedly.

10. Our more important task this year is to build upon the concept of inclusivity in all
areas that we do and undertake. Inclusivity means that in all undertakings, the entire campus
community will take part in its activities through volunteerism, academic activities, research
undertakings, community engagement and activities that bring benefits to staff and students.
Records show that about eighty-five percent of students are involved in campus activities and
many of our staff is engaged through their involvement in Continuous Professional
Development programmes, training programmes and other university programmes assigned
to them. Nevertheless, many of the staff members have yet to become active volunteers
working along with the community and students. In this instance, let us show our
appreciation to all students and staff that have been involved in volunteerism work through
their societies and departments which have helped the less fortunate in many ways during
the events that have unfolded this year.
11. At the same time inclusivity means that programmes and activities should benefit and
give a positive impact to as many people as possible. Inclusivity will use the concept of 1USM
and We LOVE USM. Thus inclusivity is
“The fact or policy of not excluding members or participants on the grounds of gender,
race, class, sexuality, disability, etc.” (Collins).

Enables all community to fully benefit from wealth of the country is the definition of
the Malaysia New Economic Model (pg 9).

12. 1USM appropriately is directly under the concept of inclusivity and I call upon
everyone to subscribe to the idea and mindset.
1USM is based on the principles of together and togetherness. It is about unity in
many activities undertaken. It encourages group dynamism. It settles in the concept
of working as a team and striving together under a common goal. It is expected this
will enable service departments working for a common aim on a common platform,
merging under a single stream of services but also remains independent and diverse.
Many examples of programmes to be undertaken in the future require the concept of
1USM to be applied thoroughly.

13. We love USM already with its own logo and song is a bottom driven idea and is based
on the following objectives that all of the community continue to serve USM and works
through the success and challenges presented to us.
 To encourage more staff to practice healthy lifestyle. Healthy lifestyle of staff will
improve the quality of work and also leads to healthy social life of campus
community.
 Improving caring community programme through instilling the sense of belonging
and caring for each other.
 Strengthening of mentoring programmes has been designed so mentors can be
the social agent to promote caring community in USM.
 Fostering and training more volunteers to help those who need help. Mentor
Programmes are based on the concept of helping oneself and helping others based
on volunteerism.

14. Sustainability is the hallmark of our university and will continue to be so in our goal to
become a sustainable university. As a reminder, Sustainability in USM is based on the 7
pillars of APEX Thrusts;
i. The future,
ii. Being different,
iii. Sustainability,
iv. Humanity,
v. Universality,
vi. Change and
vii. Sacrifice.

In USM APEX Phase 2, these will be embedded into programmes and will spread more
intensively in all aspects of university and campus life from actions, to fundamentals and
relevance.

15. Excellence will continue to be the hallmark of University’s quest. Although such
definitions may move from the fundamentals of tangible to include also the intangible, it is
important that excellence remain the hallmark. Excellence will be defined from three main
perspectives; how well we utilise resources for specific goals? How productive is our talents?
and have we reached the ultimate benchmark?

16. This year’s theme is realising the Excellence with Sustainability and Inclusivity. The
questions are:
 How do we arrive here?
 How well have we done?
 How sustainable are our activities? and
 How inclusive have we been?

17. It is with this aim that we propel into the business of educating and strengthening our
knowledge in 2014 and ultimately these goals can be achieved if we utilise two fundamentals
- Quality and Relevance - for the talents that we have, for the resources that we utilise, for
the governance that we adopt in those five areas of sustainability identified above. In simple
words, ‘Excellence’ means ‘Quality’, ‘Relevance’ means ‘Inclusivity’ and ultimately Quality
and Relevance means ‘Sustainability’.

18. I would like to remind myself and everyone that success does not come easy, success
does not provide short cuts in our pursuit to establish strong fundamentals of knowledge and
essence of excellence and success is also not about indulging in past glories and over
glorifying achievements. We must frown and shy away from this practice. The practice of
overstatement and over claiming should also be frowned upon. We must earnestly and
sincerely safeguard our university against efforts to undermine higher education through
many means. As such Quality and Relevance must be the fundamentals and the fundamentals
need to be built upon, strengthened and accelerated together for the ultimate achievements.

19. A few items of concern in the above issues of sustainability, inclusivity, excellence,
quality and relevance include;
i. Research Enculturation,
ii. Academic Strength,
iii. Network Strength,
iv. Individual Serenity,
v. Institutional Stability,
vi. Environmental Stability,
vii. Sustainability Culture,
viii. The Sejahtera Culture, and
ix. Relationship culture.
We should take the nine items as a general checklist when we are evaluating our way
forward. At the institutional level this has been undertaken. It is most pertinent that all
schools, centres, and institutes adopt the same analysis.

NURTURING THE SOUL AND SEJAHTERA TRANSFORMATION PROGRAMME

20. The university will begin in earnest a programme aimed at enriching the Sejahtera
concept in many programmes to continue to nurture the soul of the university and its
communities. The essence is to strengthen the staff commitment to excellence work culture
with nurturing and enriching the soul through systematic infusion in the staff training. It will
be based on nurturing the civil society culture, integrity culture, mental well-being, good
value culture. Many staff will be involved in this programme through a three (3) year
schedule. The programme will be known as Sejahtera Transformation Programme under the
stewardship of the Office of Transformation.

21. Nurturing the Soul agenda will push the institution for further excellence. It is
believed that not only individuals will be more motivated towards the excellent work culture
but the individuals’ well-being and general well-being will be enhanced. Imam Al Ghazali
forwarded a few analogy on the relationship between ‘hati-akal-anggota fizikal’ (soul-mind-
physical) and it is useful for all walks of life. In general it explains the impact of the clean soul
on life. A clean soul is the right and effective initiation point to approach life in a holistic
manner.

22. “A similar influence of philosophy is also apparent in al-Ghazali’s view of human
beings. Human beings consist of soul and body, but their essence is the soul. The human soul
isa spiritual substance totally different from the body. It is something divine (amr ilahi ), which
makes possible human knowledge of God. If the soul according to al-Ghazali is an incorporeal
substance occupying no space (as Ibn Sina implies, though he carefully avoids making a direct
statement to that effect), then al-Ghazali’s concept of the soul is quite different from the soul
as 'a subtle body' as conceived by theologians at large. According to al-Ghazali, the body is a
vehicle or an instrument of the soul on the way to the hereafter and has various faculties to
maintain the bodily activities. When the main faculties of appetite, anger and intellect are
moderate, harmonious and well-balanced, then we find the virtues of temperance, courage,
wisdom and justice. In reality, however, there is excess or deficiency in each faculty, and so we
find various vicious characteristics. The fundamental cause for all this is love of the world
(http://www.scribd.com/doc/54252025/Al-Ghazali-Purification-of-The-Soul)”

23. The prevalence dynamism of working for excellence among campus communities in
the university need to be spread to the whole campus not only through the above
programmes but also the intense dynamism of internalisation process which need to be
embarks extensively at levels. The Apex phase 2 is aimed at focussing on new dynamism in
relation to quality and relevance on the seven (7) pillars of APEX and seven (7) Thrusts of
Phase 2.

24. They are depicted in the financial sustainability, institutional enhancement and global
mindset. In its original form in Phase 1 these are the talent, governance and resources. To
realise quality talent, the realisation will be to move the talent to global mindset; to improve
the use of resources, financial sustainability will be the aim; to improve governance; move
towards institutional enhancement is the next destination. The three (3) pillars are all geared
towards producing Quality moving towards Inclusivity and Excellence.

25. The move towards relevance lies in the initial phase Apex Phase 1 of becoming world
Class Research University and Sustainable Led University and regional centres in community
engagement in the future. To ensure this dynamism continues, Global Research Prominence,
Leadership and Nation Building, Apex Sharing, Apex Extension and Positioning are crafted as
the new pillars.

26. On Relevance it is about a certain relationship; practical and especially of social
applicability.Relevance establishes credibility – like in a court of law - the relevance of a given
item of evidence prove or disprove a case or its elements; relevance can help build brands
and credibility like in advertising and marketing. Likewise, the content of our curriculum and
the character of our university must be relevant to the times. What we research must be
relevant to knowledge pursuits as much as it is relevant for finding solutions to pressing
environmental, developmental and socio-economic problems, and above all must help lift the
poor from their plight. If people’s character defines their behaviour, the reverse is also
mostly true – discrete behaviour patterns will show insight into their character. So it is worth
pondering, what others would conclude about USM’s character judging from our behaviour
as an institution? Are we relevant?

27. Relevance and USM’s Scenario Planning: The question of relevance to the time and
space was an integral part of the elaborate ‘scenario planning’ exercises undertaken by USM
during the middle of the last decade. Through this process we concluded that universities
which are primarily driven by market forces; those led by special interest groups such as
scholars, state or corporations; universities which are totally invisible, and those focused
mainly on financial motives are at best ‘wrongly relevant’ in spirit or pursuits. On the extreme
end of this spectrum are institutions engaged in unethical teachings and research.

28. Selectively relevant: The same scenario planners finally settled on a university model
that mimics nature for its own existence and the provision of goods and services. Like the
symbiosis that exists in ecosystems where everything is related to everything else, we chose
to be ‘selectively relevant’ by ensuring a symbiotic relationship with the communities we are
set up to serve. Like in nature we wish to be symbiotically connected to everything we can
define as having a stake in us – those whom our actions affect or influence and those whose
actions affect or influence us. From this consideration emerged eventually the University in a
Garden scenario. This choice was an endorsement of the view that universities should be
selectively relevant, as we cannot be all things to all people at all times. What we should do
though is to excel in a strategically chosen area that has wide implication for now and the
future. This brings us to the next point – Sustainability.

29. On Sustainability: In higher education, one side of the sustainability coin represents
the efforts of a university to be competitive in the red ocean environment by attracting
quality students, competent staff, adequate facilities and finances. Often, the focus here is
on maintaining status quo, best practices and excellence. The other side of the coin
represents the major global sustainability challenges, as highlighted by the Brundtland
commission’s report and its triple bottom line approach - environment, economy and
society. The report argues that current developmental paradigms that deplete natural
resources, increase pollution, change climate, and widen the rich-poor gap are simply not
sustainable. Thus protecting our planet, lifting people out of poverty and advancing
economic growth are interconnected aspects of the same thing – sustainability or
sustainable development. Addressing these challenges is the realm of ‘blue ocean strategy’
in the context of USM.

30. The red and the blue ocean spaces usually exist side by side and our challenge is to
increase competitiveness to stay successful in the red ocean and be innovative enough to
move out to the blue ocean space as quickly as possible. Having opted to be selectively
relevant as an institution promoting sustainability, the ability to sustain this stability seems
to define sustainability for us. In reality this means that every step needs to be taken in the
right direction with reflective realignment and proactive action.

THE 10 YEARS IN REVIEW 2004-2008 AND 2009-2013

31. USM has been evaluated from the quantitative aspects in the Key Performance
Indicator (KPI) National Higher Education Strategic Plans (PSPTN), Key Performance Indicator
(KPI) APEX, and Malaysia Research Assessment Instrument (MyRA) and also in qualitative
aspects based on Guide to Assessing APEX Special Agenda – Community Engagement in the
review of the five year APEX performance. Other performance by ascertaining our position at
the international level through rating and ranking were also undertaken.

32. The auditing by the Special APEX Committee in November has shown that USM is at
the right pathway in determining the way forward as a university focused on sustainability
and also community engagement. There are however challenges to be faced. In general we
have gone through a ten-year period of improvements, with the last five (5) years at more
accelerated phase.

33. USM will continue to push for a university distinctively different and the success of
USM to be more visible in pushing for the public understanding of the new era of
transformation in higher education.

34. USM’s position in discipline based ranking is very high and impressive. The overall
positioning in general rating and raking need to be assessed well.

35. USM in the last five years has faced tremendous challenge and the understanding of
what APEX University is all about. Our future challenge is to build a strong foundation and
fundamentals and pushing for the right model of APEX that will fit the need of Malaysia and
become relevant to the nation and the quality achievementsthat surpassed international
benchmarking.

36. I have chosen to review the progress of the university 5 years before since the
beginning of the APEX Programme for the university. In this review, taken from the book
“USM in Numbers: Apex Special Edition”, what was produced the previous year are again
presented, but this year it is in the 5 years averages of improvement including the
achievements in 2013 and also the achievements 5 years before.

37. The achievements are not insignificant but are also by no means excellent in all
aspects. The BUKU 2013 reviewed in the same book also shows the achievements and the
gap in realising some of the targets.

38. The following summarises the achievements.

Table 1
Pre APEX and Post APEX Achievements

Items 2004-2008 2009-2013 % increase
New Research Grants 2717 4897 80%
Cumulative Publications (Citation Indexed 3392 10464 209%
Journal) (ISI/SCOPUS)
Publication per staff 0.74 (2008) 1.50 (2012) 102%
Enrolment PG 7801 (2008) 12097 (2012) 55%
PhD Graduates 521 1315 152%
Patents Filed and Granted 40 filed 287 filed 617%
34 granted 35 granted
39. Other achievements – The University is also proud to be part of the achievements in
many fields. Notably we maintained a good position in many rankings and we will continue
to monitor our progress and at the same time join other rankings worldwide that is based on
“sound methodology and least cost”. Table 2 shows our rankings in subject matter, one of
those that give us guidance. Table 3 shows the summary of our position in many other ratings
and rankings.

40. We also celebrate outstanding individuals and groups that won awards and accolades
based on fundamentals performance and rigour. The achievements range from academic to
research to sporting achievements at both national and international level. More of these
are available in “USM in Numbers: Apex Special Edition”, and also newspaper reporting
booklet of the University.

Table 2
Other Achievements
Items 2004-2008 2009-2013 % increase
Academic staff 1760 1887 7%
No of Alumni 101,471 133,642 32%
No of Graduates 35,426 32,171 -9%
**Percentage of Fulltime Undergraduates 2009 - 59%
with CGPA 3.0 and above 2010 - 58%
2011 - 66%
2012 - 67%
2013 - 70%

Table 4
USM Performance and Achievements
Table 3: USM Ranking in Subject Matter