UNITAR-Malaysia

You Are Welcome, Shabs et al

I try to focus on DL possibilities outside the usual suspects. There is a whole world out there that tend to be ignored, neglected or dismissed without any good reason.

KKA

 

Jack,

"Bumiputera" is native Malay. This group of people have special privileges in Malaysia.


Simon Choo

 

What an elegant way of describing it; you are an ironist and a gentleman, Simon. Best of luck to you, and belated new year's wishes.

God forbid I should comment further. And you can quota me on that.

 

Nevertheless, UNITAR appears to be a secular institution and not a pervasively Muslim sectarian school.

It also apparently requires students to take some of their classes face-to-face at regional centers located in Malaysia, so it really isn't a fully DL school in the international context.

 

Re: You Are Welcome, Shabs et al

Outside the borders of the United States, you find hordes of people running around, jabbering crazily in gibberish. Beyond this zone of cacophony, there is an uncharted region where anything can happen, inhabited by dragons and sea serpents. If you persist on pushing even further, you will reach the edge of the earth and fall off.

Seriously though, I agree with you. Undoubtedly there are lots of DL schools that we never discuss, particularly those operating in languages other than English. Even if I can't make use of them personally, I'd be interested in knowing more about what other people are doing out there.

China's got a billion super-industrious people. They must have countless inscrutible DL schemes brewing. We hear about dozens of UK DL programs, so what are the Germans, Italians, French and all the rest of the Euros up to? We marvel at the low cost of South African programs, but what's coming out of India? (Indian programs might even be in English.)

One of the coolest things about distance learning is the way that it brings the world's education to us, wherever we are. That's particularly attractive to those, like myself, that are interested in other cultures.

 

Yes,

I whole heartedly agree, Bill. That is why I reported on occasion on one Lebanese University, the state of DL in Romania, a Baltic university, and recently Malaysian. I am sure I may have done others, too.

Interestingly, English is available as a medium of use (in all aspects) in these places.

In fact, English is an ever-present medium of communication and study out there in the world--for two reasons, I think: namely, first, because it is the lingua franca of contemporary times, and, two, because not everyone is afraid of other languages in other parts of the world.

Just a few thoughts.

KKA

 

Re: Re: You Are Welcome, Shabs et al

We Germans think the pure online degree thing does not work YET. A lot of articles were written about that in the biggest and most famous German magazines, and the overall result was:

online education: yes
purely only education: no

-> meaning that there is an increasing number of partly online programs of b&m universities year by year, but nobody sees the economic necessity to put up an overall online degree program. Moreover, the online classes are held parallel to b&m classes, sometimes even instead of the b&m classes, but never (yet) a whole online degree program.

coming to "traditional" Distance Learning, Germany only has 1 official DL university, the "counterpart" of the British "Open University": "Fernuniversität Hagen" (meaning "Distance University of Hagen", a city in Northrine-Westphalia, Germanys biggest state).

www.fernuni-hagen.de

They have numerous DL programs, but all paper-based (except for the Business Informatics classes, IIRC), and all in GERMAN.

Exactly, that´s the thing.

We did not use to have foreign speaking classes or even degree programs up till like maybe 5 years ago because the subjects we are famous for do not need to be taught in English - like Economics or Engineering or Chemistry&Physics and stuff like that (mainly the ones were we make money with or that bring us the rare Nobel prizes).

Furthermore, since German speaking countries are a big market with around 140 million people altogether, it is always better for the (academic) MASSES to learn in in their mother tongue, because that´s simply in more than 95 % of all cases where they work in! Only maybe 5 % really get into international operating companies and/or in that highly positions that English is "language of the board".

Therefore, most English language programs that have been arising in the last few years, are MBA or other Master programs in Business Administration mainly for Managers (from other subject areas). We have quite a lot of those now, but I think only very, very few are totally DL / online, and I guess there is not even one totally without a residence phase.

But, if one is interested in such a program in Germany,
don´t hesitate to contact me,
I will try to search in my own database...

Greets,
Trigger

 

Some negative feedback on Unitar: Grouses against Unitar, the 'virtual university'

 

mmmmmffffffllllllnnnnphphphmmm

 

More from Malaysia (also somewhat skeptical): Net Value: What ¡s the value in e-learning?