By Amie PDH Ishak
Bandar Seri Begawan - The Private Higher Education Institutions in Brunei Darussalam in cooperation with the Private Education Section, Ministry of Education (MOE) yesterday held an opening ceremony for a `Study In Brunei` exhibition at The Mall, Gadong.
Present to officiate the opening ceremony was Dk Hjh Mastoli bte Pg Seri Indera Pg Hj Ismail, Acting Deputy Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Education.
The morning`s ceremony began with an opening speech by the chairman of the exhibition, Mr S Sivarajah, who said, "We hope to help cater the needs of those pursuing higher education locally in this `Study In Brunei` exhibition and also help promote Brunei as an educational hub for international students as well as local private institutions."
Meanwhile the guest of honour in her speech said, "It is my understanding that there are many students who wish to further their studies either full time or part time abroad but do not have the opportunity due to financial constraints. The answer to this is to study locally.
"I hope this exhibition is an opener and a starting point to raise the level of awareness of the public, especially students, towards the availability of private higher education in Brunei Darussalam.
"There is no doubt the private education industry will flourish through the coming years in order to meet the increasing demand from the people of Brunei Darussalam," she added.
"I am sure that this exhibition will help to promote Brunei Darussalam as one of the education hubs in the Southeast Asia Region, apart from our neighbouring countries. No doubt this exhibition will benefit the people of Brunei Darussalam and hopefully it will encourage more participants in the future," she further added.
Among the aims of the exhibition is to reach out to the public of Brunei Darussalam as a whole, be it students, parents or working adults, about the existence of the variety of quality higher education offered by private higher institutions in Brunei.
It is also to minimise the outflow of students who pursue their higher tertiary education abroad by encouraging them to spend the first couple of years in Brunei, as this will benefit the parents by reducing their financial burden, not to mention helping the local economy by reducing the outflow of education investment.
Another aim is to enable students and working adults who do not get to pursue their studies overseas to obtain the same international qualification by studying locally.
It is also hoped that by organising this exhibition, the public`s level of awareness towards the availability of private higher education institutions will increase.
The private institutions participating in the exhibition are Laksmana College of Bussiness, Brainwise Quantum Learning (BQL) College, Kemuda Institute and BICPA-FTMS Accountancy Academy.
Other participating booths include BIBD Bank, Concept Computer and the Private Education Section, MoE. Sponsorship for the exhibition come from Abdul Razak Holdings, ALIF Technologies, Syarikat Halim and ANR Fatabarak.
The three-day `Study In Brunei` Exhibition will continue today and will end on May 24.
Sumber : www.brunei-online.com (24 Mei 2008)
