NEWS Malaysia

This webinar was organized by the NCKU Overseas Hub in Malaysia and UKM Global. The webinar’s topic was ‘Virtual Student Mobility during COVID-19 from Student’s Perspective’, which comprised knowledgeable panellists who shared their views and opinions on virtual mobility especially in the era of pandemic. Among the objectives of the webinar are; 1) To learn from the experience of students’ undergoing virtual mobility programs in the COVID-19 era. 2) To understand the challenges of virtual mobility programs faced by students. 3) To discuss the strategies for overcoming challenges in virtual mobility programs. 4) To address the future of virtual mobility in the post-COVID-19 era. The forum started off with each panellist introducing their respective institution and their own journey of participating in mobility or even virtual mobility programmes. Their experiences are truly worth note-taking. One of the main topics of the discussion is their experiences on their virtual mobility programme. On top of that, the panellists also discussed the impacts of the pandemic on education, especially on virtual mobility programmes and the future of it. The webinar ended with concluding remarks from each panellist giving their views with regards to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic on student’s mobility programme. In terms of its reach, the webinar has managed to attract a good number of participants from countries all over the world. In conclusion, the webinar has achieved its objectives and it is hoped that all audiences have benefited greatly from the webinar.

Summary of opening remarks

The welcoming remarks were given by Prof. Dr. Noor Hayaty Abu Kasim, the Director of NCKU Overseas Hub in Malaysia and Dean of Faculty of Dentistry, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Malaysia. She began by expressing her gratitude in this collaborative event with UKM Global. Toshiba International Foundation.  She started off her remarks by briefly introducing the NCKU Overseas Hub. As the Director of the NCKU Overseas Hub and the Dean of Faculty of Dentistry, UKM, she then emphasized how UKM has a diverse community and a global network of academic scholars working in partnerships with universities, government, and communities worldwide. She concluded her opening remarks by expressing her hope that the input and feedback of the webinar would be beneficial in improving the strategies to create successful virtual mobility programs and for the higher education institution to explore ways in overcoming the challenges of virtual mobility programs in this COVID-19 era.

Summary of panel discussion

As part of the introduction, the moderator, Miss Deena Yasmeen, asked the panellists to briefly introduce themselves and their experience with regards to their mobility programmes experience.

i. Seeking mobility programme opportunity  

Miss Olivia mentioned that she came across the mobility programme in Japan because the university is actually the partner university of her home university. Although the programme offered did not require her to go there, she actually went to Japan to conduct a study on the cross-cultural comparison between Germany and Japan. And due to this factor, she also looked up only for the universities that offer research writing programmes. Even though it is a research programme, Miss Olivia stated that she still needs to take a few extra language courses.

As for Miss Diah, she came across the virtual mobility programme through the Airlangga Global Engagement which is the international relations officer for her university. Being a student from the STEM background herself, she found that the virtual mobility programme on sustainability that she registered for would be something beneficial and engaging for her. She had to take around 10 courses which consisted of a course on sustainability and also other courses that revolved around the SDG such as equality and equity. She also added that she attended a few courses that focused on soft skills.

The third panellist, Mr John Sebastian, came across through the international relations centre in his university (UKM Global). It was also mentioned that they nominated him as one of the applicants. Out of ten people, only four of them were selected. The courses that he took while joining the virtual mobility programme were related to entrepreneurship such as the ASEAN startup ecosystem, understanding business model innovations and social entrepreneurship.

ii. Problems, challenges and how they overcame them

While joining a virtual mobility programme, there are a few challenges and it is inevitable.  The panellists had shared their ways of overcoming the challenges.

Miss Olivia mentioned that one of the hardest challenges for her was the time difference. Some of the classes that she took required her to wake up at 2 in the morning. This took her rest time away and she even had to coordinate the timing with her part-time job. And because there were less than ten people in her class, they cannot do a separate class that will benefit her in terms of the time difference.  And the final problem mentioned by Miss Olivia was the inability to attend the mobility programme physically. Despite all these challenges, she learnt how to accept it and compromise things which eventually helped her to adapt to the learning environment better.

Mr John Sebastian also stated the same thing as Miss Olivia which is the inability to join the programme physically. However, he added that since he was joining it virtually while being at home, he also had to balance attending the classes and carrying out his responsibilities at home. On top of that, he also had to manage his time in order to attend the classes from the virtual mobility programme and also the classes at his home university as the semester was still going on during that time. Apart from that, he also experienced “Zoom fatigue” as everything is conducted online and he needed to sit in front of his laptop from 8 in the morning until 8 in the evening. He felt exhausted by it but he reminded himself to take a rest whenever he could, especially at night.

As for Miss Diah, she found that communication is the hardest problem while joining the virtual mobility programme. Since she needed to do a presentation along with her groupmates from other countries, they had to arrange a few meetings outside of the classes in order to discuss the tasks that they have been assigned. At first, it was very difficult as there were a few things that she could not express well through an online platform. It also happened to her other groupmates. And due to this, they took time to get to know each other, talked about something else to prevent things from getting tiresome when discussing work only.

iii. Comparison of the mobility programme before and after pandemic COVID-19

Mr John Sebastian made a comparison by giving the pros and cons of virtual and physical mobility. Firstly, he mentioned that the pros of having a virtual mobility programme is the cost. Since the cost of a physical mobility programme can be up to thousands of RM (Ringgit Malaysia). By attending it online, they did not have to pay for anything. But virtual mobility programmes have its limitations. One of them is human interaction. Mr John explained that it is also hard to build friendships when things are being done online due to the lack of “face to face” interaction.

iv. Virtual mobility programmes in enriching student’s life

For Miss Olivia, she admitted that virtual mobility programmes gave her a different outlook of an international student’s life. When she attended the programme physically, she did not focus much on her study as she had a lot of distractions back then. But virtual mobility programmes allowed her to focus more on the classes especially when she had to take extra classes. She also mentioned that the hardships that she encountered while attending virtual mobility programmes made her more optimistic and gave her a new mindset. It taught her to come up with new solutions and she said that she is not as afraid of taking risks as she used to be.

v. Gaining  international experience from virtual mobility programme

Miss Diah gave her thoughts on this by mentioning that she gained it from the international lecturers who attended the programme as well. She felt that a lot of international lecturers were able to attend virtual programmes rather than physical ones because it is more accessible for them. She also added that virtual programmes allow the international lecturers to easily and freely join the sessions. On top of that, Miss Diah also gained her international experience from her international friends while attending the virtual mobility programme.

vi. Improving the virtual learning experience

Ever since the pandemic COVID-19 started, virtual learning has been considered a burden due to the amount of workload and because of this, students all around the world are struggling which results in declining mental health.

Being a student of Psychology herself, Miss Olivia stated that she agreed some universities managed to handle it well. As for her, according to her own experience, some of her lecturers reminded them to always speak up if they are feeling overwhelmed with their learning whether in terms of the assignments given or others. In conclusion, at the end of the day, it all comes down to talking about how you are feeling. Some lecturers are very understanding and they are willing to help and negotiate what options are better for the students.

vii. Ministry or others roles and responsibilities in providing a better virtual learning environment

Mr John gave a heartfelt take on this one. He mentioned that virtual learning actually widens the education gap. This is because some students still do not have full access to online classes due to connection problems. For example, there are some rural areas that have a very poor connection, resulting in the students having to travel to places to get a better connection. And therefore,  the ministry or authorities should come up with plans on how to cater to this problem. In addition, Mr John also thought that training should be given to educators because some of them are facing difficulties switching from the traditional teaching methods to online teaching due to the involvement of technology. He added that this training is compulsory especially seeing our world right now and this online learning does not seem like it will be stopping anytime soon.

viii. Concluding remarks

The panellists were asked about what kept them going especially facing those challenges in joining virtual mobility programmes.

For Mr John, whenever he is facing a hurdle in life or even during learning, he would tell himself to finish what he had started. He added that when he decides to join a programme, he feels that the setbacks that he faced or problems should not stop him or should not make him feel like this is not for him. Solutions always exist. He concluded that we should never give up on something that we had started.

For Miss Diah, she always keeps to herself that when joining mobility whether physical or online, not only she is carrying her own name, but also her institution and her country. It is an opportunity to get exposed to international programmes since not everyone is able to experience them. Therefore, the challenges that she faced are also what kept her going.

Miss Olivia said that all the problems and challenges that she had faced gave her personal growth. A lot of questions came out to her mind and this allowed her to reflect on her own decisions especially regarding the programme she had joined.

To conclude the session, Miss Olivia gave a piece of advice for those who are planning to go for a virtual mobility programme to find out first how much they want to embrace the country’s culture and to what extent they want to integrate it into their own life. She added that it is also important to keep in mind that they should also figure out ways to retain in order to be happy mentally and physically while joining virtual mobility programmes.

(Written by: Miss Ainul Hayati binti Ab Karim)

To watch the recorded session, please visit https://fb.watch/9Z5xX-olSO/