The Islamic University of Indonesia (UII) held a Leadership School Idea Screening program as a follow-up to the Indonesian Higher Education Leadership (iHiLead) Program. The event which was attended by all UII leaders took place on Tuesday (13/7).
IHiLead is a collective effort sponsored by Erasmus+ and participated by 7 universities in Indonesia, 3 universities in Europe, and supported by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia which aims to build a leadership school in 2021 to 2024. This program is motivated by by the emergence of leadership challenges in various universities. Universities often face a gap between the challenges of the higher education system and the availability of financial support and the inadequate operational needs of higher education institutions.
One effort to overcome this is to focus on developing the capacity of leaders in various universities in Indonesia. As stated by Dr.-Ing. Ir. Ilya Fadjar Maharika, MA., IAI. as the Head of the Planning and Development Agency and coordinator of the iHiLead UII program. “The final output of the School of Leadership program is a European Union-funded leadership laboratory.” Said Ilya.
In 2021, iHiLead targets to complete the leadership school preparation. Implementation of leadership schools through tests, preparation of materials, and implementation of leadership training at partner universities is targeted to run in 2022. Meanwhile, in 2023, iHiLead hopes to be able to implement networks, evaluate networks and compile recommendations and dissemination to consortium members which will then be closed with a report results of program implementation in 2024.
Ilya emphasized that the iHiLead program has 3 organizational network options, namely universities that have independent consortia and leadership schools, a consortium consisting of universities and leadership schools that are verified by the National Accreditation Committee (KAN) or a university that has a special faculty. with a focus on leadership studies.
Ilya is also aware that there are various challenges ahead, such as the establishment of an appropriate curriculum that suits internal needs, selection of the right trainers, program implementation and training for trainers, implementation of assessments to program follow-up, as well as future action plans. Currently, the program partners only consist of various universities on the island of Java, so the consortium is also faced with the challenge of expanding its network coverage outside of Java.
UII Chancellor, Prof. Fathul Wahid, ST, M.Sc., Ph.D., in his speech underlined the importance of school leadership. According to him, there is no special school that aims to become a forum for regeneration of campus leaders. The process of regeneration of leaders in the campus environment often runs naturally without a systematic intervention.
He added that UII had previously initiated a similar idea by incorporating a leadership school curriculum in the pre-service period for new lecturers. He also plans to form a lecturer leadership school which will continue to be discussed to suit the level he has. “Leaders can be trained, so with that starting point we have a leadership school.” concluded Fathul Wahid.
Meanwhile, Ir. Wiryono Raharjo, M.Arch., Ph.D as Deputy Chancellor for Networking and Entrepreneurship at UII explained that IHilead is a branch of the Erasmus+ program in Indonesia, namely Capacity Building for Higher Education (CBHE). In addition to encouraging scholarship programs for degree and non-degree education and training for academics, Erasmus+ also strengthens cooperation between countries and European Union partners as donors of funds.
Wiryono added that the collaboration with Erasmus+ has resulted in several CBHE sub-programs. Among them are Erasmus+ REPESEA (Assessing and Improving Research Performance at South East Asian Universities), Erasmus+ GITA (Growing Indonesia: a Triangular Approach) which gave birth to the UII Growth Node Directorate. There are also Erasmus+ BUILD (Building Universities in Leading Disaster Resilience) as a response to the earthquake in Palu and Erasmus+ ANGEL (ASEAN Network for Green Entrepreneurship and Leadership). (AP/ESP)
