Jakarta, Antara) - The Australian government and Indonesian Religious Affairs Ministry are collaborating to develop Islamic education in Indonesia through Partnership Programs in Islamic Education Scholarship (PIES) for lecturers taking up a doctoral degree at Indonesia's Islamic universities.
PIES Program Director Greg Fealy stated here on Tuesday (Apr 4) that the scholarship program offered for one semester at the Australian National University (ANU) is unique, as it does not require the participants to be fluent in English.
"It does not matter if the candidates only master basic English because we want talented lecturers in Indonesia to have an opportunity to study abroad without facing any language barriers," he noted.
Every year, PIES is offered to three women and three men who register as civil servants or as private Islamic university lecturers and are currently studying for a doctoral degree.
For a year at the ANU, the six participants will take academic lectures and learn writing skills, attend seminars and conferences on a regular basis, and follow scientific and religious activities organized by the Indonesian student community in Canberra.
The entire process of learning and training is conducted in Indonesian by the ANU professors who are Indonesians having specialized in the field of Islam.
"We also provide classes for writing articles for international journals, as now, one cannot pass the doctoral study without scientific articles published in international journals. This is a tough requirement, so we provide training for writing journals, which helps the PIES participants complete their dissertation," Fealy explained.
The PIES program is an initiative taken by Australia to improve the quality of education in Indonesia and to help realize a program launched by the religious minister to produce five thousand doctors to improve the quality of Islamic education.
Muhammad Rozali, a PIES participant from the North Sumatra Islamic State Institute, said the PIES had helped him understand how the western society views Islam and the Islamic way of life in Indonesia.
"It turns out that the opinion about Western people suspecting Muslims or Islam affiliating with terrorists is not true," Rozali said, adding that the program has helped him complete his doctoral study faster within just two years and six months.(*)
