Indonesia Partnership

Home

Meetings

Indonesia Country Partnership meeting – 12 June

This is the first Indonesia Country Partnership meeting held in British Council Office in Manchester. The meeting was conducted after we delivered the Education UK Exhibition from 1 - 6 April 2006.

There were six Country partners present at the meeting:

• Andrias Soesilo, British Council Indonesia
• Fiona Bartlett, British Council Manchester
• Marcus Atkinson, University of Southampton
• Mr Geraint Fox, Goldsmiths, University of London
• Rhian Dobbs, UCE Birmingham
• Sarah Beresford, University of Manchester
• Shona Malcolm, University of Strathclyde
• Sinta Berry, British Council Manchester
• Wendy Yip, Aston University.

Andrias divided the meeting into three sections and gave a detailed and open presentation for each area.

Market update and visa information
It was reported that the economic growth was improving and that the inflation rate had started to fall with a strong belief that the Rupiah will be stronger than last year.  Due to the recent earthquakes, the social conditions continued to be difficult.

Indonesia has just introduced the VFS visa system and students now have a choice of going to one of the VFS centres or going through one of the consulate’s recommended agents.  The Consulate select these agents using the following criteria:

• Involved in the are for a minimum of 2 years
• Have several branches throughout Indonesia
• Have not knowing had any complaints issued against them

An overview of statistical visa figures for this last period was produced which compared it with the previous year.  PhD applications had increased and this by large was a result from increased sponsorships from bodies such as the World Bank.  The pre-universities and A’level applications have reduced and this was largely due to the increased provision in-country.  There are now three UK Universities on the Indonesia scholarship MBA programme (previously USA and Australia were the main recipients) – the three business schools are Warwick, Manchester and London.  British Council are working on increasing the UK involvement in general government and industry lead scholarships.

Market research
Bandung is now the second largest source of international students next to Jakarta.  In 2005, 31,900 Indonesians studied overseas with the USA having the largest share of 30%.  The UK’s current share is 3.3%, however, because of number of Indonesian coming through from other South East Asian countries such as Singapore and Malaysia this is not an accurate reflection.  Mike Hardy had met with the Indonesian Ambassador in London recently, who believed this figure to be much higher.  Andrias is visiting the Ambassador this week and hopes to get a more accurate reflection.   It is worth noting that both Malaysia and Singapore’s market share is increasing.  Mainly due to the close proximity and the relative low costs.

There is a collaborative partnership between one Indonesian university and the Interactive University based in Scotland to deliver UK degrees and plan to launch in October 2006.  British Council in Indonesia is current looking at setting up “UK Zones” in some universities.

There has been an increase in the number of Chevenning scholarships awarded – from 20 in 2005 to 32 in 2006.  There are also 6 OSI scholarship – Open Society Institutions.

British Council had recently conducted some research with the local High school students during education exhibitions.  There was a strong desire to study in the UK however, students were only really interested in full scholarships and were not keen on partial funding.

British Council had also conducted research with their alumni and there was strong interest in alumni associations.  

Education exhibitions
There has been an increase number attending the exhibitions and it is important that the fairs are located in key cities, especially as British Council has closed it’s operation in some cities.  This has sent a message out to the market that the UK is no longer open.  Australia continues to be active in the market and have “Australia” zones in some universities.  British Council needs to market the advantages of PG in the market as the research had shown that many did not know that UK PG’s were one year only.

Marketing activities
British Council has been working on establishing links with companies and activities that link with our target audience.  Currently they produce a newsletter which is sent out to targeted students.  Country Partners were encouraged to send in good news stories and contribute to this publication.

British Council have complied tables of international schools, university ranking and media usage. This will all be made available in the Country Partnership website.

Staffing
There has been a little re-structuring in the office and a new Education UK Partnership officer has been recruited.  Sanni Susanti will start on the 19 June.

Questions raised

• Wendy Yip asked for more market intelligence but was unable to provide any examples of what would be good.
• What work does the British Council do with Agents?
• What are agents perceptions of working with UK institutions compared to other countries?
• What research is planned on what returning students experience in terms of salary changes?
• British Council asked about the forthcoming European fairs and as it was planned with the November 2008 PG exhibition would did institutions feel.

The general consensus is that is it one or the other and they needed more information to make an informed decision.  There was some concern expressed that they UK institutions would need to be under a very impressive Education UK Zone as the general feeling was that our European counterparts had more money to spend on the their exhibitions stands.  The UK institutions did not want to feel like the “poorer cousin”.  There were also concerned that European fees were lower (and in some cases free) and they would be competing on an unfair platform.

Market information

Events

Promotional opportunities

Communications

Contact us

DCSIMG