THE principles of Community Engagement (CE) are in line with Universiti Sains Malay- sia’s cherished vision of empowering the disadvantaged and marginalised within the framework of a sustainable tomorrow.
It is testimony to our ideals of reshaping tertiary education as a “human varsity” and building respectful community relationships. It also expands the notion of scholarship to embrace community engagement as both are core to the university’s apex mission and foundational to excellent teaching, learning and research.
The ultimate goal is the collective mobilisation and orchestration of the strengths of USM staff, academia and the student body to collaborate as a synchronised whole working in harmony to transmute lives, remould societies and transform futures for a better tomorrow.
People need to understand the underpinning philosophy of University-Community Engagement (UCE). UCE, in this context, refers to the collaboration between university and community. This may be the underserved, marginalised or underprivileged, for mutually beneficial exchange of knowledge and resources that are then symbiotically catalysed to effect societal transformation.
UCE is closely linked to the scholarship of engagement, which seeks to harness institutional resources and capacities to address pressing social, economics, culture, health, educational and environmental needs. This is what makes universities different in delivering CE.
We need to embrace the concept that the ultimate aims of the engagement are both tangible and intangible in nature, such as providing benefits and mitigating risks to improve the lives of communities and strengthen a project’s viability, as well as initiating attitudinal transformation through empowerment processes, such as education, campaigns and knowledge exchange.
To achieve these desired optimal outcomes, community and industry engagement need to be participatory, accountable, inclusive and transparent. I strongly believe the role of the university is to collaborate and leverage its rich repository of knowledge and expertise for the common benefit of everyone.
Over the years since achieving apex status, engagement with the community has showcased not only USM’s role as a premier institution of higher learning with close collaborative relationships with the community, but also demonstrated its capacity as an institution to effect transformative change in the economic, scientific and social spheres of the nation.
In this regard, USM’s efforts to embed engagement and involvement as best practice has received widespread acceptance in diverse communities. In fact, I am proud to state that our engagement initiatives thus far have resulted in increased research and scholarship, elevated the socio-economic status of the marginalised, enriched cultural heritage, and powered the exchange of knowledge and innovation between collaborative partners.
I am extremely grateful to the staff and students for their strong support and commitment to inculcating engagement as an integral part of USM’s proactive efforts towards building a sustainable tomorrow. Our proactive approach, allied with strong institutional support, has successfully reengineered our planning and operational modalities to further percolate engagement into every level of the social strata.
As part of that transformation, we have expanded the range and menu of our USM Prihatin grants to support initiatives conceptualised by the administrative staff and student citizenry of the campus to reinvigorate altruism and foster volunteerism among a wider spectrum of the campus community. In fact, this approach is part of our strategy to synergise all human resource and physical infrastructure to work towards the common goal of empowering the bottom billions in our relentless quest to create sustainable futures.
The USM Prihatin initiative is aligned to USM’s core philosophy which propounds that community engagement exposure is crucial to produce well-rounded students imbued with objectivity, positive values, independence, perspicuity, and a sense of social responsibility that will engender the development of holistic, socially conscious, caring and loving personalities.
It is hoped that students will touch hearts, flower hope, drive innovation and shape transformation as they sow the seeds of USM’s humanistic concept in the soils of the present to bring forth the blooms of an equitable, sustainable and humane future.
In conclusion, empowering communities provide opportunities for the campus community as well as community members to work together in collaborative partnerships that yield positivistic outcomes in the form of enhanced productivity, innovative products and sustainable ecosystems.
The ergonomics of such modalities reside in the fact that they couple brains and vision with capital and innovation to create outcomes that have far-reaching transformative impact.
The writer is a professor and vice-chancellor of Universiti Sains Malaysia