Airlangga University is one of the national flagship universities that get a mandate from the Ministry of Research Technology and Higher Education (Kemenristekdikti) to become one of the universities of international reputation. As the implementation of the mandate, Kemenristekdikti has developed Airlangga University (UNAIR) development scheme to be able to penetrate 500 world rank of World University Ranking of QS version. Therefore, various efforts and strategies have been formulated in a regular roadmap through the strategic plan (Renstra) Airlangga University period 2015-2020, where UNAIR targeted to reach 500 major world in 2019, one effort that can be done is the internationalization of institutions, such as benchmarking activities to enhance collaboration with international institutions.

Thailand is one of the countries in ASEAN that has a global reputation. Ranking of Chulalongkorn University is included in the world’s 300 major versions of QS WUR. The number of publications in the international journal Scopus University Chulalongkorn is also not an ‘easy’ to achieve, reaching more than 2,000 Scopus articles annually. Furthermore, one of the environment-based learning activities has also been applied by Chulalongkorn University, through the activity of utilizing marine station for research and student learning activities. The results of the visit indicate that the marine station area owned by Chulalongkorn is located quite far from the main campus and not too broad, but functional. Many activities can be held at the marine station such as lectures, sampling, research, and community service. In the future FPK UNAIR also has a marine station that will be used for Tridarma college activities.

The high productivity of research and learning activities based on the environment need to be studied and if it can collaborate will be much better. Therefore, international FPK collaborative programs with universities in Thailand will begin to be improved, especially to support the target of university priority programs that include post doc, student and staff exchange, as well as international publications.

The UNAIR FPK delegation was well received by both universities in more technical discussions related to research collaboration, staff exchange and post doctoral delivery, as well as internship (cross-border PKL). This is a follow up of previous activities, where FPK UNAIR has sent four students to follow street vendors at Kasetsart University. The result of the discussion with Kasetsart University, this year will be sent two lecturers FPK UNAIR who will hold post doc there, namely Dr. Ir. Gunanti Mahasri, M.Si., from the Department of Health Management of Aquaculture and Aquaculture. Laksmi Sulmartiwi, S.Pi., M.P. from the Department of Marine Affairs FPK UNAIR. It is expected that from this cooperation in the future much more research and internship can be held to support the achievement of UNAIR ranking.

Author: Heru Pramono

Editor: Dwi Yuli Pujiastuti