Udayana University held The 3rd Annual Meeting of The Udayana University - International Advisory Board (IAB)

The 3rd Annual Meeting of The Udayana University - International Advisory Board (IAB) was held in a hybrid manner on Saturday 28 September 2024 at 09.00 -12.00 WITA, with the central point of implementation in the PTN-BH Room, Udayana University (Unud) Postgraduate Building, Sudirman Campus.

The third Udayana University-IAB Meeting was attended directly by the Rector of Udayana University, Prof. Ir. Ngakan Putu Gede Suardana, M.T., Ph.D., IPU., Vice Rector for Academic Affairs Prof. Dr. Ir. I Gede Rai Maya Temaja, M.P., IPU., Vice Rector for Student Affairs Prof. Ir. I Ketut Sudarsana, S.T., Ph.D., Vice Rector for Planning, Cooperation and Information, Prof. Dr. Dr. I Putu Gede Adiatmika, M.Kes., Deputy of Chief Udayana University IAB Prof. Palm, Internal Member of Udayana University IAB Prof. Dr. I Nyoman Darma Putra, M. Litt, Chairman of LP3M Prof. Ir. I Nengah Sujaya, M.Agr.Sc.Ph.D., Chair of USDI Dr. Dewa Made Wiharta, ST, MT., LP2M Secretary Prof. NMAE Dewi, KUI Coordinator Putu Ayu Asty Senja Pratiwi, S.S., M.Hum, Ph.D., Head of the Udayana University IAB Secretariat Team dr. Ni Nengah Dwi Fatmawati, Sp.MK.(K), Ph.D. and all members of the IAB secretariat (Ainul Ghurri, S.T., M.T., Ph.D., Dr. Eng. I Made Gatot Karohika, S.T, M.T., Made Diah Lestari, S.Psi., M.Psi., Ph.D., Dr. Ketut Widya Purnawati, S.S., M.Hum.).

Apart from that, IAB Chairman Prof. Adrian Vickers (University of Sydney, Australia), and other members Prof. Kadambot Siddique (The University of Western Australia, Australia), Assc. Prof. Carol Warren (Murdoch University, Australia) and Prof. Suastika from IAB internal members.

The meeting began with opening remarks from the Rector of Udayana University who expressed his thanks to Udayana University IAB who has continuously interacted and provided input to Udayana University for almost 3 years.

Prof. Adrian Vickers then gave a speech by explaining the IAB members for the next year period, and also touched on several inputs from last year's IAB meeting which he saw have been implemented to date. Members of the 2024-2024 International Advisory Board consist of 2024 IAB Internal members, Prof. Suastika, Prof. Ketut Budi Susrusa, Prof. Darma Putra. While the 2024 IAB External member is Prof. Adrian Vickers (University of Sydney, Australia), Prof. Harry Palm (The University of Rostock, Germany), Prof. Kadambot Siddique (The University of Western Australia, Australia), Prof. F. Miura (Yamaguchi University, Japan), Prof. Osamu Matsushita (Okayama University, Japan), Assc. Prof. Carol Warren (Murdoch University, Australia).

The next session included a presentation from the Vice Rector for Student Affairs at Udayana University, Prof. Ketut Sudarsana who comprehensively conveyed the response and progress towards the 4 recommendations from the 2023 IAB Meeting including: (1) Increasing outbound student exchanges, (2) Increasing internationalization programs related to research and publications, (4) Expanding research collaboration opportunities, and (4) Website development that makes it easier for prospective foreign students to find out information and register at Udayana University.

The four recommendations have been responded to in the form of various activities and developments which are in line with existing programs at Udayana University, for example research collaboration with the University of Sydney and ongoing workshops conducted by Prof. Palm at the Faculty of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries which also involves students from other countries; as well as issues that Unud has responded to by forming a website content team for international classes and foreign students.

After delivering these presentations, IAB members gave their appreciation and continued responses for further program development. Regarding the existence of 2 journals at Udayana University that have been indexed by Scopus, Prof. Siddique gave high appreciation and at the same time emphasized the importance of increasing the journal's impact factor. If there are many similar journals, it will be difficult to increase the impact factor, because of the tight competition between these journals in accepting quality journal manuscripts, so it is necessary to consider journals with a scope that is unique to Bali and Udayana University, for example regarding tourism.

The discussion continues with Prof. Palm pitched an idea about the issue of overload tourism. The Rector then responded that tourism issues have always been of concern to researchers at Udayana University. Unud has a special team, research center and PUI (Center of Excellence for Innovation) related to tourism, so that this idea can be well received for development. The discussion continued with responses from the Vice Rectors and other meeting participants.

The discussion increasingly focused on the importance of interdisciplinary research, where Prof. Vickers suggested that if a resource person or research collaboration partner from a university with a high ranking position (QS WUR 100) came to Unud, at least 3 faculties would take part in the meeting so that the research topic and scope of collaboration could be developed more broadly. For the next step, Unud needs to maximize interdisciplinary research as a way to increase internationalization and as a way to increase student and staff mobility, research opportunities and collaboration.

In the internal scheme, it is necessary to conduct research and facilitate grants on topics that are needed for university or regional/government policy making. And what is no less important, the selection of interdisciplinary research topics must be current and attractive for LN collaborators so as to increase the potential for collaboration with LN. The IAB meeting ended with a wrap-up delivery of the discussions that had been carried out, and closed with closing remarks from the Rector of Udayana University.