MUST

Sunday April 3, 2011

The show MUST go on

By RICHARD LIM
educate@thestar.com.my

YOU rarely hear of universities closing down but if a report in an online news portal is to be believed, the Malaysia University of Science and Technology (MUST) could be a first in Malaysia.

Alleged to be down to its last RM10mil, the report pictured a varsity at its knees and it was alleged that the money in its coffers would barely last a year.

Now, no one really knows the script of interviews which lead to such reports and neither did MUST president Dr Leong Choong Heng who labels the report as “inaccurate” and “damaging”.

Looking back, the president believes that he was not given a fair chance to explain the varsity’s standpoint.

“The reporter saw me for another issue – one of accreditation – and the report was very different from what we discussed,” he said.

“I wasn’t prepared when the reporter posed the questions so I merely answered yes or no to most of them.

“But some things cannot be yes-or-no answers and I don’t know how the report turned out the way it did.”

While Dr Leong concedes that certain elements – particularly the historical bits – in the report are true, the Harvard-trained faculty member insists that the public examine both sides of the coin before jumping to conclusions.

Dr Leong: ... even firstclass honours students found the going tough

 

Formed in 2001 after receiving a RM100mil grant from the government, MUST was earmarked from the start to be something special.

Boasting a partnership with the renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), hopes were high that MUST would establish itself as a premier private university.

Its faculty – comprising PhD holders from renowned institutions like Harvard, MIT and Cambridge, among others – added fuel to those expectations and the varsity seemed to check all the boxes.

However, the MUST brand has not exactly taken off a decade on and student numbers are disappointing at best.

So what exactly went wrong?

Pausing for thought, Dr Leong ventured that one had to have a good grasp of the MUST-MIT model to understand the varsity’s position.

The intention of the MIT partnership, he said, was to set up a postgraduate research and development (R&D) university which focused only on a few selected programmes, specifically in areas related to science and engineering.

The objective: To train capable R&D scientists and who would build a research-based culture in Malaysia.

“It was a very niche approach from the start and students had to be heavily subsidised,” he said.

“To do postgraduate work, you have to have the necessary infrastructure and postgraduate laboratories cost a lot more than normal laboratories.”

Dr Leong added that MIT staff frequently flew over to help the MUST faculty during the partnership and this added strain on the varsity resources.

“They helped us develop the curriculum and sat in classes to ensure things were on the right track,” he said.

“Although our students benefited immensely, bringing them over and taking care of their needs was not cheap.”

At the same time, good faculty members kept joining the varsity and this created an imbalanced structure in terms of financing – the overheads were simply too high.

More twists

It turned out that the high cost and subsequent financial commitments were just the tip of the iceberg as student numbers failed to take off.

Calling a spade a spade, Dr Leong conceded that this was a disappointment.

“We were optimistic as we thought we could get a few hundred students in our first three years,” he said.

“However, our application process was more stringent than what most other universities would practice at that time and some students were jointly interviewed by MIT and MUST staff.

“We could not accept anybody and even first-class honours students found the going tough.”

The varsity ended up with more than 20 students in its first year but some dropped out after a few weeks due to the tough MIT curriculum.

In hindsight, Dr Leong said that a pool of postgraduate students was hard to obtain at that point of time and it would be a different story if MUST had a steady supply of undergraduates who would then move on to postgraduate level.

Delving deeper, Dr Leong shed light on the nature of MUST’s initial student pool.

“The students were all under scholarship and the workload was heavy,” he mused.

“It was stated that the minimum time required to complete the course was one-and-a-half years but the majority took two to three years.

“In fact, some are still writing their thesis as we speak.”

The scholarships saw the students receiving stipends and this added to the burgeoning costs.

Eventually, the varsity management decided that it was too expensive to go on and the MIT agreement lapsed in 2005.

“The funding ended earlier than expected but there were still students in the system so the programme continued in a way,” said Dr Leong.

“Each R&D student costs around three times more than regular ones and the management decided that it was not financially viable to go on.

According to the online report, MUST produced 107 graduates under the MIT programme – implying that the cost of accommodating each graduate amounted to almost RM1mil.

However, Dr Leong stressed that this was not the case and 173 was the correct figure.

The same inaccuracy applied for the depleting RM10mil which was mentioned.

“It was reported that we have less than RM10mil and this can be disputed,” he said.

“And let’s move beyond cash. How do we value the intangible assets like the knowledge of our faculty and students?

“Their value is substantial and if you factor this into account, MUST has a lot more than RM10mil and it is up to us to utilise our assets to their best advantage.”

Dr Leong said the report caused some anxiety amongst students and parents alike and he was on the receiving end of a few calls.

“Some parents were very concerned and wondered about the future of the varsity as the negative report said that MUST’s license was expiring,” he said.

Recalibration

Although the naysayers harped on the report and said that MUST would go bust, Dr Leong is holding onto a very different adage – the show must go on.

No stranger to tough problems, the newly-appointed president said that the varsity was more than capable of turning the corner.

Stopping short of blaming the previous management, Dr Leong likened MUST’s early years to “an experiment” and with unsatisfactory results, a change in direction was needed.

And that change has seen the varsity open its doors to undergraduates

The original goals, however, have not changed.

“We still want to be a premier R&D university and with an undergraduate pool to fall back on, I believe we have the right model,” said Dr Leong.

“All the best universities possess a substantial undergraduate pool and a portion will move on to postgraduate study.”

Dr Leong was quick to point out that the MUST-MIT collaboration should not be seen as a loss.

“We inherited a good curriculum and a good faculty and our undergraduate students will benefit from this,” he said.

“Plans are also afoot to move to the Strand in Kota Damansara and this will give us a real city campus feel.”

Drawing inspiration from New York University and Hong Kong University, Dr Leong said the new location would allow students to feel the buzz of the business community.

In this light, the migration would be done in stages with the varsity’s business school moving first.

Collaboration with foreign universities is also on the cards. Must has a working agreement with the University of Tasmania to offer business courses and discussions have been started with three British universities.

A scholarship package is also in the works to appeal to students. Effective this year, MUST is offering a RM1,000 deduction for every A or A+ a student scores while RM500 will be deducted for every A-.

Adding that the move reflected MUST’s experience in catering to its students’ needs, Dr Leong was upbeat about the varsity’s future.

“What happened is a problem, but we are happy to face problems as they bring out the best in us,” he said.