AUSTRALIA鈥橲 scholarship programme for foreign students should include ways of helping the recipients maintain the professional links they make, two Indonesian doctoral students say.
Fadliah Salim and her husband, Afriadi Hasibuan, believe that the training they are receiving in Australia is important to the future of their family and their country. To make the most of it, they want to ensure they can maintain contact with their Australian colleagues once they return to Indonesia in 1997.
Salim echoes a point made frequently by Indonesian students in Australia 鈥� at home, there is a constant battle for up-to-date journals and information. 鈥淚n Indonesia, it鈥檚 hard to follow what鈥檚 happening in our fields.鈥� Foreign study helps fill the gaps, she says, while providing an opportunity to explore another culture. 鈥淲e study society, what people do. If it鈥檚 good, we bring it to our country. If it鈥檚 bad, we leave it.鈥�
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Both students are at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) on scholarships from the Australian International Development Assistance Bureau.
Salim is doing a doctorate in plant biotechnology. Before enrolling at UNSW, she studied plant metabolism at Rutgers University in New Jersey. When she finishes her doctorate, she will return to the Agency for the Assessment and Application of Technology or BPPT in Jakarta, where she will work on improving agricultural production.
Hasibuan, who has degrees from the universities of Southern California and Wollongong, is working on a doctorate in science and technology studies.