Depok, July 11th 2023. Director of Vocational Education Program Universitas Indonesia, Padang Wicaksono, S.E., Ph.D; accompanied by four resident lecturers of the vocational program, visited Seattle, USA, to demonstrate their commitment to global engagement, broaden their international network, and foster partnership with various global companies. They visited Amazon Inc., Warner Bros Discovery, and Microsoft XBOX. The upcoming partnership will include an international internship program and an idea for collaborative laboratory development, and a certificate program.
“As a vocational education program, our attempt to broaden our partnership is not limited to national industries, but also world-class companies. We initiated a partnership with Amazon Inc., and are currently in talks with Warner Bros Discovery as well as Microsoft XBOX. These partnerships are especially for our departments that focus in communication, such as Media Production and Public Relations,” stated Padang.
A partnership with foreign industries is crucial in creating a learning environment that encourages global competition from an early stage. Padang admitted that we cannot deny how borderless global competition in work field is now. “This international internship program,” said Padang, “could encourage a competitive spirit within college students and allows them a chance to be accepted in global companies.”
Amazon Inc., a multinational tech company focusing in e-commerce, cloud computing, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence warmly welcomed the delegations from UI. The two parties were in talks about building a partnership for student internship program, teaching program, and community outreach at Amazon Web Services (AWS).
This pilot project is implemented in the Media Production department of Vocational Education Program UI, firstly through Media Intelligence course, and then expanded to Public Relations department, Multimedia Broadcasting department, and Creative Advertising department. Meanwhile, the internship program with Microsoft XBOX is still in the planning process before it will be implemented in the Asia-Pacific area.
“We also initiated a partnership on production laboratory with Warner Bros Discovery considering its reputation as a global media and entertainment company who produces contents for films, television, sports, news, and games,” Padang stated in their visit last June.
Paula Kosasih, MBA, Product Management Lead Warner Bros Discovery, believed that UI’s vocational program and Warner Bros Discovery held the same value, which is continuous innovation. “Our company sees innovation as an opportunity. We believe that what UI’s vocational program has started, which is to involve foreign companies in their learning system, is visionary. This will give young generation to compete with their peers in a global scale,” said Paula.
