Four faculty members from Postgraduate School of Universitas Airlangga (UNAIR), Indonesia, visited Walailak University (WU) today (26 October 2023) to explore potential collaborations with WU’s schools and colleges.

The discussion took place at WU’s Center for International Affairs (CIA) meeting room with representatives from School of Accountancy and Finance, School of Law, School of Management, School of Public Health, School of Allied Health Sciences, School of Nursing, School of Languages and General Education, International College (WUIC), and Center for Cooperative Education and Career Development.

Areas of mutual interests include joint research, exchange of students and staff, joint conference and seminar, short courses, and internships.

Assistant Professor Dr. Patnarin Suppakorn, Director of CIA, said that the center would coordinate and facilitate the cooperation between the two institutions. She expressed hope that this collaboration could evolve into the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding in the future.

Located in Surabaya, the capital city of East Java, the second largest city in Indonesia, UNAIR established Post Graduate School in 1999. The School offers a wide range of Master’s and Doctoral programs.

After the meeting, the UNAIR team paid a courtesy visit to WU President Professor Dr. Sombat Thamrongthanyawong. Assistant Professor Dr. Muhammad Zamal Nasution, who led UNAIR faculty members, mentioned that the discussion in the morning session was very fruitful. “We have lots of dreams for both our universities to come into a closer academic collaboration and partnership. We are ready to be invited – to give what we have, what we understand about Indonesia, to Thai Students,” he said.

Professor Dr. Sombat Thamrongthanyawong, on this occasion, briefed the UNAIR delegates about Walailak University’s development and progress, including the implementation of the United Kingdom Professional Standards Framework (UKPSF) into teaching and learning, the development of teaching and learning facilities, university accommodations, and the commitment of producing research in line with the university mission as research-intensive university. He said that he would like to visit “our friends in this region more” and believed that Indonesia would play an even more significant role in ASEAN. He also extended an invitation to UNAIR’s president to visit WU.

Following the meeting with Professor Sombat at Honor Hall, the UNAIR faculty members delivered a special talk on Indonesian Overview: Cultures, Investment & New Capital Development to WU students from School of Political Science and Public Administration at the CIA meeting room.

Situated near a coastal area in Thasala District, Nakhon Si Thammarat Province, Walailak University currently has 648 lecturers certified by AdvanceHE based on UKPSF, the highest number of HEA Fellowships in the country and in Southeast Asia. Over 90 of the university’s research publications are in Scopus-indexed journals in Quartile 1 and Quartile 2. Walailak University received a global ranking from Times Higher Education (THE) at 1201-1500 among 1,904 research-intensive universities worldwide in 2024 THE World University Rankings. Aditionally, in the World University Rankings 2024 by subject, it achieved a global ranking of 801-100 in Clinical Health and Life Sciences, and 1,001+ in Physical Sciences.

News by Settaboot Onphakdee, Division of Corporate Communication