Role of Government in Tertiary Education

[digimushu]

I was reading my usual NST news when I stumbled on this:

UPM asks ministry to retain (Aerospace Engineering) course


...
In a letter to UPM vice-chancellor Professor Datuk Dr Muhamad Zohadie Bardaie on April 4, the ministry had directed that the programme be transferred to UKM.
...
Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) has sent a memorandum to the Higher Education Ministry giving reasons why it should retain its Aerospace Engineering programme and not have it transferred to Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM).


I am a strong believer that academia and politics should be decoupled. However, that does not seem like the case here, so i was wondering, what power does the higher education ministry have on our local universities? does anyone know?

[markuzzz]

well, the govt does fund the local public universities, don't they? It's like shareholders vs management..

[digimushu]

Yes, in the US, the governments also give money to the public universities, but they do not ask universities to move whole departments to another unversity, right? So, i'm just wondering... how much power does the Malaysian government wield in the management of the unversities? is there even a limit?

[masdie]

erm..i think the main role of our government should be to save enough money to send everyone OVERSEAS to further their education. since our local ones are not so good, i think this is the best thing to do.... :D

[Boyz_Zoo]

erm..i think the main role of our government should be to save enough money to send everyone OVERSEAS to further their education. since our local ones are not so good, i think this is the best thing to do.... :D
I object to this statement. If our government take the initiative to improve the local university, I believe our local Uni can get into the Top 100 list again. Let just see our neighbouring country, Thailand. Although their economy and political stability is not as good as us, but there still have a very good university there, University Chulalongkorn. So, I believe our country which is way better than Thailand should pump in more money and experts into local U so that the standard of education can be increased. That way, we don't have to go overseas to get a highly recognised degree which will reduce the exchange rate of ringgit thus improving our economy.