Eyes set on enhancing capability of its academic and administrative staff in order to actively participate in the ASEAN Community, Indonesia’s State Institute for Islamic Studies-IAIN North Sumatra joined hands with the Colombo Plan Staff College (CPSC) in organizing the Customized Program on “Capacity Building of SIIS-IAIN North Sumatra Lecturers and Staff on Educational Leadership and Management” from June 2 to 6, 2014 at CPSC Manila.

Also in view of meeting the specific needs of the 19 lecturers and staff towards the transformation of the institute into a full-fledged university, the program was designed to deliver lectures, exercises and presentations relevant to country-based educational management trends and their implications for sustainable human resources development with reference to the ASEAN countries context.

The inaugural ceremonies for the program commenced Monday at the CPSC conference room where the CPSC Director General, Dr. Mohammad Naim Yaakub, welcomed the participants and officials of SIIS-IAIN headed by Prof. Dr. Hasan Bakti Nasution, Vice Rector II and Dr. Phil. Zainul Fuad, MA, Project Manager. Dr. Naim briefly shared about CPSC’s beginnings from Singapore to Manila, its mandate, programs, activities, networks and development partners. He also cited about the design and components of the program which include blended learning systems such as face to face lectures, web-based teaching and learning system, computer hands on, online tests and assessments, study visits and socio-cultural activities. He wished for the success of the program and pledged his commitment to the participants that the CPSC management and staff had put up a good program for the institution.

In response, IAIN’s Vice Rector Prof. Dr. Nasution, expressed his appreciation to CPSC in working with them for the capacity building of their personnel and for the benefit of the institution. He wished that they will be able to share all the learning they would gain from the program with the other 63 higher education institutions in Indonesia. He also briefly introduced about the establishment of SIIS-IAIN in 1973 and its current composition of 400 lecturers with 9,000 students. He hoped that the program will provide benefits to both CPSC and IAIN.

Dr. Hazrat Hussain, CPSC Faculty Consultant, who acts as Program Coordinator and Resource Person for the program provided the orientation and other important information and details pertinent to the program implementation to enlighten the participants. Dr. Paiboon Saiyawongs, Short-Term Consultant will also act as Resource Person for the program.

In significantly giving birth to a new partnership between the two entities, CPSC and IAIN inked their cooperation through a signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) during the opening ceremonies of the program. The MOU solidifies the two new allies’ agreement on exploring and identifying opportunities for: potential joint activities on education and training, training professional staff members, accreditation training and accreditation and certification of educational institutions, faculty and staff exchange and for sharing of facilities and human resources.

The MOU was signed by Dr. Naim for CPSC and by Prof. Dr. Nasution for IAIN witnessed by Dr. Hussain and Dr. Phil. Fuad for CPSC and IAIN, respectively.


Prof. Dr. Hasan Bakti Nasution, Vice Rector II, SIIS-IAIN (left) and CPSC Director General, Dr. Mohammad Naim Yaakub (right) with Dr. Phil. Zainul Fuad, MA, Project Manager, IAIN (right photo, first fr. L) and Dr. Hazrat Hussain, CPSC Faculty Consultant (rightmost) during the MOU signing.

Study visits of the customized program will be held at the two most prestigious educational institutions in Manila namely, the University of the Philippines and the Asian Institute of Management including a visit to the Philippines’ Commission of Higher Education (CHED).