Taylor's University was recently pleased to host a delegation of over thirty-two senior executive managers from the University of the Philippines (LPU) Laguna Campus. As one of the leading universities in the Philippines, LPU wanted their senior staff to be able to benchmark their institution's activities, processes and procedures with another leading institution in Asia. Like Taylor's University, LPU is a non-sectarian, private university. However, LPU was originally founded by the third president of the Philippines, Dr. Jose P. Laurel, and has now expanded to five campuses. LPU is particularly well known for its international relations and hospitality programmes. The day began with the Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Taylor's University, Prof. Dr. Pradeep Nair, discussing the innovative SHINE Award and 2nd Transcript Programme. Then, Mr. Guy Perring, the Southeast Asia Regional Director for i-graduate, spoke about benchmarking the student experience. Taylor's University was the first institution in Malaysia to adopt the i-graduate survey and his presentation was followed by an open and frank discussion on ways for LPU could improve the student experience. Assoc Professor Dr. Tang from INTELLECT, discussed the Taylor's teaching and learning strategies and details of the various programmes that have been developed to provide holistic developmental support to both students and academic staff. The LPU visitors then had the opportunity to experience American Degree Program (ADP) applied learning classrooms throughout the afternoon, with presentations using one of our X-SPACE interactive classrooms. Given our recent listing in the QS Rankings Asia Top 250, Prof Mushtak Al-Atabi, Dean of the School of Engineering, discussed the importance of international rankings and the approach we have taken to them. Given the Taylor's University focus on "Top Employers, Top Choice" Ms. Sandy Tan shared her perspectives on Career Services and enhancing graduate employability. Finally, LPU gained a lot of valuable knowledge on best practices in research from Assoc Professor Dr. Anthony Ho from the School of Biosciences, and also about our student mobility initiatives from Ms. Angela Pok. Then Dr. Thian Lok Boon discussed Taylor’s quality management system and Prof Vik Nair showcased some of the sustainable tourism programmess that have been developed at Taylor’s University.
The visit was organised by Global Engagement, and hosted by Dr Andy Nazarechuk, Dean of the School of Liberal Arts and Sciences. He said that "I would like to thank Dr. Flora Javier, Executive Vice President and Vice President for Academics at LPU for bringing this group to Taylor's University. It was a wonderful opportunity for the two institutions to discuss best-practice approaches and to gain additional insights from one-another".