John Howard visits ACICIS

The Prime Minister of Australia, Mr John Howard, and the Australian Ambassador to Indonesia, met with ACICIS students and staff at a reception on the 8th of February 2002, when they visited Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.

Mr Howard presented a certificate to Ms Jennifer Robinson, the 500th participant in the ACICIS "Study Indonesia Program." Ms Robinson was in the fourth year of her Asian Studies Specialist (Indonesian)/Law degree at the Australian National University in Canberra. She celebrated her 21st birthday just before leaving for Indonesia. She took subjects mainly from the political science faculty at Gadjah Mada University, and then did field work at Muhammadiyah University, in Malang, East Java.

Ms Robinson presented the Prime Minister with a package of information on ACICIS, including brochures, handbooks and an ACICIS T shirt.

Ms Robinson said "living and studying in a country is the only way to gain fluency in the language and gain a full understanding of another culture, in particular one so alien to our own. It opens your eyes to different ideas about living in general and allows you to gain important life experience which is invaluable to any given career."

At the reception, hosted by the Rector of Gadjah Mada University, the Prime Minister highlighted some of the achievements of ACICIS.

Now in its ninth year, ACICIS is the largest consortium of its kind in Australia, with 21 member universities, including all of the leading institutions in the field of Indonesian Studies. It is a unique support network for students and others who wish to experience living and studying in Indonesia. Not only does it cater for undergraduate students, but also for private individuals and for honours students wishing to do field work for their thesis.

"These students are the cream of the cream - so committed to their studies of Indonesia that they want to spend that year there. They graduate amongst Australia's best speakers of Indonesian," said Professor David Hill, ACICIS Consortium Director.

Students from Australia on the ACICIS Journalism Professional Practicum also covered the visit of the Prime Minister for Indonesian media outlets while he was in Jakarta.