National University of Malaysia

Main gate

The National University of Malaysia (abbreviation: UKM; Malay: Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia; abbreviated UKM) is a public university located in Bangi, Selangor which is at south of Kuala Lumpur. Its teaching hospital, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre (UKMMC) Pusat Perubatan Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (PPUKM) is located in Cheras and also has a branch campus in Kuala Lumpur.It’s one of the most prestigious university in Malaysia and Southeast Asia.There are 17,500 undergraduate students enrolled, and 5,105 postgraduate students of which 1,368 are foreign students from 35 countries.^[5]

National University of Malaysia is one of five research universities in the country. It was ranked number 259th in the world by QS World University Rankings in 2014.^[6] It is ranked 98th place in the 100 best new universities established within the last 50 years in the world. It is the only university from Malaysia that made it in the 2012 Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) Top 50 Universities Under 50 Years Old list ranked in the 31st place. It placed 56th and 56th in the QS Top 500 Asian University Rankings in 2014 and 2015 respectively.It is ranked at 184th position in world in the 2019 QS World University Rankings making it a top tier university internationally.^[7]

History

Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, the national university of Malaysia was born from the aspirations of the nationalists to uphold the Malay Language as a language of knowledge. The quest for a national university was suggested in 1923 by the writer Abdul Kadir Adabi as a move against British colonisation. This nationalist tide galvanised Malay intellectuals of the time but met British suppression. The nationalists never wavered and in 1969 the movement again blossomed. A Sponsoring Committee chaired by Syed Nasir Ismail, a Malay intellectual, was set up to prepare a report recommending the establishment of UKM. Other prominent members of this committee include Dr. Mahathir Mohamed (Tun), Malaysia's fourth Prime Minister who was then the Education Minister, and Dr. Mohd Rashdan Haji Baba, who later became UKM's first Vice-Chancellor.

Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia opened its doors on 18 May 1970 to 192 undergraduate students in Jalan Pantai Baru, Kuala Lumpur, a temporary campus housing three main faculties, the Faculties of Science, Arts and Islamic Studies. In October 1977, UKM moved to its present premises which form the main campus in Bangi. The campus has a size of 1,096 hectares (2,710 acres), situated in the metropolis encompassing the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Kuala Lumpur, the main commercial centre, and Putrajaya, the administrative capital. The UKM Bangi Campus is 45 km (28 mi) from KLIA, 30 km (19 mi) from Kuala Lumpur and 20 km (12 mi) from Putrajaya.

UKM has two health campuses, the Kuala Lumpur campus in Jalan Raja Muda Abdul Aziz, and the UKM Medical Centre in Cheras. The Kuala Lumpur campus consists of the Faculties of Health Sciences, Pharmacy, Dentistry and the Pre-Clinical Departments of the Medical Faculty. With a size of 20 hectares (49 acres), the Kuala Lumpur campus was established in 1974.

The campus in Cheras consists of the Medical Faculty, the UKM Teaching Hospital and the UKM Medical Molecular Biology Institute (UMBI). The Cheras campus was opened in 1997. Besides these campuses, UKM operates seven research stations (RS); The Tasik Chini RS, The Marine Ecosystem RS, The Langkawi Geopark RS, The Marine RS, The Fraser's Hill RS, The Plant Biotechnology RS and in the main campus itself, the UKM Campus Living Laboratory, which comprises the UKM Permanent Forest Reserve, or its Malay name, Hutan Simpan Kekal UKM as well as the Fernarium and the Herbarium.

Based on a foundation of 30 years of research, UKM was awarded the status of a Malaysian Research University in October 2006 by the Ministry of Higher Education, a move designed to propel the four public universities into leading research universities in line with the Higher Education Strategic Plan 2007–2020.

The year 2006 also saw UKM winning the Prime Minister's Quality Award. This award vindicates UKM's efforts at quality education and management, as outlined by the objectives of the UKM Strategic Plan 2000–2020 (PS2020). The Strategic Plan has been augmented by the newly unveiled UKM Knowledge Ecosystem Transformation Plan, a transformation set to catapult UKM into the league of leading research universities by 2018.

Academics

Residential Colleges

• Kolej Aminuddin Baki (KAB)
• Kolej Burhanudin Helmy (KBH)
• Kolej Dato' Onn (KDO)
• Kolej Ibrahim Yaakub (KIY)
• Kolej Ibu Zain (KIZ)
• Kolej Keris Mas (KKM)
• Kolej Pendeta Zaba (KPZ)
• Kolej Rahim Kajai (KRK)
• Kolej Tun Dr. Ismail (KTDI)
• Kolej Tun Hussein Onn (KTHO)
• Kolej Tun Syed Nasir (KTSN)
• Kolej Ungku Omar (KUO)

Notable alumni

• YB Dato' Haji Mohd Rashid bin Hasnon, Deputy Chief Minister 1 of Penang
• Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor, Country's First Astronaut
• Syed Hussein Alatas, academic
• Anthony Loke Siew Fook, Minister of Transport of Malaysia
• Liow Tiong Lai, Former Minister of Transport
• Tan Sri Dr. Jemilah Mahmood, Chief of the Humanitarian Response Branch, United Nations Populations Fund (UNFPA) in New York
• Anwar Ibrahim, Former deputy Prime Minister of Malaysia and, later, head of the opposition
• Anwar Fazal, Father of Malaysian NGO Movement – Honorary Doctorate in Law, 1997
• Datuk Razali Ibrahim, Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister's Department (Read law)
• Dato' Halimi Abd Manaf, Deputy Secretary General of Ministry of Defence
• Ramlan Bin Ibrahim, diplomat, Permanent Representative of Malaysia to the United Nations
• Jess Lee, singer
• Mohamad Fuzi Harun, 11th Inspector General of Royal Malaysian Police since 4 September 2017

Rankings

When the Times Higher Education Guide University Rankings (THE) was published in October 2014, it was reported that UKM, along with Universiti Malaya, opted to not submit data for consideration. UKM Strategic Centre deputy executive director Associate Professor Dr Masturah Markom responded to the snub by saying that the rankings were unfair to the Malaysian education context. She specifically cited the measurement of "industry income" in the THE methodology of university assessment, stating that Malaysian industry input cannot compete with other countries such as the United States of America. This is despite the fact that only a 2.5% weightage is allocated to "industry income" in the methodology, and more conventional categories such as teaching and research still makes up 90% of the methodology.^[10][11]

See also

• UKM Medical Centre
• PATMA Library

References

External links

• Official University website
• Official news portal