Related to the cooperation with Australia, UMM held some events. One of them was an event themed Australia Week which was lasted for three days. Starting from Monday (7/18), it was begun with the photos exhibition of the Australian students activities when they were in UMM. Today, the event was the Professional Development Activities (PDA) and Art Performance in UMM BAU Hall. It was also completed with Aussi Edu Expo which gave information about how to get scholarship to Australia.

The Chief Committee, Prof. Dr. M. Masud Said, stated that in PDA, the event was about the international scientific publication development. It was attended by some lecturers who ever got the scholarship in Australia and master program students. The society might also join the event. “The keynote speakers are from Lembaga Ilmu Prengetahuan Indonesia (LIPI), Ausaid team, and ADS scholarship alumni,” said Masud.

In the Art Performance, any traditional dances and gamelan were performed in front of the audiences. The Australian students also got chances to perform their art.

The Foreign Cooperation Bureau Chief, Dr. Masduki, hoped that the event would be successfully attract the society. At least, they would be more aware that UMM had a cooperation with Australia. “I hope we all can facilitate this cooperation through this event," said Masduki.

The cooperation lasted for more than 15 years. It was signed with the opening ofAustralia Concortium for In-Country Indonesia Studies (Acicis) at UMM on 1995. The concortium consisted of 19 universities in Australia always delegated their students to UMM. “Every semester, Acicis delegates its students to study at UMM and now their number is more than 170 graduates,” said Masud.

UMM Acicis also accepted the students from Netherland, France, and US. Those students could study at UMM if they had already registered and been selected by the Australian Acicis. At UMM, they learnt the language, culture, religion, social, politic, and economic to do research in Indonesia.

UMM also cooperated with some universities in Europe. Through Erasmus Mundus, UMM delegated its students and lecturers. “This year, we have two proposal of cooperation model with the Europe. We will have not only students and lecturers exchange program, but also lecturers delegation to get the degree in europe," said the Assistant Rector of Foreign Cooperation, Drs. Suparto, M.Pd.

In that photos exhibition, there were 30 photos. One of them was when a student presented the research wearing the Javanese traditional clothes. Another student was captured while he interviewed someone for his research.

“I am interested in an Australian student photo. She wears kemben, just like the dayang-dayang in Javanese kingdom long time ago,” said Iwona Matyza, one of the visitors. Iwona was from Poland and now taught at UMM for Internship program. The exhibition was started from 9 am till 5 pm, and for public.

(hm, retreived from umm.ac.id)