As one of the big universities in Indonesia, it is time for Universitas Brawijaya (UB) to have a flagship that distinguishes it from other universities, both nationally and internationally. This was conveyed by the Vice-Chancellor of Planning and Cooperation, Prof. Dr. Ir. Moch. Sasmito Djati, M.S., in the UB Flagship FGD, which was held online on Thursday (8/27/2020). He emphasized this event requires serious thinking and accurate strategy so that the flagship is truly unique and the differentiator is clear.
“If everything is red, and we are also red, then we will disappear. We need to look for something else, we need to be different from the others to be visible,” he explained, giving an illustration.
Furthermore, he added that UB flagship must be a flagship that is not partial but universal to provide a holistic picture of all scientific development activities in UB’s academic community.
“This needs to be considered seriously. One of the most likely paths is to build a flagship that is based on values that must be universal. Maybe we can explore those values from the spirit of the Kings of Brawijaya which has become the name of this university,” he said.
In line with this, the head of the FGD committee, the Dean of the Faculty of Cultural Studies (FCS) UB, Prof. Dr. Agus Suman, S.E., DEA., emphasized in his speech that flagship also has a practical function as a medium for UB to participate in global competition. According to him, if there is no specific strategy, it will be difficult for an institution to have calculated competitiveness. Therefore, the UB flagship development plan through this museum needs to be taken seriously by UB leaders by starting to think about it as part of UB’s development master plan in the years to come.
In this FGD, there was also a speaker, expert on the history and cultural studies, Drs. M. Dwi Cahyono, M.Hum, who gave reinforcement in terms of the importance of elevating the spirit of the Kings of Brawijaya as the main values in developing UB flagship. He emphasized, in the context of building UB flagship, UB leaders have a moral responsibility to explore the spirit of the flagship from the depths of the spirit of life of the Kings of Brawijaya who have already become the name of this university.
At the end of the FGD, the Head of the Doctoral Service Team, Dr. Hipolitus Kristoforus Kewuel, M.Hum, a lecturer of the Study Program Anthropology FCS UB, explained some of the study results of the DM team. First were the results of a comparative study of university museums, both national and international. He said, from the results of the study, almost all university museums develop partial flagships so that the concept of UB flagship which is universal is one of the distinguishing points that can be relied on.
Second, the content design of the UB Museum consists of two main things, namely the Representation of the Glory and Wisdom Values of the Kings of Brawijaya and the Representation of the Values of Scientific Development in the Academic Community of Universitas Brawijaya. Third, the design of the UB Museum consists of a showroom for artifacts to exhibit original and replica artifacts from the heyday of the Kings of Brawijaya and an exhibition room as a place to showcase the results of academic community studies based on the results of field exploration due to inspiration from the artifacts in the exhibition room.
Thus, according to Dr. Hipolitus, UB Museum will continue to be dynamic so that it becomes a museum that not only presents the past, but also the present and the future through the result of the study. “That is why UB Museum will be more suitable to get the nickname as the Growing Museum,” he explained. [DTS]
