Tradeology, the ITA Blog

Amanda Lawrence is an intern working with the U.S. Commercial Service to support the Education Mission to Indonesia and Vietnam.

This morning, mission participants attended a Symposium on US-Indonesian Higher Education Partnership & Exchange at the Sampoerna Strategic Square. U.S. and Indonesian government officials discussed the importance of educational ties and improving bilateral education partnerships. Education sector executives who were also present spoke on the current industry climate.  

After the symposium, the mission participants also attended several breakout sessions depending on their interests. U.S. Commercial service staff arranged one-on-one matchmaking sessions for many schools interested in meeting student recruitment agencies.  School representatives also had an opportunity to meet with local universities and explore partnership prospects.  Lastly, several school representatives visited local high schools and met with administrators, counselors, teachers, and students.

Ambassador Marciel hosted the participants at his residence for a farewell reception this evening. Many of the representatives were thrilled with the day’s events and the reception. “The US Ambassadors reception was a great event as shows the commitment  the US government has to welcome Indonesian students to study in  the USA,” said Joseph Indrawan of the University of Buffalo.  John Lorentz of Shawnee State University agreed, “a productive mission that will lead to increased educational connections between the US and Indonesia, a mission crowned with a superb reception at the US  Ambassadors residence.”

Amanda Lawrence is an intern working with the U.S. Commercial Service to support the Education Mission to Indonesia and Vietnam.

Under Secretary for International Trade Francisco Sanchez rings the gong to open the Education Fair hosted by The Putera Sampoerna Foundation. (Commerce Dept. Photo)

We spent all day at the Education Fair at Sampoerna Strategic Square in Jakarta. Each school exhibited at the fair and met students and their parents. There were 56 exhibitors and approximately 6,000 students and more than 10,000 attendees including parents attending the fair.

Many of the representatives from the schools participating in the mission have many things to say about the experience, such as “I’ve never seen an education fair so well-organized,” said Murat Tas of University of Incarnate Word. “This is really the best!” and “I was very impressed with the students — they were very articulate and asked all the right questions,” said Jayati Ghosh of Dominican University of California.

Attendance was larger than expected and Marcos Fragoso of the University of Incarnate Word said “Attendance at the fair was really really good, and the quality of the student was excellent.”

And James Reidel of University of Pennsylvania said “This mission is an excellent use of our taxpayer dollars and I’m so pleased to be part of it!”

Overall, the first education fair was a great success!