Catatan Hadi Nur

“… The mission of the university and its commitment are to the present and future generations, safeguarding the prosperity and welfare of the world with the best in education and scientific research. Not just for ’superficial’ rankings. ”

The above statement is probably the ideal mission and goal of universities. However, sometimes that goal has been deviated because of pressure on the universities as ‘economic goods’ which must have the selling point in the market. This issue was raised by Prof. Wiranto Arismunandar (former rector of Institut Teknologi Bandung [ITB]) when giving a speech on the world rank of ITB held in ITB East Hall on May 10, 2008. My attention is attracted by the wisdom thinking of Prof. Wiranto. The following is the first paragraph of his paper which is translated from Indonesian:

Aspiration of ITB to be World Class University (WCU) is good, but it should not make us worry and panic, because this is not the most important thing. We should be worry if the ITB is useless and can’t serve the nation-building of Indonesia. The initiator of WCU ranking must have a certain plan and the various interests, and therefore, no need to worry about that. Business, student intake, political, social, economic, and various other interests, may be a few of the many reasons that underlie such interests. It should not make us anxious and vulnerable, trapped and shackled by the ranking’s issue. The most important is, ITB must be useful for the development of Indonesia and also participate in solving problems of this nation. ITB should make itself mainstay and become a national strength to overcome various challenges, in order to make the nation prosperous, respected and independent. ITB should be proud of and preserve the honor of Indonesian people. That is why we must be more serious in implementing our duties and obligations. Thus we can obtain better results and make continuous improvements. If later ITB achieve recognition as WCU, it will make us more motivated to give the best service to our beloved country. Do not be ambitious to reach a high rank, we will be ashamed if we do not serve the country and do not do anything for the development of Indonesia.

Prof. Akhmaloka, the new Rector of ITB period of 2010-2014, also voiced the same issue. His mission as ITB rector is to bring the ITB to produce something useful to society by utilizing the local uniqueness of Indonesia.

In conclusion, one suggests that it is more important to “earthing the university” rather than pursuing the prestige ranking, because it will provide tangible benefits for society and the country.

[Click the above picture to see a larger view]

As a reviewer in several journals in the field of Catalysis, I have recommended to reject nearly 80% of manuscripts (of about 30 manuscripts) which was sent to me by the editors in the last two years. Most of the manuscripts submitted were from universities in China. I do not know, if this is a coincidence or because so many manuscripts was submitted from the Chinese university. However, I also found that the quality of some manuscripts submitted from leading universities in Europe was low.

The following are the reasons why I do not accept manuscripts for publication:
- Originality. Usually in a paper that is not original, the results is very easy to predict.
- Speculation. Discussion and conclusion are not supported by the complete set of accurate data. Because of that the jump into conclusion statement was found in the manuscript.
- Logic. The analytical technique used is not appropriate, nor logic in analyzing the data.

Richard Feynman, a Physics Nobel laureate once said that, as a scientist, he enjoys the beauty of flowers with more in-depth than an artist. Artist or ordinary people just enjoy and appreciate only the external aesthetic of flower. As a scientist he was more to enjoy the beauty of flowers – not just from the external beauty of flower – but much deeper, such as molecular structure, metabolism, biophysics and the other scientific aspects.

Based on the above view, as a lecturer and researcher, I can analogize the university as “the flower of Richard Feynman”. The university is not only viewed from just the physical facilities, but much deeper – namely the process of education and research in it. This process must be based on the ’scientific culture’. The university should consider and implement this process in order to become a respected university. There are no points of scientific publications, patents and the medals obtained from the exhibition if they only showing ‘the external beauty’ of the university – just like a flower that is only enjoyed by ordinary people who do not understand the internal beauty of the flowers, as claimed by Richard Feynman.

What are you looking for in your career?

If you are a lecturer, of course your ultimate goal is to get professorship.

If you’re a politician, certainly your goal is to become a leader; minister, president or prime minister.

Based on the above two terms; lecturer and politician, I created a new term called lecturer politician. This term is created in order to describe someone who has no intention to become an educator, albeit he is a lecturer. The lecturer politicians use their academic status (lecturer, associate professor or professor) as a vehicle in the pursuit of power, like a politician does. Their intention is not to be a good teacher and researcher, but to seek power and fame. Is this wrong intentions? The answer is actually no, because everyone is free to dream what they want to be in their future life. Usually a lecturer politician is not interested in teaching.

I once read somewhere, that teaching and research are multiplicative, and not additive, factors in one’s stature as a scientist. This means that you are a zero as a scientist if you cannot teach. Of course, it also means that you are a zero as a scientist if you do not do research. Based on this consideration, a lecturer politician is not a scientist. Usually they are just a “clever scholar” who merely quotes an opinion or ideas of other scholars. So, what is the contribution of lecturer politicians in academic world?

This page was inspired by the real existing people called the lecturer politicians, but none of these descriptions refer to one single existing person. With the existence of people like this, one argues that there is must be something wrong with our university system, for example, academic promotion without considering the actual academic achievement.

I and my mother when I was 10 months (1970) in Bukittinggi, West Sumatera.

Abu Huraira reported that a person came to Muhammad SAW and said: Who among the people is most deserving of a fine treatment from my hand? He said: Your mother. He again said: Then who (is the next one)? He said: Again it is your mother (who deserves the best treatment from you). He said: Then who (is the next one)? He said: Again, it is your mother. He (again) said: Then who? Thereupon he said: Then it is your father.

This page is about my mother. My mother’s name is Sofiah Djamaris. She was born in Sawahlunto, West Sumatera on October 10, 1933 (in the certificate and the passport was written born in 1934). She was retired as a senior lecturer at State University of Padang (Universitas Negeri Padang) in 1999. Although my mother is not well recognized in the academic world, their children know that she is an intelligent person. Her friends and teachers recognize that she is a smart student. She was the favorite pupil of Pak Jalal (father of Prof. Fasli Jalal, now is a Deputy Minister of Ministry of National Education, Indonesia) when she was studying at Diniyyah Putri, Padang Panjang, West Sumatra in the 1950s. She obtained her first degree in Islamic Studies from Institut Agama Islam Negeri Sunan Kalijaga, Yogyakarta in 1964. Her thesis was supervised by the late Prof. Muchtar Jahja.

My mother come from a village called Pamuatan which is located in Sijunjung distric in West Sumatera province. She was the first person from the village who got a bachelor degree from the university. At that time, this is a remarkable achievement since her mother who financed her study at the university is illiterate.

The man who speaks Minangkabau language fluently will understand what is meant by “Galia”. “Galia” can be interpreted as a sly but with a positive meaning. Positive in the sense of clever in exploiting the situation around him. “Galia” people are very good at adapting to their environment. Therefore, this could explain why many Minang traders can successfully survive overseas with this “galia” principle. I found many successful Minang traders in Malaysia. If you go to Kuala Lumpur, please stop at Raja Alang street. You will find the Minang traders along this street.

“Different countries, different culture”. This principle must be applied if you want to survive living overseas, especially in the country has different culture and religion. Something that we think is right, maybe not necessarily right for others. “Appreciating pluralism” and “intelligent adaptation” are maybe the right terms to describe this situation.

In conclusion, “Galia” or intelligent adaptation is essential for life in our society.

My brothers - left to right: Hamdi Nur, Huseini Nur, Me and Hamda Nur

The above photo was taken in 1973 in Bukittinggi, West Sumatra. At that time my father was teaching at IKIP (Institut Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan) in Bukittinggi. Our house is located near to the Bung Hatta Palace and the Clock Tower (Jam Gadang).

Thief shouting thief. This term describes a hypocrite. Recently I found an article about this in kompasiana.com:

http://edukasi.kompasiana.com/2010/02/04/profesor-plagiator-maling-teriak-maling/

This is a case of plagiarism by an Indonesian professor. Embarrassingly, this case was found in the university, an educational institution.

Based on the above case, the following questions arise: Why plagiarism was more pronounced in the field of social science? Why is there no original opinions presented by the local scholars? The answer is the local scholars never do original research. Most of the literature on Indonesia is written by scholars from the west. Please browse the ‘google scholar‘ in order to prove this statement. Many of the social science scholars in Indonesia are only cleverly quoting the opinions of others, especially from the opinion of western scholars.

In general, there are three things that motivate people to perform plagiarism and scientific fraud:

Pressure to achieve a good career.

Trying to answer the research questions effortlessly without needed to perform any experiments in laboratory.

Working in the field where the experiment has not always been reproducible. This may explain why scientific fraud occurs frequently in biological and biomedical fields, because it is difficult to get data that can be reproducible, because in this area, the experiment results depend on many factors which is difficult to control.

What is the feeling of having successfully managed teaching? Surely the answer is excited. I felt this feeling when I saw my assessment of my teaching last semester (Quantum Chemistry and Spectroscopy – SSC2463). This assessment was made by the students. The following is my score.

Overall Achievement Statistics:
Min of my score: 4.64335
Min score of faculty: 4.39
Min score of university: 4.35
My rank in UTM: P5

Note:
P1: Rank <= 20%
P2: 20% P3: 40% P4: 60% P5: Rank> 80%

Below are the comments from my students:
1. best belajar dengan Dr Hadi
2. Dr Hadi Nur baik…
3. bagus naikkan gaji naikkan pangkat
4. sila naikkan gaji pensyarah ini