With a growing demand for Filipinos wanting to study abroad, international programs from various colleges in the country are emerging for students to pursue their educational journey in a multicultural learning program overseas.
Premier educational institution Miriam College (MC) sealed the deal on February 3 with Camosun College in British Columbia to offer more economical and competitive programs as announced by its president Ambassador Laura del Rosario in a press conference held at the school’s Innovation Center.
Del Rosario said the partnership with Camosun College is viewed as the first transnational higher education partnership once the Transnational Higher Education Act has been passed into law. This, she said, will allow MC to augment its education for its students in the country including degrees in Business Administration as well as diplomas in Early Learning and Care, Health Care Assistant and Mental Health and Addictions.
“Access to Camosun degree and diploma programs through MC here will allow us to continue advancing knowledge at a time when the world is changing faster,” said del Rosario.
“Some people when they go abroad, they pay their tuition fees abroad. We have an arrangement with Camosun with some kind of tuition adjustment so that Filipino students won’t have to pay so much.”
Camosun College president Dr. Lane Trotter and vice president for partnerships Geoff Wilmshurst said the collaboration is a first transnational partnership between colleges in both the Philippines and Canada to give students better opportunities to complete their course with a cultural exchange of learning.
“This is going to be quite unique because partnerships up to this point are kind of based on short-term exchanges. This is an opportunity for both Canadian and Filipinos to complete an entire program either in the Philippines or in Canada or in combination of both, a very elaborate and combined way of working together,” Wilmshurst said.
“It also means students can have that option to complete their degree in Canada because we are also bringing our programs to Miriam College,” Trotter added.
The MC-Camosun international programs will provide a streamlined pathway for both Filipino and Canadian students to continue their two-year courses and programs, earn their bachelor’s degree and qualify for a postgraduate program or, pursue a postgraduate degree.
“What makes this partnership also essential and different is that all their foreign students around the region will start with Miriam and then they go to Canada. So in effect we are not just giving opportunities to Filipinos to have the opportunity to study abroad at a cheaper rate. Camosun and MC share many values that put students first and that is important,” she said.
The MC Alviera campus will also bring in more international opportunities as part of its vision to provide student mobility, faculty exchange, and experiential immersion for the community and support the country’s transnational education goals poised to be the “gateway to the world.”
