JOHOR BAHRU – Kew Si Na, a Ph.D. student from the Faculty of Education, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, was selected to participate in the Youth Outstanding Programme 2018 between Malaysia and Maldives organized by International Youth Centre, YMM and Sea Tradelink in February, 2018 together with 19 other selected participants.

The purposes of this programme were to consolidate the global friendship bond between youth in Malaysia and Maldives, to foster the value of volunteerism in youth, to explore the knowledge and culture about Maldives, and to develop the potential of participants towards excellence.

The activities included of an educational visit to The Maldives National University to exchange ideas about education systems in particpants’ own countries and an activity related to corporate social responsibility such as beach clean-up activity to make an impact on the society.

Besides that, another significant activity is the sharing session with local NGOs such as the Regional Alliance for Fostering Youth to introduce Malaysia and NGOs in Malaysia and cultural performances where the participants  performed traditional dances.

Moreover, they were also arranged to join a city tour led by local students in Male to understand the development of the capital, and also to join the beach activities such as island hopping and a sand bank tour to see the natural beauty surrounding Maldives.

Throughout the whole programme, they had exchanged cultural knowledge and ideas as well as built a global friendship that had enriched their learning journey.