Improving disaster preparedness with colleagues from Malaysian universities

The Department of Critical Care was honoured to deliver a disaster response workshop to staff representing 20 public universities across Malaysia on Monday 6 September.

A delegation of students comprising academic and professional staff from 20 public universities across Malaysia.

The group recently completed the Disaster Management Essentials Micro-Certificate online, then attended campus face-to-face to consolidate their skills during the workshop.

In Malaysia, when disasters occur, professional and academic staff and students from universities are mobilised to respond. The Disaster Management Essentials course has provided these disaster response leaders with principles that can be applied to individual settings. The additional workshop was an opportunity to share local context and tailor the principles to different scenarios. A trainer pack was also provided to graduates of the micro-certificate to enable these disaster response leaders to train their local volunteer groups.

Students reported that the course was very relevant to their roles in responding to disasters such as floods. They enjoyed using the Canvas platform and interacting with subject matter experts during the webinars.

Student comments:

“Via live webinar, we were able to discuss a lot of things, especially exchanging ideas on what we experience in Malaysia and what Marion and Professor George experience in Australia. There was two-way communication and Marion was always checking whether we were okay or not.”

“The course was beneficial for us and applicable to disaster management in our home country.”

The students toured the university campus and visited the Department of Health and Ambulance Victoria’s disaster response operations centre during their stay.

For more information, visit the Disaster Management Essentials webpage or contact disastermed-critcare@unimelb.edu.au.