Rs 6 b investment on University Green Town in Homagama

Ramani Kangaraarachchi

UK’s Plymouth University, ranked amongst the top10 modern UK universities in the world, will invest in the first ever University Green Town in Homagama Sri Lanka with an investment of Rs 6 billion.

The state-of- the- art university which commenced construction last week in a 26 acre land in Pitipana will be completed in 2014. This was announced at the launch of it’s partnership with Sri Lanka’s National School of Business Management [NSBM] held at the Waters Edge Hotel Battaramulla recently.

The CEO, NSBM, Dr E.A. Weerasinghe, said that as an educational institute they were inspired to redefine the role of higher education here in Sri Lanka. And currently they have long term affiliations with world renowned universities such as University College Dublin- Ireland and Limkokwing University- Malaysia and this partnership with Plymouth University will undoubtedly strengthen the capabilities in the field of higher education..

Plymouth University’s President and Vice Chancellor, Wendy Purcell, said that NSBM would deliver tailor made degrees relevant to the Sri Lanka of today as well as that of the future.

“We want our graduates to be Sri Lanka’s leaders of tomorrow,” she said.

She said the Plymouth University has been named as one of UK’s top performing ‘green’ universities. The Annual People & Planet University Green League ranked Plymouth University second out of 145 universities, while Plymouth retains the accolade of being the National UK League’s top overall performer since it began.

The courses that will be offered will include programmes in Supply Chain and Operations, Business Management, Marketing, Accounting, Finance, as well as Tourism and Hospitality.

“Each degree will be delivered by our leading academics who will make up a ‘flying faculty team’, travelling to Sri Lanka to teach students in their third year”, said Professor Purcell.

She said while the students would enjoy the same benefits and access to resources and facilities as if they were studying in Britain, there would also be options for exchanges so that Sri Lankan students could come to Britain for part of their course.