Page 240 - Universitas Terbuka Center of Excellence In Asia 2010 and The World 2020 (A Journey Towards a Leading Open and Distance Education Institution 1984-2008)

Therefore, PELMA unit only serves students who come directly or who contact
UT by telephone or electronic mail .
At the beginning, electronic mail addressed to pelma@p2m .ut.ac.id is

tackled by PELMA, while electronic mail addressed to info@p2m.ut.ac.id is
tackled by BAAPM . From 2002 , both addresses are joined together and

tackled by BAAPM. Then , in 2006 the electronic mail info@2pm.ut.ac.id was
changed into info@mail.ut.ac.id. Questions addressed to the Graduate

Program through info@mail.ut.ac.id will be forwarded to pps@mail.ut.ac.id .
From 2005 PELMA is under the coordination of BAA PM . As the result, the

service given by PELMA is emphasized more on academic adm inistration
services so that all the functions of academic counseling are returned to each

of the respective Faculties.
• Student Service through telephone, facsimile, and letters

The students who do not have internet facilities in their areas can use
telephone as a means of fast communication . Although it is expensive , this

facility is effective for counseling activities because they can put their
problems forward. One weakness is that many callers do not know the UT

telephone service system so that many telephone calls come to PELMA which
are supposed to come into other units. This causes losses on the students'

side, as they cannot contact PELMA because the line is too busy. If academic
counseling through telephone is not fully given by PELMA, it will be

transferred to lecturers or academic staff at the faculty or the Post-Graduate
Program .

Communication through letters is easily done by the students at relatively
small cost. However, this service is considered to be less effective because

too much time needed to find their addresses. To make this easier, all their
letters sent by post should be addressed to BAAPM as provider of information

and academic administration services or to the Dean or Director of Graduate

215