Why SSBU?

Shan State Buddhist University (SSBU) founded in 2014 by Ven. Prof. Dr. K. Dhammasami (DPhil. Oxford) is the first Buddhist university established in Shan State, Myanmar. It is located around serene hills which only takes about ten minutes by car from downtown of Taunggyi, the capital of Shan State.

SSBU at present offers BA degree, postgraduate diploma and MA degree programmes. In our unique degree programmes, students can tap into our rich tradition of excellence in textual, philological, philosophical, psychological and doctrinal study and gain perspective on ways in which Buddhism informs and is informed by the contemporary world.

SSBU’s MA programme offers a wide range of courses, including Pali, Tipitaka studies, Meditation, Buddhist Philosophy and Buddhism in Myanmar. The tutors of the students who will also be the MA lecturers of SSBU include Ven. Prof. Dr. K. Dhammasami (Oxford Sayadaw) (Dhammacariya, MA and MPhil. Kelaniya, DPhil. Oxford); Ven. Dr. Senghurng Narinda (MA Kelaniya, PhD Peradeniya); Prof. Peter Koret (PhD SOAS University of London), a specialist on Lao literature and culture; Dr. Susan Conway (BA West Surrey College, MA Goldsmith’s College, PhD Brighton), a Research Associate at SOAS and a specialist on Shan culture; Dr. Aleix Ruiz Falqués (BA Barcelona, MA Pune University, PhD Cambridge), a Pali scholar; Dr. Pyi Phyo Kyaw (BA Oxford, MA SOAS, PhD King’s College, London), a Postdoctoral Fellow of Buddhist Studies at King’s College; Dr. Anuja Ajotikar (MPhil. Pune University, PhD ITT Bombay), a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Sanskrit Library; and Dr. David Wharton (PhD University of Passau), a specialist on the language, orthography and Buddhist manuscript culture of the Tai Nuea ethnic group. More scholar-tutors will join.

Moreover, since 2015, SSBU has been training the teachers of our MA programme. The academic training workshops for our teachers have covered a wide range of areas, including how to teach at a postgraduate level and how to be research-active scholars, all of which are important aspects of good academic practice. We strongly believe that academic excellence comes from continuous academic training and development. Therefore, SSBU provides in-house academic training for our teaching staff to ensure our teachers are of the highest standard.

As part of our commitment to academic excellence, library is an important component of SSBU, supporting the university’s teaching, learning and research activities. SSBU library currently houses over ten thousands of academic books collected from Europe, America and Asia, covering diverse areas of study. In the future, we hope to make SSBU library an outstanding Buddhist library containing books and resources in many different languages.