The government is believed to have committed more than A$100 million ($617 million) to the scheme to cover scholarship, tuition and travel costs for the 625 students likely to have been involved by the time the project ends in 2011.

Two Australian universities, two in New Zealand and one in Britain were selected by the Malaysian Ministry of Education to take part.

Macquarie University in Sydney and the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane are among the five that have twinning arrangements with Malaysia's International Languages Teacher Training Institute in Kuala Lumpur.

The others are the universities of Auckland and Victoria in New Zealand and the College of St Mark and St John at the University of Exeter in England.

Malaysian students hoping to become teachers of English as a second language first undertake an 18-month foundation programme at their home institutions. If they qualify and their English is good, they may then enrol in the first year of the course at the Teacher Training Institute.

The students do one year in Kuala Lumpur and the next two at one or other of the foreign universities.

The final year of the degree, which is mainly teaching in schools, is completed in Malaysia.

Academics at the five foreign universities oversee the curriculum, quality assurance and assessment. They will also run workshops for institute staff in Malaysia while Malaysian teacher educators will visit the overseas institutions.

Last week, the first group of 125 Malaysian students arrived at the five universities, with 25 enrolling at each.

A second group, currently completing their first year at the Kuala Lumpur institute, will go overseas next year and so on until the final group of 125 enrols in 2008.

Professor Pamela Coutts, head of Macquarie's school of education, said the project represented a huge commitment by the Malaysian government to improve the quality of its English teachers.

'The curriculum has been developed in consultation with our Malaysian partners but each university will offer slightly different subjects,' Professor Coutts said.

She said the students would take classes with Australian students and the entire programme was designed to provide the highest level of competence in the language.

Students would graduate with a bachelor of education degree (ESL or ESOL) issued by the foreign university where they studied.

Director of international development in QUT's faculty of education, associate professor Bob Elliott, said the scheme had great potential for Malaysia and the foreign universities.

'The potential benefits for these students to learn within an English-speaking country at a time when Malaysian schools are progressing so rapidly are immense,' Professor Elliott said.

'Apart from their formal studies, the students will have wide exposure to English as it is used from day to day and be required to speak it daily themselves.

'This immersion within the culture will help them understand the language in its context. We hope that many long-lasting friendships are formed with our Australian students while the Malaysians are here.'

He said QUT was running professional development courses for staff at the teacher training institute in Kuala Lumpur. The students undertaking courses at Auckland, Exeter and QUT will eventually teach English in Malaysian primary schools while those trained at Macquarie and Victoria universities will work in secondary schools.