Friday, February 13, 2009

Doing PBL on Campus Election

2nd PBL The Campus Election



We just completed a reading and did an exercise on differentiating between facts and opinions. I thought that the students need extra practice in differentiating facts and opinion.

Just the night before I was thinking that I haven't done any PBL with my semester 2 students. This particular group is made of accounting, management, marketing, banking, trade and manufacturing finance and banking students namely the faculty of Accounting, Banking and Management's students.

Perhaps I can kill two birds with a stone, so I thought.



Campus Election




It seems that a hot topic on campus this week is the campus election. The election of faculty representative to the Student Representative Council (SRC) is to be held on Thursday that week before the students leave for the mid semester break.

There has been a few controversy regarding the campus election mainly because there haven't been one for the past 3 years. This year's election has been postponed to this semester and the Dean of Student Affair Office has declared that there will not be a campus wide election since there were only 22 candidates bought the form and returned it to the office by the due date and there are only 22 posts vacated thus all have won without contested. Thus the election is only to vote for the faculty representative. There is even a post in a students' forum on the subject on UDM e-learning site, kelip ( http://www.kelip.udm.edu.my/ )

Upon searching the article on the internet, I've come across a newpaper article posted back in October last year about the postponement of the campus election in all university in Malaysia. The article looks good for looking for facts and opinion exercise thus filling up the FILA table.




Campus elections to be postponed until year’s end
By KAREN CHAPMAN and TAN EE LOO
Saturday October 11, 2008
PETALING JAYA: Campus elections in several public universities will be postponed to the end of this year or early next year. This is because the elections coincided with the Hari Raya and Deepavali festivals, semester break and examinations. Sources said at least four universities, including Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), Universiti Malaya (UM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) and Universiti Sains Malaysia intend to delay the campus elections. It is believed that existing regulations prohibit some universities from holding activities too near the examination period. Campus elections are usually held in October to elect members of the student representative council for the next academic year.
UPM vice-chancellor Prof Datuk Dr Nik Mustapha Raja Abdullah said the university decided to postpone the campus elections as the period coincided with the Hari Raya break, convocation, the final examinations and semester holidays. He said the elections would probably be held in January.
UKM vice-chancellor Prof Datuk Dr Sharifah Hapsah Syed Hasan Shahabudin said the university was also postponing the campus elections as it was near the final term exams.
UM student representative council president Afandy Sutrisno Tanjung said there has been no announcement of the postponement of campus elections.
Meanwhile, in Putrajaya some 300 university students, led by Solidariti Mahasiswa Malaysia (SMM), a coalition of several student bodies, held a demonstration in front of the Higher Education Ministry.
SMM chairman Haafizuddin Abi- rerah said they were protesting against the delay in announcing the date for the campus elections.
Pro Mahasiswa Nasional chairman Nor Razali Zainuddin questioned why campus elections could not be held at all public universities simultaneously.
Haafizuddin later handed over a 17-page memorandum which contained, among others, a request for the abolishment of the e-voting system, to Higher Education Minister Datuk Seri Mohamed Khaled Nordin’s special officer Mohd Arif Adenan.
Additional source: http://forum.lowyat.net/topic/530198




First activity was a facts gathering based on the reading passage as a trigger done as a group work.


Doing PBL




Then, all groups share with the class of what they thought as fact based on the passage that serve as a trigger. The whole class then got involved to determine if what the other groups have added onto the board is really a fact or just an opinion.

One group listed more than 10 facts but their facts are such as such is this and that universities vice-chancellors thus the opportunity to explain about the raw fact or generic fact versus facts that are related to the problems that we have to solve.

Then all agreed that there are four facts to base our PBL on and localized the issue to our university.


A Letter to dear Minister

FILA Table Scriber




FILA table then was completed as the whole class discussion but facilitated by their lecturer. All of the students save one have not done any PBL last semester. The lone student was from my class last semester. Thus, it was more like introducing FILA table to the students as a problem solving tool. The students were guided to form the ideas, learning issues and many have ideas to offer when it comes to action.

The students were divided into 6 groups for 6 different tasks.

1) Group Name: We are the Best

We are the Best on E-Voting System




2) Group Name: Underworld

The Underworld




3) Group Name: Duyong Vs Dugong

Duyong Vs Dugong on


4) Group Name: Gaza Incredible

Gaza Incredible on the Faculty Repressentative to SRC Election




5) Group Name: Commando

The Commando




6) Group Name: Infinity

The Infinity on the interviewing the Dean of Student Welfare Office