Students & Society

Which of These Description Apply to You?

==Leader==

+ Appeals to the best in each person.
+ Advice giver and "cheerleader".
+ Comfortable with people.
+ Thinks of ways to motivate and help others.
+ Simplifies - makes the work look easy.
+ Gives credit to others.
+ Straightforward.
+ Admits own mistakes; comforts others when they admit theirs.

==Non leader==

+ Distrustful; believes all people are lazy and dishonest.
+ Expects orders to be followed without comment or question.
+ Hard to get to know.
+ Thinks only of his or her status, how he or she looks to others.
+ Complicates - makes the work seem more difficult.
+ Takes credit; complains about lack of good people.
+ Tricky; manipulates people.
+ Never admits mistakes; blames others.

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Being Part of a Group

Groups require leaders. Someone must take charge of the group. Someone must set the group's purpose or determine how the group is going to operate. These actions are leadership behaviours.

A leader guides, directs, or influences the thoughts, feeling, or behaviour of others. All of us are leaders at one time or another. A person does not even have to be in a position of authority to be a leader. When you are with two or three friends, one of you will be a leader, influencing the way the group behaves.

To be a good leader takes skill. You need to be willing to listen to others, but you must also be able to make your own decisions. You need to understand people's strengths and weaknesses so that you can help them do their best.

Of course, where there is a leader, there must be followers. Every group needs followers. If everyone tried to be the leader, the group would become divided and might even stop being a group.

Followers are the "doers." They carry out the purpose and goals of the group. It is important that followers think about the directions their leaders give. Good followers do not follow blindly.
They ask themselves, "Am I doing what is right? Will this make me a better person, or will it bring harm to me or to others?"

You can be a leader in one situation and a follower in another. You may be a leader with your best friend, a follower in a school club, and a follower in most of your family situatuions.

Remember, a leader must understand, willing to listen and able to make decisions. And followers must not follow blindly.

*Have you answered the question "Which Description Apply to You?"

Students

Students, Their Representatives, and Administration: Symbiotic, Parasitic, or Mutual Respect?


Students at higher learning institutions tend to blame their representative if there is any flaw to the university or college. They expect their representatives to do more than what they are capable of. Unfortunately, pushed to the limit, tensed and tired representatives couldn’t blame back the students they led while keeping good relationship between the students. Doesn’t those students think back that their representatives only represents them, voicing out their problems to the administration level, while doing social obligation? They are not the labor workers!

Student representatives listen more compared to being heard by the universities’ administration. Does administration doesn’t involve students’ voice or does the voice worth nothing or do they expect the students to be more grateful on what they have and tolerate more, or are the students just being over-demanding?

To non-functional and unreliable student representatives, what can we do about them? Leaving the students they led behind, ignoring social obligations, following 100% what is being told by the administration without considering students’ problems, taking advantages, and worst, being a representative with no manifesto! (Doesn’t have any intention to be the representative but took up the challenge to be one) If that’s the worst case, haven’t you heard about student representative having such manifestos and ‘big dreams’ as he or she is a visionary, BUT never have the effort to reach it when he or she was appointed? This is far worst! There are also some students boasting around on what they are capable of while showing off their work. (Also there are ‘talkers’ and not ‘doers’)

Do you really think that there’s a need for student representative council? Don’t you think the administration is taking advantage on these students’ representatives to do their work, and vice versa? Why are there students taking advantage if one of their friends become the students’ representative? And why we enjoy blaming the others? (Students to Staff and vise versa)

Comment please…

Society

"Society and Education System in Malaysia"

At month end of April 2009, a table top discussion organized by the New Straits Times - Learning Curve in collaboration with Acer Sales and Services Sdn Bhd, chaired by Prof Madya Koh Soo Ling, a lecturer from Universiti Teknologi MARA, was held. The topic discussed was "What should the students do after SPM and STPM?"

The summary of the discussion are, students should be prepared, know their rights, responsible, as well as can adapt themselves with the surroundings if they want to be succesful at higher learning levels.

Prof Datuk Dr Ahmad Zainuddin, director of Akademi Kepimpinan Pengajian Tinggi, in his opinion said, in spite of getting good grades, they should actively involved in the extra-curricular program such as involved in a society or sports thus, mixed with the other students to improve their communication skills and develop holistic "jati diri". (*ehem...who can help me with this?)

For Dr Asma Abdullah, Culture Expert, culture and social contact in campus can nurture the students' thoughts and relationship.

From the above statements, we can see that how important self-development is especially to the students. None of them suggested that the students should continue on reading only, or "Be prepared for another higher level of examination!" Having excellent grades with no soft skills is such a waste and we always declare them as 'hardly-employed'.

Answer this: "We often criticize the education system in our country which is exam-oriented but at the same time we are swollen with pride having students that successfully get excellent results in their examination. Example, Amalina (SPM2005) and Madiah (SPM2008), two Malay girls having the most A's (up to 18A's if I'm not mistaken), are placed 'on top of the world' to show how brilliant they are! Is this how we act in response or is this the irony reaction of Malaysians towards excellent-on-a-paper person, or they didn't realize as they lost their conscious or did they thought that exam-oriented education is no longer an issue if their children excel superbly in the civil examination?"

Prologue..

"Equalize the Mind and the Tone of Voice before speaking to others." -BC. LEE

We all have something to say, something to voice out, different point of views, varying opinions. The first thought I have when I decided to set up this blog was, "I want to know how others think and react toward certain issues." It's better to hear from various background of people, different level of education, and different understandings as these will develop critical minds and look at the issue from different angles.

I'm not good in writing. I don't have fancy words to entertain you guys and make this blog looks appealing. So, if there is any flaw, incorrect fact, syntax error, inaccurate information, please kindly inform me. I would appreciate it if you do it in a nice way. By the way, harsh words are forbidden in this blog. However, 'hard talks' are allowed. We are not searching whom to be blame for, but rather finding the truth. And of course, fitnah shouldn't be here, in any way or in any form. Prohibited.

Oohhh..please call me Ahmad Fadhil. Or maybe Fadhil is good enough. Currently pursuing my studies in B.Sc.(Hons.)Chemistry(Forensic Analysis) at the Faculty of Applied Sciences, Universiti Teknologi MARA Malaysia. Some interesting courses I took were "Criminology and Criminal Justice" and "Forensic Science" having the book "Criminalistic" as my reference. Questions? Please do not hesitate to ask me. Any question or comment are most welcomed.

Fadhil starts to scribble..

WELCOME!

Everyone is allowed to be here. The more, the merrier! What I meant by everyone was, as long as you are an 'existing' human being, welcome! I wont be happy seeing 'anonymous' commenting, hacking IDs, and 'pretenders'. Whoever you are, I hope you enjoy reading this blog!
(Contents are in English and Bahasa Melayu)

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