scirev360-revolution in school of science, monash university sunway campus

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SciRev360-

Revolutionin Schoolof Science,

MonashUniversitySunwayCampus

Monash UniversityStudent Association2010

Julius Wong, MUSA PresidentYinny and Fahad, MUSA Schoolof Science Representatives



Table of Contents1.0 Preamble to Monash Sunway Science’s student scenario ................................... 3

2.0 Action taken ......................................................................................................... 3

3.0 Meeting Minutes of School of Science- Students-Teaching Staff Dialogue .......... 5

4.0 Follow up .............................................................................................................. 8

5.0 Conclusion ......................................................................................................... 10

Appendices #1: ........................................................................................................ 12



For information and discussion with Dean of Faculty of Science, Clayton

campus

Date 21st November 2010

RE: SciRev360- A revolution in Monash Sunway Science

1.0 Preamble to Monash Sunway Science’s student scenario

Science students of Monash University Sunway Campus have complained of the

excessive workload given to them over the course of 13 weeks per semester.Although for some weeks, works are well staggered or otherwise, students still find ithard to juggle as multiple assignments, essay and lab reports to be handed in.

This issue has been brought up in the Student-Staff Liaison Committee (SSLC)meetings several times however, we are yet to see any progressive or constructivesolutions being put in place. Note that the meeting minutes of SSLC are confidential.MUSA has no access to it.

Apart from juggling the workloads, students need to join social events as well asother family commitment. MUSA strongly believe that education is not merely about

getting HDs in assignments/exam or winning some competitions. This denotes thatstudents also have right to join social events such as those of clubs and societies,annual ball etc. MUSA do believe these students have a great sense of timemanagement and they do prioritises what tasks need to be completed first.

Aside from this, the chronic traffic congestion in Kuala Lumpur and its suburbs is aserious issue that deter students to spend more time doing their internal assessmentin a more comprehensive and detailed, let alone studying. Not only staff, butstudents as well are often caught in traffic congestion for three to four hours daily.

2.0 Action takenIn response to the students’ growing concern, the School of Science- Students-Teaching Staff Dialogue was arranged on the 9th September 2010 in LectureTheatre 6007.

Attendance:

Assoc. Prof. Song (Head Of School)

Yinny and Fahad Razeen (MUSA School of Science Representatives)

Julius Wong (MUSA President & Mediator)

Approx. 30 students



The event is publicised throughhttp://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=142203979154429

*Due to lack of access to students’ e-mail database, MUSA uses Facebook and posters as mode of publicity.

The meeting minutes is as attached.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=142203979154429

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=142203979154429



3.0 Meeting Minutes of School of Science- Students-TeachingStaff Dialogue

Dialogue was started with welcoming notes from MUSA President, Mr Julius Wong,and Head of School of Science, Assoc. Prof. Song Keang Peng.

Open discussion was started right away, attended by approximately 30 students.

1. A student that went to Australia before for an exchange program suggested tohave less number of formal reports. Back in Australia, the number of formal reportwriting was lesser.

Prof Song responded: he would like to make the number of report writing, forsubjects that are the same with the one in Australia.

2. Students mentioned that in Australia, the unit PHY2021 was mostly onlyworksheet and half report.

3. Students mentioned the workload for subject medical micro was too much but themark contributed for that was just a little. There were 7 reports, all full reports, butthe total mark of all reports was only 10%, so each report was less than 2% butthey have to work so much on it, alongside with other assignments.

Prof Song's responded: this subject was only the same with the one inGippsland and the update for changes is taking a very long time. And inGippsland, they do it differently, as in no lab throughout the semester, but the labsare done during summer. And that very same program is hardly done in Malaysia.

4. Third year biomedical students complained that they are having 3 essays,presentation and reports all due in one week.

Prof Song responded: better time management

5. A student (me) suggested to arrange assignments and reports due date,especially the core units, so that the due dates are more spread and notcramming in very close dates. At least the core units due dates, because majorityof students from respective intake will be taking the same unit (easier to bemanaged)

6. Immunology students complained that all reports in Sunway is full reports, while inAustralia not all are full reports.

Prof Song responded: would remind the staff about which report is supposed to

be full or half.



7. Students complained that evening class (the ones started at 5pm) also affecting

their study. They come home late to start do things like study or report, etc, due totraffic congestion.

8. Students complained that they are cramped with assignments until week 12 or 13,therefore often cannot start studying for exam earlier.

9. In the lab in Australia, there is more info, especially on why do this in the lab, orwhy use this instrument, therefore students are well informed.

10. Student mentioned about mastering bio was done before lecture, so they haveno idea about the quiz and asked why not it is done after lecture.

Prof Song responded: that it was the purpose of mastering bio to be donebefore class, so that students have the idea of lecture topics in that week.

The issue now is with overloading of works in writing up reports andassignments, hence students have insufficient amount of time to do study thechapter before going into lectures.

11. Students from the course food science and technology felt that the unitrecombinant DNA (BTH2732) was irrelevant to their course.

And others would like more guidance during tutorial. They felt the lecturer justthere going around in the classroom, not giving enough explanation for thestudents on what they have to do, so students often do not know what to doeven though they have the assignment slides.

12. Prof Song answered a question from a student on the purpose of report writing.

Prof Song responded: to write what the student know, want and understandingexperiment result.

However, for some cases, the markers seem to expect the students to giveanswer that are similar or at least close to those in the textbooks. This mentalitydefeats the purpose of doing the experiment.

13. Students asked if the school can change the mark weight for medical microreports so they feel that the hardwork is paid.

Prof Song responded: that it won't happen in this semester, because it isdifficult and the school will need to discuss it first and bring it up to the otherMonash Science school and EAC.

14. Prof Song ended the dialogue with some resolution that he'd try to meet unitcoordinator to arrange report and assignment due dates, asking for feedbacks



from and for the lab demonstrators, and giving more feedbacks for students as

the lab reports are returned.

15. The students lamented the lack of flexibility in choosing units to take everysemester and the way the course is structured is so rigid that they lack the optionof migrating to another major should they decided to quit the current one.

Following the conclusion of dialogue, MUSA is to draw up the report, codename:SciRev360 to be presented to the Dean or Senior Management Team of Faculty ofScience in Clayton campus.

Meeting minutes is prepared by Yinny.

Correspondence of students is edited for length and clarity purposes.

Sample copy of a Science student’s typical workload throughout his/her threeyear course is appended for references.(Refer to Appendices #1 at page 12)



4.0 Follow up

Following many requests, MUSA stepped in for assistance for requesting for internalassessment extensions, especially during Week 11 to Week 13. Below are thecorrespondences:

RE: Follow up for Student Staff Dialogue

Dr. Song Keang Peng

Sent: 13 September 2010 13:19

To: Musa President

Dear Julius

There is no immediate solution to the students’ concern at this moment. As Iexpectation of assignments, dates of submission, or deadline for essay submimessage to our lecturers and request that expectations of the unit have to be

which I have in mind to improve on this, but I can’t disclose in this e-mail.

On a separate issue, as my secretary has indicated to you, the School of Sciethis is the platform for a two-way exchnage of ideas/suggestions to improve oto students. This Committe holds a meeting once every semester with represeAs you can see, this committee already serves the same purpose as the dialoto have both, it should only be one, and since our SSLC invites student represscience student community (rather than those students who only happen to bcommittee. Most of the discussions at the dialogue session has already been

Regards

KP _______________________________ Assoc Prof SONG Keang Peng BDS, PhDHeadSchool of ScienceMONASH UNIVERSITY, Sunway campus

https://webmail2.monash.edu.my/owa/?ae=Item&t=IPM.Note&id=RgAAAACm9QQ4d6HdS5LGpuasTtBBBwAjOhrh2TVERqf8XFr6wtWPADT6JHU8AAAjOhrh2TVERqf8XFr6wtWPAEg2%2f9NrAAAJ







The reply was somewhat disappointing as, from MUSA’s point of view, the staffs of

School of Science in Sunway campus failed to take into consideration of students’

plight. This plight is not by one individual only, rather different batches of students

who are facing the same issue.

From: Musa PresidentSent: Friday, 10 September, 2010 2:00 PMTo: Dr. Song Keang PengSubject: Follow up for Student Staff Dialogue

Dear Sir:

Good day!! Hope this e-mail finds you well.

In following up to the Student-Staff Dialogue for School of Science, may I enquire if

there is any possible solutions for students who have multiple assignments, reports,essays due in the upcoming two-three weeks? As highlighted during the dialogue,most of the students are 'running out of breathing space' for the many tasks on hand.

We hope that the academic staff are understanding and sympathetic towards thestudents, allowing some leniency.

Looking forward to your reply. Have a great weekend ahead!

Warmest Regards,Julius Wong Ling Tze

PresidentMonash University Student Association 2010Monash University Sunway CampusJalan Lagoon SelatanBandar Sunway, Petaling Jaya46150 Selangor Darul EhsanMalaysiaTel: +60 3 5514 6000 ext 61786H/P: +6016 312 3793General E-mail: [email protected]: http://www.musa.monash.edu.my/

ps: Sms me for immediate response. If I do not do so, that means I am being a goodboy, attending lecture or tutorial.

https://webmail2.monash.edu.my/owa/redir.aspx?C=b0e0fae6aa0741dcb34e1514468d9a82&URL=http%3a%2f%2fwww.musa.monash.edu.my%2f

https://webmail2.monash.edu.my/owa/redir.aspx?C=b0e0fae6aa0741dcb34e1514468d9a82&URL=http%3a%2f%2fwww.musa.monash.edu.my%2f



5.0 Conclusion and RecommendationAs an overall conclusion, more proactive steps need to be implemented for current

and future batches of students. As competition in higher education heats up across

over the world, Monash University should be on the forefront of changes in education

sector, equipping students with high critical thinking analytical and skills, not solely

relying on textbooks and current journals.

MUSA hopes that the Faculty of Science in Clayton can work closer with Gippsland

and Sunway campuses to reduce the deviation between the three campuses. The

Senior Management Team should; rather must ensure that the quality of lecture,

tutorials and lab delivery are standardized across the three campuses for the

betterment of all Science students. Moving forward, MUSA will always be the eye-

and-ears for Sunway students.



This report is prepared by Julius Wong, Yinny and Fahad. MUSA would like to thankall parties that are involved in contributing towards this report.

Yours Sincerely:

Julius Wong Ling TzeMUSA President 2010c/o on behalf of Yinny and FahadMonash University Student AssociationMonash University Sunway CampusJalan Lagoon SelatanBandar Sunway46150 Petaling JayaSelangor Darul EhsanMalaysia

Tel: 603-55146000 ext 61796 Fax: 603-55146356E-mail: [email protected]: http://www.musa.monash.edu.my

Monash University Student Association (MUSA):

MUSA was officially launched on 25th January 2000. It is the student organsation,run and owned by students for the benefit of all Monash University Sunway Campusstudents. Governed by the Monash Student Council (MSC), MUSA serves as therecognized means of communication between students and the academic as well asthe administrative authorities of the University.

While all effort is put in to ensure that all information is correct at time of publish, MUSA andany of its committee members shall not be held liable for any form of legal issue andreserves the right to publish or amend any form of publication and correspondence for clarity

and length purposes.



Appendices #1: Sample copy of a Science student’s typical workload throughout his/her three year course

Year 1 Semester 1 Units taken(science)

Workloads (roughly)

BIO1011 2 reports every week1 or 2 assignments (for Bio1011)CHM1011

SCI1020Semester 2 BIO 1022 2 reports every week

CHM1022BTH1802 Video assignment every fortnight.

Year 2 Semester 1 Biochem Almost every week there would be onereport.

One of the reports was on a biggerexperiment (around 4 weeksexperiment), 30pages maximum.

My friend who took it in Clayton was notexpected to write so much and thedemonstrators/lecturer there actuallyprovided worksheet for them.

For some of the reports, all they had todo was just filling up the worksheet andwrite one or half a page of discussion.

Over here in Sunway, the discussionhere sometimes went up to 5 or 6 pagesand yet our marks were lower thanthem.

Genetics We had problem sets to do every week.

In Sunway campus, we get penalized forevery little thing we did wrong.

In Clayton, as long as the studentsattempted the questions. and if there isno major mistake the student will sure toget full marks.. VERY UNFAIR!

Microbiology(MIC 2011)

2 reports for the whole semester..

Physiology(PHY2021)

Worksheet every week…



Year 3 Semester 1 Labmanagement

5 assignments.

MBB 3 reports and 2 assignmentsGen 3030SCI2010 Quite all right.

Semester 2 Med Micro 8 reports for 15% (7 of them were 10% and 1of them was 5%).

Gen3040 3 reports. (Usually no clear instructions were

given on how to do the reports etc)Plant Biotech 3 reports. (Usually no clear instructions were

given on how to do the reports)Env micro Around 6 reports. All were full reports.

Semester 2 Instrumentalanalysis(CHM2741)

8 reports for the whole semester…

All the reports are very long and theyexpected really a lot for discussion.

For some reports, the discussion itselfwas around 5 or 6 pages long..

Cell Met Similar to Biochem

RecombinantDNA

A few assignments. No reports..

Crop science Approximately 5 or 6 reports..

scirev360-revolution in school of science, monash university sunway campus

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