About 500 students of Wawasan Open University from the Klang Valley descended upon the Kuala Lumpur Regional Centre (KLRC) over two weekends in March to collect their 1Malaysia Book Vouchers (BB1M).
QUEUING UP TO COLLECT THEIR BOOK VOUCHERS.
The students from KLRC and its three support centres – Bandar Utama, Klang and Subang – turned up during the undergraduate and postgraduate tutorial weekends on March 16-17 and March 23-24 respectively, to grab hold of the vouchers.
The University also organised mini workshops on learning tips from 1.30pm-2.30pm in conjunction with the tutorials, with some 50 students attending each of the four workshops.
During the first workshop on March 16, tutor Dheena Dhayala, a private HR consultant, spoke on ‘How to tackle your TMA’. He gave tips and guides on TMA submission to help especially the new students to become acquainted with the dos and don’ts of TMAs and procure good marks on their assignments.
DHEENA SHARES USEFUL LEARNING TIPS.
Dheena, who used to work in a manufacturing company in Johor, highlighted the need to elaborate on their answers in the TMA, even to the extent of doing an own SWOT – strength, weakness, opportunity and threat – analysis on their answers.
His talk was followed by a session on how to use the University’s digital library by KLRC director Nooraini Youp, before ending with a preview of WOU’s Family and Friends (FnF) Programme. She
also showed the students how to insert references and citations using Microsoft Word; this proved to be an eye-opener for many students and will surely come in handy during submission of TMAs.
NOORAINI EXPLAINS ABOUT WOU’S DIGITAL LIBRARY RESOURCES.
On subsequent tutorial days, the workshops were conducted by tutors Perinparajah, a public school administrator; Jonathan Wong Shin Voon, a private university lecturer; and MQA panel member cum lecturer Aw Yoke Cheng.
According to Klang Valley Regional Operations Director Adrian Siew Wai Yen, all these activities “gave us a chance to build rapport with the students and provide them with some value-added services”. He added that this would further help in student retention.
STUDENTS POSE QUESTIONS DURING THE WORKSHOP.
Overall the workshop sessions were well-received by the students, with many of them keen to know when the next session will be held. In view of this, Adrian said that there are plans to have similar workshops during the next and/or the last tutorial weekends, perhaps focusing on “Tips on examination preparation’.
It is envisaged that such sessions will turn KLRC into a hive of activity during tutorial weekends and persuade students to continue to enrol for studies at WOU.
