On 15 September 2021, the day of UPU's results come out, I was excited to check which University and courses I got online. Before the result, I had guessed that maybe I do not have the opportunity to enter a research university in Malaysia but it was surprising to me that I can get UTM to continue my tertiary studies. I had checked that I get the Bachelor of Science (Industrial Biology) with honours in UTM Johor Bahru.
10 Oct 2021, the first day to enter University life but it was in front of computers. It is disappointing to me because I cannot enter the UTM JB campus on that day since the Pandemic Covid-19 was spread out at that time. Between 10 to 14 Oct, it was the welcome event special for new students entering UTM called Minggu Mesra Mahasiswa (MMM). It was the right time for us to cognate about the university such as background, management, rules and regulation, facilities, hostels, faculty and our courses. Not only that, but MMM also provided funny entertainment events to us such as singing, dancing, drama and drawing. Although MMM was conducted online I still feel that UTM spend much time in the preparation for us rather than boring or simply perfunctory to us.
16 Oct 2021, semester 1 lecturers class begin as well as MMM, the whole semester 1 lecturer were conducted online as well as a final examination. Hence, my semester 1 university life was staying at home and sitting in front of a computer for every lecturer's class. However, the lecturers were trying their best to conduct the class more interesting and funny for us although we cannot see each face of each other. There were also some obstacles in online classes which difficult to know the coursemates because mostly in class, the camera was turned off, only knew the name of each other. Also, the internet connection leads to problems of communication in class bet00aaween lecture and students. Since everybody stayed in different states, it was difficult to make communication and decision easily when doing the group assignments because everyone was shy to talk to each other on the online platform. However, there are many challenges during online platforms but I have still enjoyed my first university life although we cannot meet the coursemates each other. Also, I got good results in my Sem 1 studies which I got a GPA of 3.75.
Not only academics, but I also joined some club activities in UTM and took part in some talks or speeches that gave beneficial to me. The clubs that I joined in this semester included Mandarin Club, BIOMEHS and SVO. Due to online obstacles, there were no events in SVO since this club requires musical instruments from the university. In Mandarin Club and BIOMEHS, I learnt some soft skills for improvement to me such as making posters, leadership skills and managing events. For the talks, I had taken part in some talks organised by Faculty Science, hostels and other sponsorship which can give the knowledge to me for my future such as resume, financial, computing and research programmes.