Graduate Success Attributes Reflection
1) What have I learned from this course?
On the first class, for the first agenda, lecturer told us to do a name tag using a piece of paper and put it on the table. The purpose of this activity was for the lecturer to recognize faces and names of the students in the class. Next, the lecturer told us to find a partner and talk to each other about ourselves. My partner’s name is Anika and she is an international student from Bangladesh. She is older than me and I need to speak full in English with her. So, this session trained me to speak in English with an older international student. We also got to know with other students as the lecturer called for some students and told them to introduce their partner in front of the class.
For the second agenda, lecturer told us about the importance of this course. This course is important because it is as requirement, fundamentals for our studies in UTM and also for our future career. The third agenda, the lecturer explained about the course information. The synopsis of this course is, the course aims that the students will understand and apply attribute of UTM graduate skills. This course will guide the student in developing basic skills such as communication, teamwork and leadership, thinking, adaptability, global citizenship, scholarship and enterprising skills. This course will also make the student be well-prepared to face the real challenging world. Students will involve in many activities like individual project or group project in this course.
The lecture also gave us information about the first assignment which was an essay assignment. The lecturer not allow us to do the essay on paper as we must save the environment. We were told to submit it to UTM e-learning portal.
On the second class, we learnt about employability. The lecturer showed us a video from Youtube about job interview. The video was very funny but it has many important things that we must learn from it. There were many people that came to the interview but only one person got accepted for the job. In the video we learnt that attitude is everything. We must be confident with ourselves. We also should not give up on something easily. Even though there is no one that trust or stand up for you, you should trust yourself and believe that you can do anything. With a positive mind, the impossible things can become possible.
We also learnt the top five reasons fresh graduates do not get hired. The reasons are, during interview, they asking for unrealistic salary, poor command of the English language, choosy about the job, poor communication skills and poor character, attitude or personality. There are factors that give an extra advantage for the fresh graduates to get hired such as has held a leader position, has high academic scores, involves in extracurricular activities and also has done volunteer work. Many fresh graduates from local universities lack of soft skills. We learnt about the word employability that means the skills and abilities that allow you to be employed.
In this class, we also discussed about graduates attributes, such as communicating skills, thinking skills, scholarship, team-working skills, adaptability, global citizen and enterprising skills. The lecturer asked some students which one of those skills is the first one we must have. There were various of answers from the students. Then, the lecturer told that, there was no wrong answer. It can be any from those to be the first. I learned that if we mastered up all these skills, we will have a higher chance to get employed.
On our third class, I learned about scholarship skills. It is about information management skills and lifelong learning skills. The first aspect of scholarship is, able to search and manage relevant information from various of sources. Second aspect of scholarship is, able to accept new ideas and capable in doing independent learning. The third aspect of scholarship is, able to expand curiosity and gaining more knowledge. The fourth aspect of scholarship is, able to conduct systematic research. I learned scholarship means good thinker, good researcher, good reader, good writer, good reviewer and also good presenter.
Then, lecturer divided us into 5 groups and told us to choose one topic. The topics are being a successful student, being a good son and daughter, being a responsible citizen, being a good leader, being a good servant of God. My group chose the topic of being a responsible citizen. The lecturer gave us 20 minutes to discuss in group about the topic we chose. All groups must appoint one leader to become the group representative. My group had chosen Chien Li as the group leader. Each group leader came in front and did a forum for 30 minutes. So, each leader spoke for around 5 minutes one by one about their chosen topic. I learned that to be a holistic human, you need to be a person like mentioned in all the topics.
I believe that this world will be a better place if all people being a holistic human. When there are many successful students, they can invent many new good things that will bring goodness in our country. By being a good son or daughter, it can make a whole family live happily. By being a responsible citizen, there will be no fights between all people around the world because we care and respect on each other. By being a good leader, it can make people follow the good actions, can lead and do a project together easily without facing many problems. Being a good servant of God is the first important for me. All religions teach us to be a good person. So, if all people are good servants to their God, there will be no people do evil things. We must cooperate in doing good things so that we can live happily and calmly in this world.
On the fourth class, I learned about communication skills. The first activity was forming groups assignment. Lecturer was the one who decided our group members. After that, lecturer gave us a short lecture about communicating skills. Communications skills involves in presentation, oration, debate, forum, teaching, job, interview, article, writing and also Facebook, Twitter or Whatsapp update.
The activity for that day was oration. All students must be talking in front of the class for 2 or 3 minutes. We got to choose the topic that we want to talk. The lecturer gave us 2 minutes to plan for speaking. I quickly searched anything topics on the internet. After the 2 minutes ended, the lecturer called for the first name by looking to the list names. I was really glad that I was not the first one to speak so that I still have time to plan my speak. All the called names were good at speaking and it made me more nervous. Not more than half students excluded me got to speak in front on that day as time was not enough. There were some students who spoke more than 3 minutes until it took other students time.
This taught me that time is precious. Even though it is just a second, we should not waste our time, it can make the things not work as well as we planned. The other students will continue the oration on the other week. From this activity, I learned that we should confident and calm when speaking in front of many people so that we can deliver our talk fluently. There are some tips of effective communication. One of the tips is, fluent does not mean fast, we should talk calmly so that we can think about the words we want to use before we speak. Next, we should master the specific language such as English so that we use the correct words when we speak in front. What’s more, we should really know about the topic that we want to talk. We should be able to think fast and our voice must be clear but that does not mean we should be so loud when we talk.
Communication skills is the important thing when we go for an interview. If we can speak nicely during the interview, the interviewer would make us pass our interview. We can predict someone attitude by focusing on how they speak. That is the reason the communication skill is important for everyone especially for fresh graduates who wanted to find a job.
(2) How will I advance my learning for the next part of the semester?
I will advance my learning for the next part of the semester by speaking in English to many people to practice my communication skills. I can do this by taking part in any activities that have in UTM. When I communicate with many people, I can higher up my confidence when I am talking. It can make me stay calm when speak in front of people. When I join activities that involves group, it can practice my teamwork skills with the group members. When I become a group leader, I can practice to be a good leader.
(3) What challenges have I faced and how will I solve them?
The challenges that I have faced were communicate with group members that are international students and teamwork problem in group assignment. For the first challenge, this was my first time on having group members from other countries. It is hard for me to speak with them in full English because I rarely speak English when I am with my friends. Sometimes, it was hard for me to find the exact word to use when talking to them so that they can understand what I was saying. The solution is, I downloaded an application which is e-dictionary. Thus, when I do not know the words in English, I quickly search it in the e-dictionary. Sometimes, I also ask my Malaysian group member for the English words. For the second challenge, when our group wanted to do discussion for the group assignment, there were always one or two of our group members cannot attend. It happens every time we wanted to do the group discussion. It stressed me because we cannot finish our assignment quick. When there were only two of us from a group of four members, it was hard for us to find ideas and solutions for our assignment. To solve this problem, I asked them their free time and we make plan on when we will have the group discussion and free my time on their free time. Everyone must be tolerate on each other so that we can do the assignment easier without having any fights.