Again, I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the pictures in Jeff Ooi's and Kit Siang's blogs. I thought that 'pasting' over last year's results were bad enough. This is going overboard. The UM VC must have worked his printers overtime to create these posters in a relatively short time. Maybe he should take out a few full page advertisements in the Star, the NST, Utusan and Berita Harian, publicizing the latest UM 'achievements'. How about using these posters as adverts on the KL buses as well as on the LRTs? Maybe even create an air ballon with these posters?
This only gives us more impetus to keep up the pressure on this guy who is obviously fighting for his survival and will resort to any and all short term tactics instead of planning for real reforms and improvement over the medium and long term.
13 comments:
While the VC is happy with his "achievement", I'm sad because I'm studying in UM which is filled with racism and favouritism.
The Dean from the faculty of education and some of the lecturers from the Science & Mathematics and Management departments are known for their biasness when it comes to grading. However the Indian and Chinese students always keep this problem to themselves to avoid problems that might jeopardise their future in this university. More and more good lecturers are leaving the university. We are left with incompetent lecturers who spent most of their time hanging out, drinking and smoking at the cafe. I believe favouritism exists in the faculty of education because the head of educational management department is only a master graduate. He is not well-versed in English but have lecturers who are phd graduates reporting under him.
With the studying environment I'm in, I doubt UM is worth the position they are having right now.
Hopeless
For a Vice Chancellor who insists that all rooms in the University buildings have his portrait displayed along with the Agong and PM, this wanton display of his university's "success" is a negligible matter. would you believe that more than half a million ringgit have been spent on such vulgar display of UM's 'achievements'? In addition,he gets political mileage by putting up the pictures of the PM, DPM and Shafie 'aka clueless about varsity' Salleh in prominent places within UM. I wonder if the terminology of 'thick skinned' exists in their dictionaries.
Time for action, bombard emails and call them non stop as complaints. They are just asking for it.
Since after Prof Diraja Ungku Aziz been "kick" out form UM, UM become more into making name rather than produce intelligent.
Azlan
Isn't the act of blowing your own trumpet and licking the a.. of your political masters a political act and hence contravening the UCCA?
I thought everyone in the university are not suppose to be "taking part in any political activities" and that includes what they are doing now?
I'm sadden by the fact that our former "premier" institution of higher learning has to stoop so low as to this and it no longer raise any eyebrows nowadays nor surprise anyone who has been following the education system here.
Its clear that the VC does not give a damn about anyone's opinion except his and his political master. He knows his political master wants him to have dictatorial control over the student body regardless of the consequences including education standards. Its why this issue need to be brought up no less than the PM otherwise, its a spit in the face of everyone else.
Perhaps, he is happy because this year UM managed to be in top 200 in overall ranking, after he found out that UM was never suppose to be 89 last year? Come to think about it, THES's calculation last year in doubtful, or it is UM whom give the wrong informations, regarding non-bumi Malaysians as foreigners. Malaysia s***s, that's why more and more Malaysians are leaving their own country, leaving it to rot.
At first i think that i make a bad choice for going NUS, because i was accepted into UM as well. I really thought both of them are equally high standard at that time. But now, i am glad i was here, at NUS. I am damn sure i will rot if i keep staying there!
This has become an issue of national concern due to the attitude of the VC. Malaysian have been incredible tolerant of the lowering of quality of education for decades and now the VC spits in the face of those who are concern - all the parents who sacrificed for the children education and the children who slogged hard to better them selves.
This VC should have gone with Dr. M in Zimbabwe. They would get a long even better given their similarity.
Stop talking about Ungku Aziz as if he was the person who maintained the high standard of UM in yesteryears. In fact the rot started in mid 1970s during his tenure as VC, when Pusat Asasi Sains was set up and when SLAB (Skim Latihan Akademik Bumiputra) was enforced. Both schemes, in principle and if carried out stringently, are good for the nation to balance the imbalance. However, they were badly implemented by the offer of places and positions to many undeserving and poor candidates – leading to the current state of free-dropping to the bottom situation.
It was lucky for Ungku Aziz the drop in standard was not so obvious then because there was a reasonable pool of performers among the staff members in the 1970s and 1980s (employed in the 1960s and early 1970s when students and staff members were taken in largely based on performance). This gave the false thinking that academic standard or excellence can be maintained although the yardstick of employment has been lowered and compromised.
However, by early and mid 1980s, the sign of decay, academic incompetence, and lowering of academic standard began to surface and has since continued unabated. The floodgate of decline was wide open since mid 1970s! Any simpleton would know this, at the very outset, as a natural conclusion! You don’t need to engage a foreign consultant or to set up a royal commission to tell you this. What do you expect when competent staff members began to leave UM or retire from UM, and when young mediocre staff members under SLAB (some with poor undergraduate records; unable to complete their PhD after spending 4 to 5 or more years overseas; with no idea, vision, and passion about teaching, research, and administration; and active not in research but in UMNO politics) began to be appointed as heads, deans, and deputy vice chancellors? A world class university? I won’t even say ‘Dream on’ or ‘What a joke’.
Just look at UM’s recent record of academic failures – even from Ungku Aziz’s time. One example that stood out like a sore thumb – the Institute of Advanced Studies established in the early 1980s. A brilliant idea that started with a bang and, after almost 25 years, is now totally irrelevant and still at ground zero, instead of flourishing and blossoming. What a bleeding waste of our tax money!
After Ungku Aziz, Syed Hussein Alatas tried to change the biased system to be slightly fair to all Malaysians employed at UM. He had a better sense of fair play than Ungku Aziz. He righted some injustices practiced by Ungku Aziz and tried to introduce academic honesty before academic excellence. All of us know the current VC of UM has a long-lasting memory of Syed Hussein Alatas. Fate was kind to Hashim Yaacob when Alatas relinquished the VC post.
I wonder how our students in Uni would do if forced to that something like a standard graduate test like GRE, GMAT, MCAT, LSAT, TWE.
Don't assume that UM students are not bright enough to sit for test like GMAT and MCAT. For your information, a MBA student is required to sit for GMAT and pass before he is accepted into UM. Btw, the students in UM are among the best in Malaysia.
The problem is the poor management.
I just wonder, if he says that THES ranking is not accurate, why is he so happy about the "achievements" in the 3 categories? Isn't he contradicting himself over and over again? First by denying that last year's UM ranking had been due to "wrong" calculations. Then that the way THES compile the data is unfair to Asian universities, and finally he celebrate the "achievements".
What the hell in the world is he doing? Or he has never been to Disneyland all his life and trying to make one here, in UM? Or he is trying to misguide the public, and more importantly, the students themselves? It seems to me that UMers are indeed proud of their achievements, while their counterparts, i mean their peers outstation are secretly laughing at their attitudes for being utterly ignorant. And what has our PM done so far? Is he too busy trying to get the attentions of African countries, till he does not have time to pay at least some attentions to our local education crisis? Or, no one has been informing him of what has happenned? Or he secretly supports and are behind all this? Gosh, i dont dare to think further.....
malaysians are all very proud ppl. i for one am very proud of my country. but i guess we sometimes get so blinded and we tend to defend blindly every comment that is thrown at us. come on UM. time to wake up and do the right thing. i am sure we have the talent in our students to beat NUS. UM have a longer history and had a stronger academic record. time for UM to revaluate thier administration and strategy before we have to suffer another round of disgrace.
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