ConfessionS Of A SleePlesS MinD

Media writing class

Yesterday, we had our last Media Writing class. Basically,for the module, the class forms an editorial team and comes up with an online newsletter. You send in your resume at the start of the semester for the position you want and the tutor will decide which role you play. (There were 4 managerial positions in the committee up for grabs) I didn't get the managerial positon I wanted, ended up as a staff writer (a worker bee), sucks. The leader was to lead the class in the creation of this online newsletter.

The leader sets the tone of the class. In my opinion, our leader failed miserably in leading the class. For the entire semester, she chose to keep quiet during lessons and left the all the making of announcements to her assistant. I don't understand why she and her assistant don't like to communicate information with the class face-to-face. She always choose to communicate things through emails. The only thing she and her assistant say in class is "Okay guys, I will send out an email to you telling about ..."

Every single week, most of the 2 hour tutorial proceeds in silence. Normally, the tutor is involved only in the first 30 minutes of tutorial. After that, she passes the time to the leader and the class to coordinate their newsletter efforts. When the tutor passes the time over, the leader doesn't do mucn and everyone is just doing their own thing on their computer monitors. There is hardly any interaction among the class. I don't understand why all the other committee members don't speak to the class and choose to follow her system of sending emails and yahoo messages. The end of the semester is approaching and still I do not know the name of my classmates. Everything is left to be done through yahoo group messages and email. There's 2 f**king hours of tutorial time. Can't you just address the class face to face? She even had the cheek to lie through her teeth, telling the entire lecture group that our class works well as a team. (Leaders had to report the class progress to the lecture group) Bullshit! I guess as a person, she's nice. But as a leader, she sucks big time.

I was so bored in class yesterday. It was silent and everyone was clicking away at their own monitors. I have no idea what they're so busy with. I had nothing to do. I just sat there in my revolving chair, spinning left to right, acting like an idiot and annoying the people around me.

When I see the bonding in the other classes, I feel sick with my own class. They know each other by name, they work together, they make decisions togther, they basically have a good time in class. For me, media writing class is a torture. Cold, silent, undermined. Nobody cares about nobody. Just sit there on your cold ass, we'll email you shortly. Screwed up yahoo message communication- always cause miscommunication and unclear directions.

All media writing tutorial groups are to come up with their newsletter by end of this week. The newsletters will all be sent in for some competition, and a winner will be chosen among the tutorial groups. Good luck to us in WINNING. I'm sure most of the class don't even know what the final product looks like.

Yesterday, we were told by our tutor that we had all screwed up our news release. There was some misunderstanding and miscommunication between the tutor and the assistant leader. To cut to the chase, the assistant leader gave us instructions on what to write for our news release, but it wasn't what the tutor wanted. So the entire class has to rewrite the news release. The assistant leader was apolegetic and quickly sent out an yahoo message to apologise. (yahoo message again). Then people started to reply to him, consoling him that it was alright, no harm done and blah... I don't blame him also, small matter. But I just have this feeling that some of the consolation given by my classmates are fake. There's a class peer evaluation that we have to submit soon. I can't help but think that some of them are consoling the guy for the sake of scoring points for their evaluation. Maybe I'm just being "small-heart-eye", but the possibility is there. I hope they're sincere in consoling him and not being hyprocrital to score points.

Look what higher education has turn some of us into- f**king hypocrites who are slaves to our grades. This is what we're made to become. Is this what we pride as higher learning? Stupid us. We think we're highly educated undergradutes with a high social standing. But we're actually soul-less beings undergoing higher training to be slaves to society and, in the process, giving up the important parts that make us human.

posted by KERMIT @ 2:48 AM