GIG1005
Jalinan Masyarakat (Social Engagement)
Reflective
Writing
Teh
Chen Fang (MIC170047) Date: 6 May 2018
Social Engagement is a compulsory course that should be taken by
all the students during their years of study in University of Malaya in order
for them to earn the essential credit hours for them to graduate. Back in
semester 1, our course coordinator, Dr Puah has had a meeting with all of us
and brief us about the contents, outcomes and objective of the course. First
thing that came to my mind when I first entered my social engagement class was,
we are going to have volunteering activities in either old folk home or
orphanages. But things don’t turn out that way. This year Dr Puah required us
to carry out activities which will give long term impact. This made our life
difficult as we have to think of some other activity rather than the usual one
such as “gotong-royong” and organizing a charity run.
In our first meeting, we have selected our project director and
set up our organization chart. Everyone is divided into their respective
departments. After some discussion in the first meeting, we have also decided
to visit kampong orang asli. The first problem that we faced is which kampong
orang asli should we visit. We have suggested a few kampong that are located
near to UM so that it is easier for us to go there. In all the following meetings,
each department were able to provide updates on what they had done in the past
one week. For example, marketing department had come out with a marketing
proposal to raise fund for our project. As for my department (publicity and
multech department), our team took a lot of photos throughout the preparation
phase for documentation purpose.
On 25th of March 2018, some of us went to Kampong
Orang Asli Bukit Lanjan to set up a booth during their Sunday Market to promote
about our event. From 9am to 12:30pm, our team were able to get 53 school-aged
children to participate in the games. They also distributed flyers and door gifts
to the people there. On 6th of April 2018 (Friday), we held a car
wash activity at carpark of faculty of medicine from 6:30am-10.30am to raise
fund for our project. We managed to raise quite a large amount of money through
our hard work. A special thanks to those who supported us. Car wash is
extremely tiring because we are required to wake up early in the morning but at
the same time, it helps us to improve our teamwork and foster our bond. One day
before the event, we had a test run for explore race and science experiment
which was handled by programme and activity department with the rest of us
being the participants. Not only that, we also helped to wrap the hampers for
the lucky draw and explore race winners.
The day has finally arrived. We gathered at kk1 bus stop at
7:15am. Then, we departed to our destination by bus. Once we reached there,
everyone is divided into facilitator, food and beverages, gotong-royong and
technical team. Choo who was our head of programme and activity department
started to brief all the facilitators. On the other side, the food and
beverages team begins to prepare and set up a place for them to do sardine and
egg-mayo sandwiches for lunch. At the same time, the technical team were busy
taking photos of the surroundings and setting up PA system. We started the day
with Zumba session lead by the law students. Next, we had breakfast (bread) at
the canteen. Then, we proceeded to explore race and gotong royong. I was
assigned to take photos during explore race. Therefore, I was running to and
fro all the 4 checkpoints, taking photos of them playing the station games. Not
only that, I also took videos asking opinions of the kids about the explore race.
After the explore race, everyone is exhausted. Thus, we took a rest and had our
lunch. Fast forward to the closing ceremony, I was given the opportunity to handle
the PA system. For instance, I played music for the VIP entrance, lucky draw
session and etc. We were tired but still keeping our smiles on our face.
After this programme, I have learned and gained a lot of new
experience. The times I spent with the kids taught me
to be grateful with the privileges l had and are still given until today. I hope that after our visit, the kids will realise the
importance of education in today’s world. In conclusion, I would like to thank
Dr. Puah, our Social Engagement course coordinator for giving us a chance to
involve in this meaningful and enjoyable project. I think that Social
Engagement course is beneficial to the society and thus should be encouraged
among all the university students in Malaysia so that students will be more
exposed to the society.
(807 words)
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