By: Areez
In a world where
information is particularly free to everyone whom has access to the internet,
most educational institutions have taken upon themselves into creating multiple
platforms for their students to interact with. For SEGI University, the platform
that has been created is called E-Resources or LMS and that students from all
majors in SEGI are encouraged to use it to aid them in their academic pursuit.
But surprisingly most of the students here are unaware of its benefits as well
as purpose. Chow, an engineering student said he didn’t even know about E-Resources
until #Hashtag team approached him. At the same time, though the platform E-Resources
had been free since its creation- SEGI management has decided as of middle 2012
to implement a new fee structure for the service. Of which, when asked most
students are still unsure on the criterion of the new fee implementation for E-Resources.
Sasa, an ADP student said, “I don’t even know how much I have to pay for it.
But I know they are deducting a certain amount from my PTPTN allowance every
month”.
Conversely, students
from the medical faculty are making full use of the E-Resources as they are
able to find vast number of medical journals and books for free. Fatima, a
medical student from U.A.E said that “I use it often to find for journals and
it’s very helpful for students like me and my friends as the medical books are
quite expensive if you are going to purchase it”. Moreover it is learned that
medicals students are required to access the site to summit assignment once a
month, told Amirah (another medical students) to the #Hashtag team. But for
other faculty’s, the students from there have voiced out strongly to their
lecturers that E-Resource services are incompetent as they could not even find
journals that they are looking for. “Almost all the time I get frustrated when
I use the search engines on E-Resource to find for journals; because they don’t
have much collection”, told Nadia a student from the American Degree Program.
She also pointed out that the site always lags when you want to access it.
To pursue this further,
our own #Hashtag personal went to see Ms. Samantha; the coordinator that is in
charge in handling student affairs among ADP students and here is what she has
to say in an interview we had with her:
#Hashtag: So, who
decided to charge the use for the LMS?
Ms. Sam: Well to say
frankly, it all started through management and CSS (Consortium Support
Services), they decided to charge SEGI students for their service on the LMS
usage and that it’s not just ADP, but rather for the whole student body in
every other course.
#Hashtag: Do you know
why?
Ms. Sam: Well to be
honest, I cannot fully disclose that particular subject but what I can say is
that it’s for the improvement of their service towards the increase data in
their archive as well as other improvement on the user interference.
#Hashtag: So can I ask,
what’s your personal take on this action done by SEGI’s management?
Ms. Sam: In all
honesty, it’s not a mystery why they are charging this service, but rather I’m
just curious why they did so this late in its life span, I really see the LMS
as a helpful tool for every student in SEGI. To say in short, student can now
find more information on their course subject as well as having a platform to
interact with their lecturers and University’s events. One of the interactions
I hope lecturers would start to use is the online classroom, the facilities are
there, and it’s just whether they decided to use it or not.
#Hashtag: People have
voice out on the lack of information regarding the new fee structure; do you
have any take on that?
Ms. Sam: Hmm, about
that, I do understand that there was a bit of confusion in the early part of
the introduction, but beginning this year a new structure will be initiated to
help students understand better.
#Hashtag: What is this
initiation you’re talking about?
Ms. Sam: Well, though the old student
representative has graduated, we plan to inform our student body after a new
representative has been sworn that the older intake student before 2013 will
get their money refunded, and that student who intake are after 2013 will only
need to pay for this service.
#Hashtag: Can you
explain more on this matter?
Ms. Sam: Well, in brief,
the fee will now be recorded on the contract when you first register into SEGI,
and that the fee structure of it will be in place inside the facility fee in
your financial payment.
#Hashtag: So you said
something about refunds for the old students, can you elaborate?
Ms. Sam: About that, well
the money that students have paid during that period will be refunded back into
their student account- meaning to say that it will be converted into your
payment fees towards SEGI.
#Hashtag: What if
someone were to ask for cash rebate, how does that work?
Ms. Sam: For that, you
have to submit a request form to the bursary and that it will usually take a
couple of days for them to process- but surely enough, you can get your money
back.
#Hashtag: Ok, I think
that would be it, thank you so much for your time.
Ms. Sam: Your welcome,
please drop by if you have anything else to ask.
END
Transcript
In any event, though
SEGI E-Resources have been shunned upon by some part of its students, saying
that the older version of E-Resources is pretty much the same as the upgraded
version. It is still considered as an innovative platform to interact with by
the rest. With its unique structure to let student communicate with their
lecturers to the vast archives that holds countless of information on research topic, SEGI E-Resources is still an interesting
platform that helps its student to further their pursuit for knowledge. It’s
just a matter of perspective that leads to the multiple outlooks that students
of SEGI have on its student portal E-Resources.
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