I recently took part in a market research focus group for Pearson Education, a publisher of text books. They have decided to take education back to the basics and try to ensure that all students have access to textbooks, as we all know that no-one actually buys them anymore.
www.pearsonreader.com is their new 'library' where you can log in and view all the books in your personal library.
Essentially it is the textbook online. Its a hell of a lot easier to read, and means I don't have to spend 140 on a text book I will open probably twice.
The thinking behind the idea is fantastic, the only issue they will face is convincing the University to pay for all the students ... which isn't gonna happen, not at Monash at least.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The social side of clubs
Everyone seems to mess up the name, but it is the MMSS, Monash Marketing Student Society.
I will start by saying that I will no longer 'officially' be part of the club next year as being the real gen Y that I am, I followed the money and will be working for the student union next year.
At the end of my first year of uni I was studing for exams with a group of people of which i was only friends with probably one or 2. One of them was going to be the social director for the MMSS the following year and asked if we wanted to be on the sub-committee next year.
My initial reaction was one of "pft who the hell wants to be part of a crappy uni club" then about a second later i volunteered to do so.
Thus the process of getting involved was complete. The next stage was actually doing things for the committee, I learnt extremely quickly that it was basically a big family up there. Everyone wanted to help everyone with not just MMSS related happenings, but also with assignments and study and etc, everyone was extremely happy to help out.
That is the first part about why Uni clubs are so great. The simple social aspect of them makes it essential for everyone to try and get involved. The number of friends I made through MMSS has been amazing, and not just those directly involved, but meeting the friends of those in the committee, and the group just grows and grows.
I will start by saying that I will no longer 'officially' be part of the club next year as being the real gen Y that I am, I followed the money and will be working for the student union next year.
At the end of my first year of uni I was studing for exams with a group of people of which i was only friends with probably one or 2. One of them was going to be the social director for the MMSS the following year and asked if we wanted to be on the sub-committee next year.
My initial reaction was one of "pft who the hell wants to be part of a crappy uni club" then about a second later i volunteered to do so.
Thus the process of getting involved was complete. The next stage was actually doing things for the committee, I learnt extremely quickly that it was basically a big family up there. Everyone wanted to help everyone with not just MMSS related happenings, but also with assignments and study and etc, everyone was extremely happy to help out.
That is the first part about why Uni clubs are so great. The simple social aspect of them makes it essential for everyone to try and get involved. The number of friends I made through MMSS has been amazing, and not just those directly involved, but meeting the friends of those in the committee, and the group just grows and grows.
Friday, August 28, 2009
Something I like about Uni
Alright, so a lot/most of my recent posts have been about how much I hate the way university's work and etc.
One thing I must say I do like is something which I have taken control of myself, and that is uni clubs.
For the past 2 years I have been apart of the MMSS, the Monash Marketing Student Society, and it has been probably the best thing I could be doing to seperate myself from other students who will all have higher grades than me.
The next few posts, will be a bit of information about what the MMSS is, what I have done in the past 2 years and why it is the best club at Monash University.
One thing I must say I do like is something which I have taken control of myself, and that is uni clubs.
For the past 2 years I have been apart of the MMSS, the Monash Marketing Student Society, and it has been probably the best thing I could be doing to seperate myself from other students who will all have higher grades than me.
The next few posts, will be a bit of information about what the MMSS is, what I have done in the past 2 years and why it is the best club at Monash University.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
I'm a crammer ... what ya gonna do about it?
Studying for exams is probably the biggest waste of time for me right now. I have a project I want to start working on, I have about 10 grand I need to save by January (not gonna happen) and there is plenty of TV I need to catch up on.
Why then, over the past few days have I been cramming like crazy for exams? Because I need to pass them to get my degree.
BUT in the long run what will this cramming do? absolutely nothing. Everything 'important' in the subject has already stuck from tutorials and lectures, and all the little things that I need to cram in my brain will be forgotten about 2 hours after I walk out of that exam, talk to everyone about how stupid the questions were, and start cramming for my exam on Friday.
My parents are always telling me (well mostly my Mum because she seems to care about my uni grades) that back when she was in Uni she was studying for exams like a month in advance learning everything. Today cramming is a skill, and going back to my tests in year 7, the night before was always spent thinking about how screwed I am for the test, and then always pulling through with pretty decent scores.
Anywho I should probably get back to cramming for this Sports Marketing exam tomorrow morning. Wish me luck.
Why then, over the past few days have I been cramming like crazy for exams? Because I need to pass them to get my degree.
BUT in the long run what will this cramming do? absolutely nothing. Everything 'important' in the subject has already stuck from tutorials and lectures, and all the little things that I need to cram in my brain will be forgotten about 2 hours after I walk out of that exam, talk to everyone about how stupid the questions were, and start cramming for my exam on Friday.
My parents are always telling me (well mostly my Mum because she seems to care about my uni grades) that back when she was in Uni she was studying for exams like a month in advance learning everything. Today cramming is a skill, and going back to my tests in year 7, the night before was always spent thinking about how screwed I am for the test, and then always pulling through with pretty decent scores.
Anywho I should probably get back to cramming for this Sports Marketing exam tomorrow morning. Wish me luck.
Monday, June 8, 2009
That time of year again
With exams coming up, expect to see a couple more posts from me as I procrastinate like only Uni students know how!
Exams are another thing which annoy me in relation to Uni. Now I know that it is important in the academic world and exams are an easy way to mark where people are at and blah blah blah, but realistically they are quite crap.
This semester I have only received 1 credit, and that was for a group presentation, which we got told afterwards, if we had of mentioned the name of one of the particular references we used, it would have got us an extra mark, putting us up to a distinction, but that is all beside the point.
I am not a terribly good student, in fact this semester has probably been my worst study/work wise with most of my time and effort going into the Brandstorm competition (which we came equal third in Australia, and I will talk about in another post). BUT I have still managed to receive Distinctions and High Disctinctions for every one of my assessments bar one.
But when it comes down to the exam, I expect to fail at least one of my subjects, because I can't write exams to save myself. Mainly due to the fact that I can't write essays too well, but given the time to do write an essay and actually think about everything I will be perfectly fine.
How does giving students 2 hours, to write as much crap as they can differentiate students all that well?
Thank god that employers don't just look at Uni marks!
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Where I left off ...
Alright, so my first post in a while and after re-reading it a couple of times I realised that in my true style I started off writing/thinking about one thing, then went off on a bit of a tangent and then finished on a different point to both the original and the tangent.
If you ask Zac Martin, who I am working on the L'Oreal Brandstorm competition with, he will tell you that I always jump in at random points and bring something up that we were talking about an hour prior, or even something completely irrlevent to what we are talking about, and might have absolutely nothing to do with anything. Kind of like what I am doing now.
This is probably not a good thing to do with blogging as I suppose each post should have a point, generally speaking, and if I keep up with the way I talk/act, it will mean each post will make absolutely no sense to anyone .. except maybe me, although even that isn't a given.
Already I was going to have a post explaining the main point of my previous one, but instead went off and wrote about how I write ...
Sunday, May 3, 2009
A Students Perspective
As all 3 of you who read this blog are aware, I attend Monash University. I did so because a) I wanted to do a marketing degree, and b) it is one of the top universities in the country.
I would say that 83% of students, if asked what their main motivation is for attending university, would say "to be able to get a better job" or something of the equivalent.
Herein lies the issue with tertiary education in Australia. Students attend Uni because they want to get a better job, yet almost everyone who I have spoken to who has completed their degree and are now working in that field, say that 90% of what they learnt at uni is irrelevant and they haven't used it once. Of course this is quite a big generalisation and extremely broad, as they might be using Maslow's hierarchy (the only thing I can remember from first year Management, but I will get onto that in another post), but will not specifically say as such, they might just be using the theory subconsciously.
Anywho, back on point, students believe that going to univeristy will put them in good stead to get a better job, and whilst that is true, it provides absolutely no training for students to be able to have the job, it simply gives them a piece of paper that says they have managed to get greater then 50% in at least 24 subjects.
Universities on the other hand KNOW that their main priority is not the education, but the research. Therein lies the major issue.
There is a massive difference between what students believe University is about, and what the Uni's think they are about.
I would say that 83% of students, if asked what their main motivation is for attending university, would say "to be able to get a better job" or something of the equivalent.
Herein lies the issue with tertiary education in Australia. Students attend Uni because they want to get a better job, yet almost everyone who I have spoken to who has completed their degree and are now working in that field, say that 90% of what they learnt at uni is irrelevant and they haven't used it once. Of course this is quite a big generalisation and extremely broad, as they might be using Maslow's hierarchy (the only thing I can remember from first year Management, but I will get onto that in another post), but will not specifically say as such, they might just be using the theory subconsciously.
Anywho, back on point, students believe that going to univeristy will put them in good stead to get a better job, and whilst that is true, it provides absolutely no training for students to be able to have the job, it simply gives them a piece of paper that says they have managed to get greater then 50% in at least 24 subjects.
Universities on the other hand KNOW that their main priority is not the education, but the research. Therein lies the major issue.
There is a massive difference between what students believe University is about, and what the Uni's think they are about.
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