Transformative Journal by See Zhao Wei (Team A U2003083)

 Before the event:

 

In the beginning, I think that doing the social engagement project is a burden for me. I consider this project as the university assignment as usual and I wish to complete it as soon as possible. However, after having the first meeting with our program supervisor, Dr. Zalfa, I realize that she expects us to do something not just for the sake of doing it, but we must give the impact to the society. Although she keeps encouraging us at first, in my mind, I still don’t want to give full cooperation and I wish to find a shortcut to complete this project.

 

Everything changes when I start doing preparation with my teammates. At first, I discuss with my teammates and encourage them to do a simple project like 1-hour seminar. They agree with me at the beginning but after listening to the consultation from Dr. Zalfa, we found that we actually cannot give any influences and really engage with our participants in only 1 hour. Dr. Zalfa quickly understands and knows that we all just want to complete the project faster. So, she gives us advice patiently and tells us the importance of doing this project. I can still remember she told us that “ we are representing Universiti Malaya and we should do something that can really show our professionalism and beneficial to our society.”

 

My mind starts changing after having the consultation session with Dr. Zalfa. I feel a bit shame about myself because I only want to complete the project casually. After that, I step into the shoe of participants and think about what students may want to know after graduating from secondary school. Starting from that time, my teammates and I put more effort to do the research on the topics that we would like to share. I begin to spend more time having the meetings and discuss the project with my teammates. I become more responsible and take seriously to the project at that moment.

 

I volunteer myself to find the content for the sharing session and I found that I have changed as compared to the beginning. When preparing the contents, though there are some tasks that are not my part, I also help my teammates to complete them. I learn how to work in a team and how to be a good leader during the preparation. Also, I learn from my teammates, Rosshinie, who always support and help us to do the extra tasks behind us. She never complains and she always gives useful suggestions to us. I really appreciate her and also all my teammates.

 

 

During the event:

 

First and foremost, I learned that it is not easy to conduct an event virtually as we hardly catch the attention of our participants. Therefore, after having the trial run with Dr. Zalfa, I know that it is important to improve our visual aids. I start amending my design of the presentation slides so that it looks more interesting. Though I am not an expert to prepare presentation slides, I adapt myself to learn how to do it with my teammates.

 

Besides, on the event day, I also improve my communication skills as a presenter. Though I have enhanced my English communication skills when doing the presentation in class, I found that it is totally different from what we have done in class. As a presenter, I have to use energetic yet understandable language to ensure the participants can really engage with me throughout the whole event.

 

I feel pleasant because our participants actually pay full attention in each session. During the Kahoot session, most participants manage to answer the questions correctly and they manage to show their understanding after listening to us. In addition, our participants also manage to learn the reality of learning to account and working as an accountant. They also show their enthusiasm during the Q&A session by asking us a lot of questions.

 

In fact, I have learned a lot from the participants. Though they are just secondary students, they really respect our event and give full cooperation in this event. To be honest, I always not pay attention to online seminars especially when the seminar is free. I know that I should be grateful and give full commitment to the online activity just like them.

 

Last but not least, I also learn how to handle technical issues in an online meeting platform. We actually face the difficulty to change the background and record the meeting in Google Meet before the event day. After we spend time and search on the internet, we finally find the solutions to solve this issue. 

 

 

After the event:

 

After completing this seminar, I found that participants give us very nice feedback. I even feel proud of myself after conducting this event. Therefore, I would like to take this opportunity to thanks Dr. Zalfa for spending your weekends and holidays to teach and guide us to conduct the event better. I also want to thank Dr. Noor Adwa for accepting our invitation to be the guest speaker in this seminar. I also appreciate my teammates who always trust me and give me their full support throughout the event. Not to forget all my coursemates, I feel lucky to meet you all and know each other in this course. I hope I could always stay connected with you in the future. Goodbye, everyone.