VI a national heritage @ 14/2/09 ; better late than never

I got a news recently about VI building being declared as a national heritage among other institutions from the facebook network. I was thinking in the back of my mind about which building they haven’t declared as one yet. Wasn’t the signboard which was still erected next to VIOBA building, last I remembered, states that VI’s a national heritage ’site’ ?

Then again, VI being synonymous with excellence, used to, would appreciate having another feather added to the cap. Perhaps with the certification, the building itself could finally be preserved from mindless and unsensible hacking, defacement and vandalism. And perhaps another thing for VI to boast about its great heritage sans scholar/sportsman/gentlemen/lady, also last I remembered.

Well at least there’s still enterprising Victorians around, nice move for this Victorian who came up the idea to selling dedication buntings and banners to fellow Victorians. Not sure bout his pricings, but at least its a novelty way to earn decent $$$ for him.

Spotted this around the facebook network, a 2009 victorians blog? Well give it a look and offer them some support.

http://viclassof2009.blogspot.com/2009/01/victoria-institution-announced-national.html

Good luck with the blog Megat Aizat Jamil.

The Un-Apprentice

Unlike the apprentice, candidates from all around America are being shortlisted down to a group of ppl for a series of elimination with the final one standing being appointed as Trump’s apprentice; allow me to introduce The Un-Apprentice, my version of getting associates to join in as fellow writers. I would love to kick things up a notch for this blog by tagging in more victorians to speak and share.

Avoid negative perceptions

Datuk Seri Rafidah Aziz said that delays in decision-making could give rise to perceptions among the public of corruption in the civil service.

Looking back those days when the school admin delaying on approving our proposal letters, I thought they were just plain lazy or incompetent decision makers. Soon after I left VI, rumours were spread about corruption in the school admin. The rumours were also ‘confirmed’ when people claims that police report had been lodged, and an ‘incident’ did occur regarding the mismanagement of the PTA funds by the school admin. Unfortunately I could not substantiate the above statements as I can’t seem to find any news articles to support the above claims.

Rumours aside however, I did notice that the people around VI were aware of such incidence, and their response hinted me that such incidence did occur. VIOBA representative expressing doubt over the school’s transparency, students and parents being careful about their monetary dealings with the school, and a teacher’s own inclination towards not dealing with the school when money are involved.

Really, in this new age, transparency is really important.

The new age VI ?

VI used to boast of capable student leaders. Students given the freehand to decide their own future and chart their own course in extra-curricular activities. Student themselves would be making the preparations, running the shows, carrying the responsibilities.

However, society really has changed, gone were those days. Activities carried in VI must now be accompanied by a school teacher. Parents would be required to sign letters discharging the liabilities of the school of the well being of their children. The school no longer wants to be blamed for things that happened to its students. Teachers were assigned instead, yet teachers also slacken in dutifully watch over the students when they have their activities. Honestly, they shouldn’t be blamed, they get paid peanuts and weren’t being paid to look after the students during their extra curricular activities.

The Negotiation

I’ve had a discussion with some boys today and they were complaining about things the school orders them to do, that their reasonings and arguments were not just being given a thought but being retaliated with threats of losing school colour entitlements.

I showed them pity for a split second. I had some other thing in mind. I challenged them to try solve the issues with me playing the role of the school administrator (admin). The following is the write up of what probably took place:

Admin wants them to do something.

They refuse, giving some lame excuses as an argument. They probably deserved a slap or two. There they are in front of the admin whose time’s is very important, giving lame excuses without even thinking it throughly as if words comes out from anywhere else except the brain. If they don’t even bother to spend some time coming up with a good argument, why should the admin be even bothered about giving time for them? There’s no need for the admins to give it a thought as its not worth a thought.

Admin remains adamant and gives back a lame excuse at split second to counter their lame excuse.

They were stunned hearing the lame excuse and started blurting out any arguments that they could think of at that time. Well at least this time they did use their brain, but still not effectively, and probably at a wrong timing. They should do their ‘homework’ before the ‘battle’.

Admin had them tasting back their own poison, retaliating any arguments that the admin could think of at that time. The admin’s arguments weren’t necessarily solid, but it was enough to throw them off guard as well. An eye-for-an-eye, a flimsy argument that had not been given some time to be thought through clearly been thrown off by another similar flimsy argument due to the time constraint.

They were devastated seeing defeat pushing against them to the edge of their wits. In a last act to salvage whatever egos thats left, they left the ‘battle’ with the victor winning a comfortable battle. At least they did something thats right, to continue arguing their way through without being well prepared would just be testing the admin’s patience and it does not bodes well to a good working relationship in the future.

The above scenario could had been so much more pleasant if they did their ‘homework’.

Yet, the above was just me playacting the admin. What they got was the “restart button” where they could go through the real ‘battle’ with the real ‘admin’ armed with better ‘weapons’ now that they knew their own weaknesses and of the enemy, making good use of Sun Tzu’s Art of War – “know yourself, know your enemy, you wont be defeated in a 100 battles”

a larger cause or is it utter futile?

This blog was created in january, but it also died on the same day it was created. This was because i personally do not have the drive and enthusiasm to really make this blog materialize.

I had a discussion with my group of friends about my so called “adventure” with this blog and i received quite some feedbacks.

I once had this stand that, “just because you’re in shit, you do not dig your way out”, perhaps there are better anologies, but the main idea is, ‘don’t just because the education system is flawed, you go through or allow ppl to go through the system knowing the system is flawed but do not do anything about it’.

if you know there’s a problem, at least do some justice and try to overcome it, don’t graduate from the system and then blame the system for your own shortcomings. overcoming the flaws of the system is one thing, but i just came aware that not knowing there’s a flaw in the system is also another issue all together. well this was probably why i set up this blog, to create awareness among the relevant parties of such issues.

my earlier intention was to address this blog to the current students of victoria institution, however, students being students, ultimately the pricipal still calls the shot. its like, rakyat being rakyat, the kerajaan pendidikan still calls the shots. alike politics, the rakyat would vote, voice out through various sources, through MPs, government agencies, etc. but looking back at the students, what sources are there for them? are they really matured enough to have such knowledge that they are going through an education system that in the end would only be affecting their future? or are their parents really aware of such issues? are the teachers really committed for the cause of education? are the educators really educating or just merely “makan gaji” or “makan suap”? Yes, there are already incidences of ‘mismanagement’ of funds, vi is not excluded.

my earlier intentions for the blog was to improve the well being of the current victorians, perhaps if they are all well awared, and more conscious of the issues, they would be more matured and show some genuine intentions. so that the educators and administrators would be more committed to chart the right paths, and not the “Ikut Suka Aku, I’m adult, u’re not, u’r not matured to think for urself, let me think for u”.

however in the end, would all this efforts be meaningless resulting in utter futile or would a larger cause be achieved?

i hope i’m not alone in this, i hope there could be more people being involved in this blog to share and to learn, to create awareness and to be made aware, to be enlightened or to enlighten….Be yet wiser anyone ?

smk jalan hang tuah

heard this story from somebody, sometime ago. leaving details aside to avoid future persecutions by any parties. there was once that victorians’ pride and culture being challenged. some party proposed to change the school’s name to smk jalan hang tuah. and what happened next was the school captain lead the whole school, gathered at the quadrangle to stage a protest. and the outcome was self explanatory.

however, i would like to emphasize the moral of this story. which hopefully also carries ahead as the voice and message to be conveyed across this blog. we as students of victoria institution carries the burden of preserving and upholding the glories, traditions and culture of the victoria institution. even when the authorities lays a hand on VI, we all still can turn the table for the good cause of VI.