Category: Random Musings

Can Pakatan Lead?

I know that change is afoot, when my mom asks me this: Anwar is a weak leader and DAP cannot work together with PAS, if Pakatan Rakyat wins the next GE, can they lead?

First, it’s good that Anwar is a weak leader. We do not need another strong man like Mahathir. Look at what kind of troubles he brought. Second, all of the parties will find a way to work together simply for political survival. If they break up, they’re as good as dead. BN will not let them live.

Our country has developed to a point where the people now want more freedoms and a less authoritarian government. We would do well with a little more decentralisation and stronger institutions. That’s why it’s probably a good idea to have a less dominant leader, like Anwar, than someone like Muhyiddin.

Anwar, as a PM, would have to govern with the help of his Cabinet, which will be made up of people from all sides, hopefully the best. He would not be able to govern by sheer force of will. I wouldn’t trust him to do it anyway as he’s not very smart.

I also think that there are a lot of capable and intelligent leaders in PR who can help run the country. I do hope that they field better candidates this time around. It’s time to retire of the dead wood within their own parties.

Furthermore, they will all have to work together to ensure their political survival. They are such a big threat to BN now that they would not be able to survive if they were disunited. They’re all politicians, out for power. They will find some way to sort things out.

In fact, for their first term, they would not need to deal with any contentious issues. Our country is so wrecked with problems that there are just so many low-lying fruits to pick on. These issues are things that all the rakyat can work together, to fix, with the politicians.

So, I don’t see any real problems initially. The cracks will definitely occur later, when all the simple problems have been solved. Then, they’ll need to tackle the big contentious issues.

But by that time, Malaysia would hopefully be in a better position to handle any political crises that may crop up.

Ubah Rocket Style

This, I’ve got to give it to the DAP.

They can come out with the cheesiest election videos ever. But at least they’ve got the guts to actually make a fool of themselves, all for a cause.

At least they’ve got some cute girls in the video – and bik mama doing a Hyuna!!!

PS: And I like the out-takes – “pok kai… zhan…” 😀

Resolution 2013

It’s the end of the year, and it’s time for a review. I made several resolutions at the beginning of the year. I’ll make a few for 2013!

  1. Profit
    My company revenues have been growing steadily over the last few years. So, I plan to continue growing my company. I plan to hire several full-timers, part-timers and interns over the course of 2013. I just hope that I can find them.
  2. Pass 2nd yr Law
    I did quite well for 1st yr Law. So, I intend to do well again for 2nd yr Law. I’ll strive to equal or better my B+ average marks from last year. This means that I’ll need to spend a lot of time on studying. I wished that there were 25 hours in a day.
  3. Professional Engineer
    I really did not have the time to get this done in 2012. So, this will just have to be carried over to 2013. I’ll just need to find some time to attend the compulsory courses and fill up the form to qualify for the PAE. I should really get it done.
  4. Write a Book
    I’m shy to say that my dreams of being an author are being neglected. I’m doing a lot of writing these days, just not a proper book. I think that I need to resolve to write one page a day for the rest of the year, at least! I know what I’d like to write and how to write it. I just need to get it done.

Just in case you did not know. I’m currently in a plane flying somewhere over Eastern Europe or the Middle East. I wrote this blog a couple of weeks ago and scheduled it for today. I’ll be landing at KLIA in the morning.

I was invited to speak at a conference in Berlin. It was indeed an honour for me. I think that I’m playing a small role at the vanguard of a new engineering revolution. I hope that things will work out in the end and that the world will be a better place because of it.

Going Away Gift

This week was my last week at the university as I had resigned from my teaching job. It has been an interesting couple of years there where I had the opportunity to learn the inner workings of a local private institution of higher learning.

While I will miss some of my colleagues there, I think that they would actually miss me more. I have certainly made a lasting impression on some lives there, as they have mine.

One of my colleagues, actually bought me a going away present – a book – The Dawkins Delusion. I had a good laugh when I opened it up as it is a very meaningful gift.

I’ll certainly read the book at some point. However, it struck me as a very ‘thin’ book. If it is a book that tries to rebut Richard Dawkin’s assertions, it isn’t presenting many arguments.

I’ll try to keep an open mind though. Promise!

The PianoGuys

Wow.. just wow…

Syariah Compliant Toilet Sign

This is absolutely cute! Spotted at UiTM Shah Alam campus.

Questionable SETARA 2011

Malaysian Qualifications Agency
Malaysian Qualifications Agency (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Our local Malaysian ranking for undergrad teaching quality of local universities, SETARA, was recently released. I thought that it would be fun to check it out to see how things have changed since the last ranking exercise.

Some universities that improved tremendously from SETARA09 to SETARA11 are:

  • Binary University of Management and Entrepreneurship – vaulted from Tier 3 (Good) in to Tier 5 (Excellent).
  • Wawasan Open University, Open University Malaysia, SEGi University – parachuted in at Tier 5 (Excellent) from being previously unranked.
  • TATi University College, University Pertahanan Nasional Malaysia, Universiti Malaysia Kelantan – moved into Tier 4 (Very Good) from being previously unranked.

Needless to say, I was shocked.

I don’t know the detailed criteria nor methodology that was used during the survey but it shocked me that some of the universities that made it to Tier 5 (Excellent) were not what I would have expected. Granted, I am no expert in local universities nor their standards but some of the results just beggar belief.

I’m not trying to single anyone out but, two of these Tier 5 universities are classified as open and distance learning institutions. I do not understand how they could achieve excellent teaching quality when the students are not even in the same room as the lecturer. I know that internet based learning is all the craze these days but even places like MIT do not consider their open learning systems at par with their in-house teaching, yet.

Some of the other Tier 5 universities are virtual unknowns. Again, I do not claim to know all the universities in Malaysia (there are just too many to keep track of these days) but some of them are total unknowns. Some are even the butt of many jokes on education quality in Malaysia, the kind of university that you would not want people to know that your child was attending.

Furthermore, more than half of the universities ranked are of Tier 5 level while there is only one university at Tier 3 (Good). I would have expected something like this to be more normally distributed as it was in SETARA09. When I see such heavily skewed results, I tend to question the accuracy of the study. Something just does not smell right to me, statistically speaking. It’s highly improbable that the majority of institutions is Excellent.

Brings to mind an XKCD comic:

My personal opinion of this is that some of these Tier 5 universities must have gamed the system. I do not blame them for doing that though, as the SETARA rankings affect many aspects of a university including fees. Nobody would want to pay top dollar to study in a Tier 4 university when they can study in a Tier 5 one for cheap. So, I expect some of these virtual unknowns to raise their fees next year!

I hope that the MQA would take the effort to toughen and tighten the criteria for ranking in the next exercise. We need a ranking system that truly reflects the teaching quality of local universities. It would serve as a useful guide to parents, only if they actually trust the accuracy of the exercise. I don’t think that any parent would agree that more than half our local universities are Excellent!

I think that a lot of people who see the list would think and start to question the SETARA rankings and methodology. While I agree that there are always flaws within any sort of ranking system, when this happens, it will become more fodder for local coffee shop talk. We know that some of these Tier 5 universities deserve to be there while others are downright questionable.

Personally, I’m not going to even bother with SETARA11. I’ll stick to the more normally distributed SETARA09 rankings for now.