CRITIQUE
ON ‘ARE OUR VARSITIES STILL RELEVANT?’
‘Are Our Varsities Still
Relevant?’ is an article written on the relevance of varsities being an influences in unemployment issue among graduates in Malaysia. It is written by Prof
Datuk John Anthony Xavier, a professor of management at the Graduate School of
Business, UKM. He has published a number of books and articles on law and
public finance and management in local and international journals. This article
was published in a column of New Straits Times, on Wednesday 20 August 2014.
The target audiences of this
article is to aim a specific group who should be responsible towards the
tertiary education system in Malaysia such as the government instead of the
common Malaysians. However, the Malaysians somehow should open their eyes and
see what is really happening now, facing the truth and also solving the
problems occurred with the help of the authorities involved.
The author’s intention is
to deliver information to the readers regarding the issue where universities in
Malaysia is actually outdated and need to be change and improve at same time.
This can be seen through the choice of content for this article. Starting off
his writing with stressing out how universities play a vital role in developing
a country which possessed powerful generations who will definitely contribute
to Malaysia’s economic growth.
Other than that, he
mentions that university is a place where youngsters have a chance to involve
in debate and dialogue related to either cultural or political issue safely and
this leads them to interpret those issues in a good way. Indirectly, it gives a
huge impact towards their intellectual capacity.
Next, he highlights on how
the universities in Malaysia increasingly less relevant to society. He takes
unemployment issue among graduates in Malaysia as an example as he states one
quarter of our graduates, or 52,000 of them who mostly from public universities
are unemployed. In 12th paragraph, the author writes about why
graduates remain unemployed. This is because they lack the skills to make them
relevant in the workplace. They lack language and soft skills and industry-related
competences. Regarding to this issue, he provides a way to solve this problem
by taking a look back at the universities’ curriculum. The universities have to
find out the skills required of their graduates by seek information or advice
from businesses and community leaders and then, train them with those skills.
Nevertheless, the
importance of teaching the theory to the students is still one of the
priorities. He also states that an academic education must be all-rounded. An
all-rounded education will surely make graduates more employable.
All-roundness also indicate that the students who involves in extra-curricular
activities, have a good grade with soft skills and leadership will prepare themselves before they go into the ‘real’ world. Moreover, they are required to appreciate the
practice of their disciplines through attachments in related organisations.
Besides, the author emphasizes
on ways to attract young minds in pursuing their studies in university. The
methods mention, is by providing academic freedom and also collaborating and
exchanging of faculty with other leading universities.
The tone and choice of
words used by the author are calm and casual but very convincing as the article
is full of facts. No notes of sarcasm are used throughout this article and the
method of delivering points is neutral without playing of emotions on the
readers.
In conclusion, I can say
that I am totally agree with the author about this article. All the points
presented with strong evidences shows that the author writes a really good
article without being biased. He managed to deliver his points in a clear
manner.
Written by : Nur Atiqah (A155581)
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