The students of Bachelor of Arts (Hons) Teaching of English of as a Second Language (TESL) recently organised the 4th Quest International University Perak International Conference on Knowledge Integration, Language (QUICKLE 4) and Education at the Grand Ballroom of MH Hotel in Ipoh.
Organising QUICKLE is part of a requirement under a course in the TESL curriculum organised by the final year students. In this course, students are exposed to the real environment of conducting a conference from writing a proposal, setting a budget, choosing the menu and venue, approaching potential sponsors, drafting meeting minutes and reports, engaging in series of discussions, setting up the venue, finding key note speakers, familiarising with protocols and other related interesting requisite elements of organising a conference. Not just that, the essence of the day of the event itself is that students are given a platform to present their research project paper which has been earlier prepared in the Research Paper course.
The memorable QUICKLE 4 was officiated by Yang Berhormat Dato’ Dr. Muhammad Amin Bin Zakaria, Perak State Exco Member For Education, Science, Environment And Green Technology. Also in attendance were Yang Berbahagia Dato’ Dr. R. Subramaniam, QIUP Council Member, Mr. Nicholas Goh, Chief Operating Officer, Mr. Muhammad MG Omar, Registrar and Mr. Magandran Rajadurai, Bursar, English lecturers from the English department and students from the TESL programme.
The event exposed students to a wide range of educational issues such as code switching, motivation and technology aids used in teaching at the same time exposing the students to the process of writing an academic paper and participate in a conference. It also provided TESL students with an opportunity to work together to organize a successful event while opening up a platform for lecturers and students to discuss and share their ideas and opinions of various educational issues highlighted in the seminar.
Kudos to TESL 4 and their advisor for the wonderful organisation of a home-grown conference!
