During the last lesson for the unit of critical thinking, the topics that could possibly be used in the debates were being discussed. One title that caught my eye was the one which involved the ferry between Malta and Gozo. Having to cross the channel multiple times each week I was interested to hear what views this person had about this issue. Unfortunately they weren't present for that lesson, but luckily enough on the way home I met other Gozitans on the ferry which coincidentally brought the topic up mid-conversation. The link between Malta and Gozo has been one of the most controversial topics throughout the years. The only transport service (Gozo Channel company limited) available has been working for years since 1975. In the more recent years there have been countless debates, arguments and articles on wether or not there should be an alternative to this service mainly a bridge or a tunnel. It is a topic I often find myself talking about with others especially when they find out I am Gozitan. The issue we discussed on the ferry was about how ever since the ferry service started there was never a reduced price for full time students. Of course we are thankful that Gozitans pay less than Maltese residents, despite some still think that this is unfair. However why should a student receiving a very small amount of stipend being the only income per month (not to mention students not eligible for stipend) pay as much as a person with a full time job and stable income? In most countries I have visited almost every means of transport has regular priced tickets and also student tickets, which would be a bit cheaper than the regular ones. When boarding the ferry as a passenger it only costs a Gozitan resident 1.15 euros, however with a car that ammount goes up to almost 10euros which would ammount up to 50 euros to go to school every day for a week. Someone who does not travel frequently would simply suggest for you to get a bus and board the ferry as a passenger although not alot of students do so, for the fact that the bus service from Cirkewwa is never there on time or sometimes never even show up. This results in students having to buy a car and spend 1/3rd of their monthly stipend in a week unless they afford to rent an appartment which would cost way more. I belive that till the day were another alternative to the ferry is offered there should definately be reduced student prices. References
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When first learning about this particular unit and the fact that part of the assignment included live debates I was intrigued, however I was not that excited about the blog posts which we had to keep up with weekly. It could of been due to last year's experience of finding another unit's blog posts boring and a waste of time. Despite the fact that this unit was completely different, it did not change the fact that some students found this as a burden left till the very last day of the week.
In my opinion I did improve in learning how to think critically since writing down my thoughts and beliefs on subjects allowed me to reflect on myself and eventually look back on these writings. After finding it quite hard to decide on what I should write about week after week, at times I found myself looking at some of the posts by my classmates just to get an idea of what everyone else was writing about. This helped in a way since when reading some posts I realised how most students found themselves in the same situation. I found the posts to be the mosts challenging when a fixed title was given by our lecturer, especially when the topic given was of no interest to me therefore making it even harder to critically think and reflect. In return it resulted in a couple of weak posts and I found it close to impossible to relate these topics to the line of work that interests me which is Spatial Design. Being a representative of the Gozitan University Group also known as GUG for the Mosta MCAST Institute, I decided to voice my opinions regarding certain issues that have been bugging me and fellow classmates for a while now. As mentioned in one of the previous posts, there are a number of issues with the current layout and system of the school. I was urged to write about the lack of space and organization since last week we were heading to one of our lectures in Art Studio 1 , were this particular unit is held every week. To the student's and the lecturer's surprise we find another lecture being held in the same class. We were surprised as when our lecturer informed the other lecturer that the room is were our lesson is held every Monday he denied it and said that their lecture was also held there every Monday. So not to cause any problems we headed outside and our lecturer was frustrated so he went straight to the secretary’s office to voice his concern yet as always got no where, which made us feel kind of on the same level as this is what usually happens to us when we voice our opinions. Later we were told that two lectures were assigned to the same room by mistake yet this did not only happen once. Week after week we have to waste time looking around the school for an empty classroom since we are still not assigned to one particular class.
I decided to voice my opinions and luckily enough points from what I wrote got published on a local article online. Besides the current issue I also mentioned the ongoing issue of general lack of space, which leads for the only option to leave the school during, break hours or group work sessions. It was shared by many and was surprised by how many people took interest in this issue, which in return made the class feel as if there was hope and something would be done about this. Unfortunately an anonymous speaker from the school's staff denied the facts and stated that the only time lectures are assigned to the same class is when it is intended for both classes to do so to gain different perspectives. Straight up lies to cover up the truth and unfortunately Power from below failed us this time since people with the power to do something about it tend to believe the ones with higher superior. Article: B.Matthew, (2016).'M'għandhomx biex jaħdmu'. Newsbook [Online]. Avaiable from: http://www.newsbook.com.mt/artikli/2016/12/6/m-ghandhomx-biex-jahdmu.54088/ [Accessed 6th Dcember 2016]. From when I started writing posts for this blog I struggled a lot with understanding how I should think critically when writing about a certain topic until I came across a very clear example of Shon's Model. I had never before looked up this model to see what it was about and now regret I not doing it sooner.
As mentioned in previous posts I struggle a lot with making decisions so when I learnt about this idea I thought including it into one of my blog posts would be a good idea. I was also surprised to discover a number of thinking models and frameworks that I had never heard about before. Shon’s model can be applied to everyday life and tasks, however the model is still criticized heavily by some since it does not take into consideration things that we are not in control of. Shon divides reflection into two; either reflection-in-action or reflection-on-action. Reflection-in-action refers to what is occurring at that specific moment and how we are looking and reacting to things at that particular point in time. Meanwhile Reflection-on-action refers to reflecting and thinking about something that has happened in the past. Naturally I apply this model almost everyday but unfortunately I often find myself stuck reflecting-on-action since I find it hard to move forward and learn from past experiences. I will definitely try to follow Shon’s idea of how to reflect and learn from things during both stages. References: Smith, K.M., 2001. Donald Shon: learning, reflection and change. infed. Available from: http://infed.org/mobi/donald-schon-learning-reflection-change/ [Accessed 4th December 2016] |
Rita Curmi2nd year Student Archives
May 2017
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