As the saying says, every coin has two sides. We often talk about the positives of our experience at MCAST, however addressing and talking about the negative sides of the school are a means to improve them and make the college a better place, both for new and current students.
Truth be told I was never so keen on applying for a course at MCAST, my mind was always keen on going to University. Call me closed minded but I it was something I wanted, to attend a university and live the “uni life” as well as wanting to study architecture. I ended up choosing what I wanted and spent a year at the University of Malta doing a Diploma in Design Foundation. After graduation I decided that I wanted to find a course, which focused solely on design. Seeing as there are limited options for this line of study I found myself researching MCAST and seeing what they can offer me. I must point out that unlike the many people who see MCAST as a second choice, in this case I chose MCAST because it was the only institute that was offering this course. Something other university should pick up on. By offering different courses MCAST is establishing itself as a first choice school something that I am proud to say. Fortunate enough the year I applied, a new course was being introduced which was Spatial Design, this being the closest subject I've found to what I actually wanted to study. The following October I started the new course at MCAST in Mosta and from the very first days I could notice the drastic changes. From being used to spending days at a huge friendly campus to a school, which hosts over 500 students in such a small space. I started questioning myself why a school filled with so many creative minds studying all kinds of design, was designed so horribly. As a spatial design student it’s a shame to see such a beautiful site with spectacular views yet a school so unorganized and old fashioned. This is now my second year at the school and I came to a realisation that besides acts of vandalism by students or outsiders the school is also partly to blame. Year after year complaints or ideas by students or student organisations are brought forward to the administration yet nothing is ever done about it. At one point last year the situation got so out of hand that female bathrooms were out of order for weeks on end before they were cleaned by the janitors which comes to show that the state of the school is given little to no importance at all. Space is another major issue, each year the more and more students are accepted to start their studies here yet there is really nowhere to put them. There are simply not enough classrooms for the amount of students attending and the amount of lectures that need to be held every day. There are cases that chairs have to be borrowed from other classrooms, as there would not be enough for everyone to be seated during a lesson. Unfortunately this is just the tip of the iceberg, the library is much worse. I have been to many libraries and got used to seeing three floors of endless books and comfortable areas for individual and group work to the sorry state of our library, which is a single room which is smaller than most classrooms with just a few options to choose from. Having three computers, which might be older than some of the students who use them. Space has become such a problem at the school that some group work that we had to work on last year had to be done sitting down in the corridor on our laptops. The administration is not helping matters. From being told we are being treated as a mature and responsible adults to feeling as if I am back at secondary school. Students seem to have no right to speak up and the only time we are allowed to speak to anyone from the administration is for half an hour every day between 12.00 and 12.30. With so many students and so many things that need to be addressed by both students and teachers one can imagine how hectic this time of the day would be in such a small hall were the offices are situated. The staff is bombarded with forms that need to be filled, certificates of sick students, complaints, requests, reports, appeals, appointments and everything else that they have to deal with. Emails often tend to be a waste of time as you would rarely get a reply or would be waiting days or weeks, even emails which are marked as urgent. One of the things that makes a student really feel like they're back in primary school is the percentage limit of lessons that can be missed. I am a 20-year-old student and there are far older students attending this college, I am pretty sure we know that missing lessons for no reason is not a good idea. So a penalty for missing lessons would result in practically nothing let alone getting accused of missing lessons when actually missing none, this seems to be a real problem within the institute. I sometimes regret my decision of leaving the university to attend the college but the course makes me hold on to it. Since I actually have something to compare it to, I found the problems to effect me more than students who have only been to MCAST and nowhere else thus don't know any better. I just hope that eventually the institute improves itself and listens to what some students have to say as it does have potential to be one of the best universities in Malta if there is motive to be so.
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After carrying some research, I came across various controversies regarding the field of spatial design. Some of which can be seen below.
References Quirk, V. (2014).Zaha Hadid on Worker Deaths in Qatar: "It's Not My Duty As an Architect". [online] Archdaily. Available from: http://www.archdaily.com/480990/zaha-hadid-on-worker-deaths-in-qatar-it-s-not-my-duty-as-an-architect [Accessed 18 October 2016] McLeod, F. (2014).The 9 Most Controversial Buildings of All Time. [online] Archdaily. Available from: http://www.archdaily.com/573271/the-9-most-controversial-buildings-of-all-time [Accessed 18 October 2016] Naviaux, J. (2008).the controversy about Interior Design. [online] Interior Design Thinking outside the Box. Available from: http://adesignviewpoint.blogspot.ie/2008/04/controversy-about-interior-design.html [Accessed 18 October 2016] Bonney, G. (2016).THE WHITE WALL CONTROVERSY: HOW THE ALL-WHITE AESTHETIC HAS AFFECTED DESIGN. [online]. Design Sponge. Available from: http://www.designsponge.com/2016/05/the-white-wall-controversy-how-the-all-white-aesthetic-has-affected-design.html [Accessed 18th October 2016] Being a Gozitan, like every other at age of 18, I found myself living a life I had never experienced before. When a child leaves their home, they are faced with many difficulties and realisations. From being pampered, being part of a family and looked after I found myself alone. Two years ago, a few months after finishing my A-levels I moved to Malta to start my higher level of Education. Unlike certain Gozitans that decided to travel to Malta everyday for lectures I decided to rent an apartment during the week whilst spending my weekends back home. Growing up with two working parents I became accustomed to occasionally cooking for myself and having to do chores around the house, however this was merely a fraction of what was to come. I soon realised I had to start dealing with things I never thought or cared to a certain point about such as paying electricity bills, setting up appointments for internet and television, scheduling with a meter reader, shopping for groceries, washing the appartment and cooking before and after school. The last one in particular was a shock to me, from having food on the table after school to having to prepare meals everyday, this would be the last thing I would like to do after a long school day.
I started to struggle with this as juggling with school life and responsibility in terms of running a household started to take its toll. It did not help matters by having a roommate who rarely had any lectures so was often spending her time in Gozo rather then in Malta contrary what I expected. The apartment was situated on the ground floor so it was dark enough during the day due to the lack of light but dark as well in terms of lack of human interaction and warmth. These things started to make me realise, I might have made a mistake, whether it was worth to move to Malta to avoid the hassle of travelling back and forth. This situation I found myself in was the complete opposite of what I imagined. From hearing stories from others about having fun living with their room mates and enjoying themselves, I found myself alone and dreading to go to the apartment. I found refuge in the library or amongst friends in their respective homes. Once that school year finished it was time to pack up and head back home. Once the summer was drawing to an end and it was time to head back to Malta I found myself faced with a problem of what I should do. Should I return to the apartment when my friend was never there? Should I start travelling to and back everyday? Or should I search for other alternatives? I realised that I should avoid both and find a proper alternative, this turned out to be moving in with another group of friends. I made sure that this time things would be different, the friends I chose to move in with were to be in Malta all the time as well as the apartment being be a warm place. The warmth stemming from actual sun light as well as the community. A year on and I find myself moving in with the same people once I return from Erasmus. This problem might not be such a horrible thing on a larger scale, there are far worse daily problems that make this look silly and childish. However, so far in my life this seemed to be a major problem. I tend to make decisions based on loyalty rather than self happiness. Whether it is where I should be living or whether I should go out and many other things. I look back on this example as a means to strengthen myself and to always remember that it is important to keep others happy but it is equally important to keep myself happy as well. Currently undertaking part in an Erasmus program, I thought it suited best to talk about my experience so far here in Ireland. It is the first time I am visiting this country and loving it so far. I was lucky enough to be chosen for this opportunity and being such a globetrotter I couldn't say no. Within a week of coming back from Croatia in August I was packing my bags once again to the lovely county Cork. The Erasmus program requires students to work with a company as an intern as well as meeting new people and going out of comfort zones. The company that I am currently working at is Grasstec, a company offering a wide range of agricultural and commercial services although mainly focuses on Farm design and Farm mapping. It took me a couple of days to fully settle in as most of the employees are civil engineering graduates, and I was just a student attending my second year in Spatial Design..... Since there aren't so many opportunities within this field in Malta and Gozo I have been learning a lot whilst also improving my skills using design programs and also my English. The Irish have quite a strong accent which also took me a while to adjust to and fully understand what people were saying but I also got used to that. Besides work I have also been exploring different county's in Ireland mainly Dublin, Galway, Limerick, Cork and Kilkenny.
I surely I miss the warm weather and not so cold winters, besides mother's cooking, since the Republic of Ireland experiences what they call four seasons in one day. Safe to say natives don't know what it means to spend most of the day with temperatures such as 30degrees. Apart from weather I have learnt about the culture , cuisine, traditions and also history of this country. Still not surprised most of the people I have met so far have no idea about Malta, let alone Gozo. Having said all that, Critical thinking unconsciously helped especially when at work. Being presented with tasks that I had never done before made me try to come up with solutions for very problem I came across instead of asking more experienced employees straight away. Thanks to this opportunity I have also increased my ability to select and to critically evaluate the various sources of information related to the profession that enabled me to develop self-learning capacity as well as the skill to adapt to the technological and organisational changes in the business. |
Rita Curmi2nd year Student Archives
May 2017
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