I Appreciate 2013

Group photo taken with the backdrop 

To kick start our 6 weeks of journey in EMRS, Team 4 was assigned to execute the 'I Appreciate' Event. This event was held from 23rd April 2013 to 25th April 2013, 10am to 5pm at the NYP auditorium foyer.

The purpose of this event is for all NYP students and staff to express their gratitude to those whom have helped them throughout their journey in NYP.

The overall ICs for this event were Esmond and Phyllis. They had to do up the design of the posters and coupons as well as to plan the manpower allocation for the event. They also did a site inspection on thye event venue to determine the placement of the logistics needed for the event.

Our team assisted in the t-shirt redemption booth and the ushering of students and staff visiting our event. There is a total of 10,000 t-shirts of which 1,000 t-shirts were given out during the actual event and the remaining to be given out on 4th to 6th June 2013.

Our team was really lucky that we did not have much setting up or tearing down to do as the T-shirt redemption booth has already been set up throughout the 3 days. 

Planning Stage

We did not have much time to plan for this event as we only received instructions from our supervisors on the 15th April. With the limited lead time, we came up with the poster and coupon designs. Since this is a school-based event, we have to go through several rounds of editing of the artwork of the posters and coupons before they were approved.

On the first day of the event 

The entire team went to the auditorium for set-up before the event commence. We placed post-it pads, markers, pens and A4-sized coloured papers on the high tables and set up the queue poles so as to manage the crowd.

Students started to make their way into the auditorium once the doors opened.We were all overwhelmed with the response from the students. Hence, we had to activate the entire team to the auditorium to help out despite having planned for two shifts.

Students writing their appreciation note on the high tables

Students pasting their post-it notes on the board

Woah, what an overwhelming response!

In view of the crowd, we decided to activate the mobile application to help ease the queue. Most of the t-shirts were given out by the end of day 1 and hence we had to issue the coupons.

Day 2 and day 3 were much more manageable as there was not a big crowd compared to Day 1. 

Key takeaways

Through this event, we learnt that teamwork and communication are very important in the success of an event. We also learnt to be patient and understanding when handling students' and/or staff's requests. Lastly, we learnt that we have to be alert at all times and to be able to think on our feet and resolve any unforeseen situations that we encounter.

In conclusion, we would like to thank the school and our supervisors for giving us an opportunity to execute this event!

The big spell zonal

Spelling Bee Zonal rounds

A horde’s worth of about 1400 students has now been compressed into that of about a hundred plus. In addition to the vast change of participants to cater for, the dynamics, agenda and requirements has also been remoulded. Fortunately, the time span we were given was about a month, a less taxing and less burdening time constraint compared to the rushed 2 weeks we were given for  the preliminary rounds.

Not too long ago, the Diploma of Business Informatics (DBI) students joined us, on 4^th march. Not only a steady form of manpower for us to repurpose, they also turned out to be valued company. We learn from them just as much as they have learnt from us too. Shuffled and merged, the class seemed ever noisier, but ever more fun too. Social circles enlarged and conversing outlets opened up as we melded in with our new surroundings.

Essentially, the EMRS class, now compromising of about 25 people had to be split up into 4 zones; North, East, South and West, with about 6 per zone. Not only did we need to prepare for a new set of stickers, participant bibs, with self-formed designs, and other miscellaneous components, we had to prepare and jot out 4 different venues’ floor plans and deployment. Suffice to say, we were glad that we had much less students to accommodate for, but in turn, had to cater for the manpower branching.

East-side Zonals

With our new donned level of adaptability and acute precision from the preliminary rounds, we tailored a new system and structure, stitching up the loose ends here and there, in pursuit of a more impeccable performance for the Zonal competitions.

With the assumption that the structure of various items, like presentations and registration lists, had to be similar for all 4 zones, we had to closely check against the other ‘zone teams’ to ensure that we are all on the right track together. A single mistake or difference gone unnoticed and discovered too late would not confuse, but it would also cause inefficiency. We guess you can say it was important to uphold clarity while communicating well. In a sense, we had to be a little more perfectionistic.

As for the event itself, we proceeded to our own destination; namely, Tampines’ Library.

Overall, everything panned out well, the registration bit was a breeze, with all attendances accounted for, and all bibs placed quickly and properly. The kids enjoyed their freebies and Koko Krunch while their parents engaged in a little chit-chat. Surprisingly, the participants seemed quite calm and collected, given the impending competition.

Onto the allocated library hall where the event took place, audience members and participants alike began to fill up the seats. Eager and beginning to get anxious, they were warmly greeted and slightly entertained by the emcee. Soon thereafter, students got up, lined up and proceeded onwards. The event had commenced in unison with the other zones.

Throughout the competition, we noticed a couple that had been constantly mouthing letters of listed spelling words for one contestant in particular. After reporting, the student was eliminated, with the couple sent to the back of the hall.

One by one, students were gradually eliminated, descending back to their seats in heart-shattering tears or overly-bashful smiles until the last 2 students remained, competing for the east-zonal spelling title. After a short string of wrongly spelt words, a St Hilda’s student emerged the victor, assuring him a spot in the Finals for the Spelling Bee.

More focused to our duties in the hall, we believe that we carried them out well, as all the needs of students, parents, supporters, and judges were accommodated for.

Overall, everything went impeccably. Winning participants reigned victorious while those who lost retreated to their parents in some humiliation and disappointment. On task with fluent execution, there was no remarkable issue reported, which implied meant that the team had worked well and effectively together.

North-side Zonals

Students began to flow in rapidly even before 8:30am, our designated registration time. Nervous and queued up, we synced with each other and registered the participants, who all turned up for the occasion, quickly and on time before their briefing.

Some of the parents wanted to pin the bibs on their own children out of a little overprotectiveness, complaining that the pins were rather small and difficult to use. In any case, this sped up our registration process, regardless.

With the exception of one missing student, participants were embraced by the unusual warmth of the library, prepped to listen in to their briefing. In addition to minor problems encountered, one of the participant’s bib was torn by its safety pin holes with that safety pin missing. Easily rectified, we fixed the bib up and sent all the students to get ready for the start of the event.

Emcees nullified the nervousness of participants and the audience by entertaining them with comically-induced sarcasm and jokes. For example, the emcee wanted to entertain everyone by singing a song, only to be sadly rejected by one of the participants who confidently said “No, thanks”.

With that, and the introduction of the officials by the front row, the event began promptly. Words continuously became larger and more confusing, what’s even more surprising is that the contestants successfully spelt them with ease.

Throughout the event, microphone adjusters, ushers and the time keeper did their jobs flawlessly, causing no delay and proving ourselves competent.

Anti-climactic as it is, the champion was quickly decided upon as the other two contestants had spelt their words wrong. What made it even more anti-climactic was that the second and third place took forever to derive.

Through it all, we think that we did a good job and the event went well with very few problems.

 

West-side Zonals

With our venue decked up with the necessary preparations placed the day before, coupled with our months’ worth of preparation for the occasion, we were ready and eager to get it through and over with.

With clear knowledge of our tasks

and time spans, we took a good one and a half hour to wrap up the registration, ending at about 9am. As such everyone was punctual and we had accomplished everything we needed to in our designated time span, causing no delay.

As the entrance to building and the location of the event, the EDUtorium, were relatively far apart, an usher was placed to ascertain the direction of supporters and students to the venue.

Eager and jumpy, the students quickly went to their seats, with their parents trailing and sitting behind them. Interviewers and media leered closely to the competition throughout to get the scoop they needed.

As the south zone took the longest to get ready, given the quantity of their students, everyone had to wait a short moment patiently. After the somewhat quiet wait, the students were brought up to the stage in an orderly manner.

Starting at 10am sharp, words were issued and spelt correctly, mostly that is. With the ticks of the clocks and minutes that pass by, students drained back to their seats in a flood of unhappy emotions. The stage became increasingly vacant as did the pressure of the remaining contestants.

2 hours had passed and it had finally come down to 2 students. Knowing it was going to end soon, the students had plastered smiles on their faces, summoning all the knowledge they had. In the end, a Unity primary school kid won and beaming with pride he accepted his triumph and secured his position in the final rounds.

Roles were executed well and overall, it was a good and memorable experience spent with both my team-mates and supervisor.

South-side Zonals

Equipped with the skills that we’ve picked up from all the previous events that we’ve observed and partaken, we planned an executed the zonal round in the south side with a banked readiness and steadiness.

Taking place in our own school, Nanyang Polytechnic, TFA, we’ve had to hand prepare the venue from scratch, an ironic ‘home advantage’.

Naturally, among the 4 zones, we took the longest to register and usher as we had the most amount of students to cater for, 44 students. Nevertheless, the process was swift and the venue became swarmed with people.

The manpower was vigilant just as the students were confident; rounds by rounds were cleared, with not a single person eliminated till the later rounds. Imaginably, one would think that it would have taken forever to finish this round of the spelling bee. Honestly, it did, it ended 2:30pm from 10am.

As the students slowly got eliminated, emphasis on the ‘slowly’, it finally came down to 4 finalists, competing for the first and third place. Tension built up and burst into applause as the winner emerged from Catholic High Primary.

All in all, it was a good event. Despite its lengthiness, it was fun and rather worthwhile. The roles were relatively easy and was simple to plan and handle.

Conclusion

Overall, on all 4 sides, everything went impeccably. Winning participants reigned victorious while those who lost retreated to their parents in some humiliation and disappointment. On task with fluent execution, there were no issue reported in any of the 4 segments, which assumedly meant that the teams have worked well and effectively together.

It’s been about one and a half months already, and the DBI students have come to the end of their stay with us. Though their stay was but two-thirds of ours (6 weeks), you can say that it’s good that they came along when they did. We definitely needed the help. The fun, cheers and laughter were but valued perks. In such a short time, we’ve learnt to collect ourselves and unravel. Not too long ago, this pool of noisy EMRS companions was, believe it or not, silent, docile and awkward classmates at the start. Whisking past the short-term reminiscing, everything on this end seems pretty awesome; the people, the tasks, the event results, and of course, our lessons and companionships. One final event waits on the horizon, finals. Till then, we remain gratified and delighted.

EMRS bonding session (11/03/2013)

In the effort of getting the whole of EMRS to bond and know each other better, Hee Jin from Team 3 and Jia Ming from Team 2 were tasked to organize a bonding session on 11 March 2013, from 2:00pm - 4:30pm.

Planning Stage

We had to think of appropriate games taking into consideration the safety, fun and venues. We prepared a list of games with instructions and the logistics required.

We played games like...
1) Whacko, so that the participants will be able to remember each other’s’ names.

 

2) Bang game, to let participants be familiar with each other.

3) Balloon popping, it was most enjoyable game out of all the games it also helped to cultivate pair teamwork among the participants.

4) Straw game, helps to cultivate teamwork.

5) Human knot, cultivate creative thinking and teamwork

6) Captain’s ball, cultivate teamwork

Challenges we faced

For preparation of the game, we needed to estimate the amount of logistics so that we could have sufficient amount for games. But we had prepared well and games went smoothly without any delay.

And around 4pm, we played the last game on our list, which was captain’s ball. Initially we thought that the weather would get better at 4pm, but it did not. Instead, it became even hotter. Because of the sun, we had to cut short our game from half an hour to fifteen minutes. We took precautions by asking participants to keep themselves hydrated at all times.

After the event

During debriefing, we asked participant whether they had enjoyed the bonding session and overall rate was ‘’good’’. The first reason we could not get ‘very good’ was because they found that few games like the straw game was not fun. The second reason may be because of the challenge we faced, the hot weather. Overall, participants were satisfied with the games we had prepared and they had fun together. We believe that through this very first bonding session, we had opportunity to spend fun time together to know about each of everyone and bring everyone closer together.

Customized Study Path(CSP)

The Customised Study Path (CSP) was held on 9^th April 2012. Team 2 did the planning for this event and both team 2 and team 3 were involved in the execution process. The objective of this event was to ensure that the entire process of the registering of modules for students was smooth and also to expose EMRS students to better understand crowd control management.

We had about a week to plan for this event so there were changes in coordination. We took reference of the powerpoint slides, layout and signages from the previous EMRS Team who has also done the CSP Registration. But we came up with new designs and ideas for our queue numbers, signages and powerpoint slides. Prior to the event we have already prepared the queue numbers and signages to ensure that they will still be in good condition. We also went round clearing the rooms needed to ensure that they are spick-and-span for the actual day. Along with a fellow team member Meng Jun, we also went round the rooms to arrange the furniture needed for the event.

All the manpower was briefed a day before on their job scope. Also there was a briefing conducted by a lecturer on how to use the software necessary for the registration of modules which was attended by EMRS students who were tasked to  station at the computer labs, including the 2 OICs.

An hour before the event kicks off, The OICs, with the help of Ms Choo and Ms Quek, went around preparing all the necessary rooms needed for the event by screening a slideshow which gave students instructions on how to proceed after each procedure. After lunch, the EMRS team members were deployed to their respective rooms to kick start the registration. The team members were deployed to their respective rooms 20 minutes before the event started.

 Our Room ICs were given queue numbers and registration lists for the diplomas they were assigned to. As the number of students expected to turn up for CSP are different for the various diplomas and specializations, some of the rooms were more. We managed to complete the event by 5pm sharp.

Key Takeaways

Both of us learnt the importance of time management through this event. Also we learnt to use proper title for the signages. Even though it is a small-scale event but we both had fun planning for this event. This event made us appreciate the importance of teamwork and collaboration. While checking the rooms we also saw how diligently everyone was carrying out their tasks which really impacted us a lot.

Overall, the event was a great success as most of the students managed to register their modules on time before the printing room closes. Huge thanks to EMRS Team 2 and Team 3 for all of your supports in ensuring the success of the event! 

Specialist Diploma Graduation 2013

27th March 2013 was an important date for the Graduants from Specialist Diploma in Supply Chain Management, Specialist Diploma in Hospitality and Resort Management and Specialist Diploma in Fund Management & Administration.

EMRS Team 3 was tasked to assist this event. Two weeks before the event, Mr Chan, the Lecturer in charged of this event gave us the overview of this event and assigned us our respective roles which included registration, ushering of the graduants and VIPs as well as handling of logistics. 

One week later, we went through another round of dry run on what to expect on the actual day of the event. We rehearsed a few times before the event commenced! As we are first timers handling such important event, we felt nervous as we wanted to put on our best performance and to avoid hiccups.

When the actual day arrived, all of us reported an hour earlier before the registration commenced. We did the final dry run and everything seemed to go on well. We were given the chance to role play as graduants queuing up and collecting the certificates. After a few rehearsals, we became more familiar with the whole process and were more confident.

Registration started at 2:30p.m whereas the official proceedings started at 4:00p.m at LTD-2. Though there were a total of 80 graduates this year, only 50 of them turned up. 

Registration~

Waiting for the Directors to arrive~

When the Directors, who were also the VIPs,  arrived, a video presentation was played reminiscing the times the graduants went through. We could tell that they enjoyed the video as they were laughing at some of the shots showed on the screen. Following that, was a speech given by Mr Henry Heng, Director for School of Business Management, Nanyang Polytechnic.

Mr Henry Heng gave speech to the Graduates.

The highlight of the event was the distribution of Certificates to the graduates.

Joanne passing the Certificates to the Director.

After the event ended, the Directors and graduates were asked to leave first for the photo taking session. Light refreshments were provided for the graduates and their families.

Getting ready for photo taking.

Refreshment time!!!

Queuing up for food!!

At the end of the event, we were all tired. But there was a sense of achievement in us as the lecturers who were at the event were satisfied with our performance and praised us for doing a great job.

It was an eye opener for us as we learnt the importance of teamwork. We would like to thank Mr Chan and the Supervisors for giving us the opportunity to be involved in the SD Graduation. We really had a great time! :)