Papercrafts

So during that almost year long hiatus, surely you would think I did not just spend all my time at school.

An example of the many things that can be built from paper

Paperwork was something that I was brought into as a kid, through origami. It all at a summer camp where a group leader taught me how to fold a star. I instantly gravitated towards this new found hobby and went on to explore more origami models.

Small star, meet big star

Eventually, I moved on to papercrafting. The main difference is that papercrafts involves the use of a paste or glue whereas origami does not.
And within the community of papercrafts, there are two main roles, the designers and the builders.

The designers are the ones that create the templates, design and make the model look fancy and nice.
They utilize various CAD programs to do so, but I haven't had much experience in this department yet.

The builders are the ones that do exactly that, they build. They take the template, cut and score it and so the problem solving begins. Note that a lot of templates don't include instructions like the order of the pieces to build (which is really key and important) so it all becomes a huge puzzle, with a rewarding end.

Read, once in a while...

Well, listen AND read (for context, see the previous post).

You have no idea how much this peeves me (well not really, but still). So due to the sheer size of the course, there is a page (on the front of the exam) for students to circle their lecture section to more easily sort exams. Instructions are displayed on the first page of the exam indicating that students must circle a lecture section, and failure to do so will result in lost marks (I think 5 was the case). So not only are instructions explicitly written down, we also do the courtesy to read out those exact instructions.

So during the mid-term exam, while collecting signature forms (basically stating that you were at the exam, and that you are who you claim to be on your photo id), I decided to spend a few seconds for each person and check that they circled their lecture section. About half of the people I checked did not. I'm sure they can do the math; losing 5 marks (on a section of the exam that's worth 20 marks), is a really big deal.

No seriously, we assume you are at least half literate, so READ.

When it came to final exam time, I figured that these people probably know their lessons by now, but I'll still read out this specific set of instructions. And luckily for people who handed in their exams early (of which I could check if they circled, as opposed to everyone rushing to pile in their exams at the end), I caught a few that neglected to circle. I even chased one of the students who was outside the classroom to get him to fill it out.

You may think this isn't a big deal, but there are two major reasons to follow said instructions:

1. To not lose marks:
   Note that the exam indicates that you'll lose marks (5 in my case), but when we actually mark your exams, somehow, we get too soft and end up only deducting 2. Either way, you still lose out.
   
2. Making TA's lives and your lives easier:
   Realise that there are ~1500 exams and TAs need a systematic way to mark them. By writing down your name and lecture section, we can categorize and allocate exams accordingly. In addition, when it comes time to inputting your marks into the system, all the exams are nicely ordered. So if you neglect to write down crucial information, you waste our time attempting to figure out what lecture you belong to and will delay the return of your exams and marks.

So if you can read carefully and follow instructions correctly and write (well legibly, we do try our best to decipher what you write, but try not to give us a hard time doing so...) you are already off to a good start.

I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please contact me.

I'M BACK!

Hope everyone's first week of the year has been a blast so far.

A very late, but happy new year to all you followers and people
that have stumbled on to this blog

So after a long hiatus, I'll be back for the foreseeable future. Feels like it has been 2 years 2 months (high-fives for those that got that reference), but no, it has been just less than a year, but a really jam packed year.

Going back to "2 Years 2 Months", a pathetic reference to FOD's - 2 Years 2 Months for those that remember the song from AuditionSEA (one of my favourite ones, considering the winter season and the incorporation of a variation of Pachelbel's canon). Had a huge trip down memory lane when I stumbled upon an actual functioning site that archived all the old songs from SEA and KOR (and still is updated with all the new stuff). Also taking a second to pay my respects to xeanz, a site that has seemingly disappeared without a trace. Kudos to Veiss for running it as long as he could, it was also great working with you.

Now back to my "year-in review", which will be spread out through many future posts and at random times of the year.

I guess this is a good time to talk about it since a lot of people are starting school again, but I'd like to share with you my experience being a TA (teaching assistant).
A quick disclaimer to cover my butt so I don't get into legal trouble or whatnot: The words, views and opinions expressed on this site DO NOT represent the view and opinions of University of Toronto, the CUPE/Union, and any of the University's employees and staff members and related organizations.

Okay, now that I got that out of the way, back to the topic at hand.
TAing, above anything, is an interesting look into the logistics of how those stacks of paper that magically appear on your desk come test time and how that big fat A is spat back out at you.

Not sure how this works for courses that have a small amount of enrollment, but for the course I TAed (~1500 students), we go through a process to sort and divide exams. A tedious, but necessary task since the appropriate amounts of test papers must be allocated through the 10+ classrooms the test papers written in.

Now here's a thing for all you first years out there.
When the TAs or professors say something while you are writing the exam. LISTEN UP.
You have no idea how important this is. There may be an error on the exam paper (blame whoever wrote them), or special instructions or even dictating instructions that are on the first pages of your exam.

More of my banter and ranting on this topic for my next post. So stay tuned folks, and I hope to see y'all in the very near future.




I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please contact me.

Hello World!

So I finally finished my final exams and then someone reminds me...midterms in 2 months.

Me, during every exam

     Well to be exact, I finished my exams last week and I've been procrastinating to make a new post (heh, procrastinating). I also started getting some of my marks back, and for the time being, I'm pleased with them so far, but I think to most important thing for me during the break right now is to pace and change my lifestyle that would be suitable for a university student.
     I find myself time and time again gaming. It's a really bad lifestyle that I've kept since high school, thinking I can still get away with it in university. I think I game so much that I barely have time to watch anime. D: So I think the most effective way for me to really focus is to simply not start my steam (I mostly play games on steam) because those pop-ups towards the bottom right corner that shows who is playing what really distracts me. But for the duration of the break...I'll be gaming =).
     Now off to the anime issue, oh how I've missed you. At least I've finally found a susatinable way to keep this hobby. My morning commute to school is about 25 mins (by car, it's an hour by public transit) and you know what that time is perfect for? Perfect for just an episode of any anime. So that means going to school and coming back, I'm still able to watch 2 episodes, yay!

Anyways, I'll be back next week to make an anime related post and hopefully, I'll be able to make weekly posts when school resumes! Thanks for reading!
    
I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please message me.

So what are you guys doing during your winter breaks? How did your exams go? Let me know in the comment section below!

First Week of University

I've been waiting a long time to get here, but now, am I second guessing myself?

Cramming, gotta get that good stuff in

     For those that read some of my recent posts about frosh, you should know that students had a choice to either stay for the frosh events or attend classes. I asked around (espeically asking senior students) whether or not to stay at frosh or just skip the first day of lectures. All the answers I got were on either side, but I guess since I'm paying over seven grand for school versus fifty bucks for frosh, I'll attend my lectures instead.

     And I'm glad I made that decision because the first day of classes in university is nothing like high school. But let's start off with the similarities, the professor will take half the class to introduce himself or herself and their respective accomplishments and go through the course outline. Okay, I guess it's nothing different so far, but after introductions we jumped right into the lecture and textbook material and I guess this is where the two diverge. In high school, we would've probably been holding hands and singing kumbaya for an entire week before we start any course material. I guess my blog will soon look like one of my fellow blogger colleagues, DWei's.

"Hold hands and singing kumbaya", a favorite quote from one of my high school teachers

     Now another difference is that in class, you should never run out of things to do (and that one thing is to listen). And that's another difference, there is no "in-class homework", you literally sit in class for 2-3 hours and there is no time allotted in class to do any readings or homework. Another note is that you have to be prepared going to class, that means note taking devices, textbook readings, printouts etc...because no one is going to remind you or bug you about this stuff. Well it's not that I had any trouble in high school with any of this but it's pretty overwhelming when you have to keep track of tutorial dates, readings that need to be done, quizzes, online assessments... And I'm sure the lists goes on, but phew, I'm just in first year.
 
I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please message me.

How was your first week of university or post secondary education? How is it different from high school?

UTSC Frosh Day 3 & 4

 The last two days of frosh week ends in style.

All of frosh week seemed to lead up to the final events for day 4, but let's get back to day 3 for now.

Day 3's main event was "The Ultimate Froshie". Froshie in this case refers to all frosh members (freshmen), and it's essentially finding the most enthusiastic, exciting and fun froshie. This is determined trhough a series of challenges which involve cheers (such as the "I feel so good!" cheer) and more. Sadly, I had class during this event and pretty much missed most of it. Video below for whoever wants to check it out.

Which brings me to my next point, who decided to make frosh week coincide with the first week of classes (most people had classes Thursday and/or Friday). So not only did I miss Thursday's main event, I missed all of Friday, but for the people that participated, I heard that it was a blast.

Friday's first main event was the parade where all 3 campuses (Scarborough, Mississauga and St. George)  convene. As fun as this sounds, there is always compeititoin between all 3 campuses to see who does the best and loudest cheers. See for yourself below.

Friday ended with an event at some event cetnre, and at a club at the Guv.
Hopefully everyone had fun, as I probably had more of it in class. =/

I do not own or take credit for all of the above images & videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please message me.

How did you frosh conclude? Did class ever coincide with frosh?

UTSC Frosh Day 2

We feel so good! Oh, we feel so good! Oh!

Youtube Karaoke @ AC112

Nothing beats karaoke, especially in a lecture hall singing things by Aqua and Bieber.

Well I'll have to say I had fun during the second day. Just like Ferdinand commented on my previous post, I also consider myself as an introvert. Those that do know me in real life know me as someone who is very quiet, as the type that is cool, calm and always collected. Today was no different? I think not. With help from my GLs (group leaders) I started to come out of that shell and had some fun.

The "Carnival"

For day 2, once of the featured events was the Carnival. Essentially it was 5-6 inflatable play areas (like rock climbing pictured above). Now don't get me wrong, these activities were fun, but when this activity lasted for 4 hours, your patience for new things to do is easily spent.

The long day was concluded with a fun event (for some at least and embarrassing for others), the long awaited hypnotist show. You can see the first part of it embedded above (I do not own the video, it was uploaded by my colleagues).


What quirky events did you have at your frosh? What was the best event?

UTSC Frosh Day 1

First impressions are everything, and today, frosh has definitely made its mark.

Woo! Frosh Week

Frosh, Day 1: All froshies were assigned to groups and separated by departments, marked by different colour t-shirts. Blue for management students, green for science and red for arts. Each group was assigned 2 group leaders which are seniors in the corresponding deparments.

Now I'm not sure how all my peers felt, but I can say I was definitely nervous and my natural personality of being shy definitely didn't help. On the other hand, all the group leaders (GLs for short) were very warm and enthusiastic (whether they were being forced to can be questioned) but the GLs assigned to my group were great.

Ice Breakers!

 For the first day, we generally did a lot of ice breaker related activities to get to know our group members better. We were also taught a number of cheers of which some are unique to each department as departments may engage in spontaneous cheer-offs against each other. Being a management student, some of our cheers would include: "Your test tubes are short" which is directed at the science department and "You talk big, you walk tall, making up for something small!" which can be directed to any department (Yes, a lot of the things were somewhat...suggestive). One my favourite comebacks against the management cheers would be: "Schu-lich Re-jects!" (People in Ontario should get this one).

Party Hard!

 There were also lots of other activities throughout the day, which eventually made me come out of my shell a bit. And to conclude the day, was a foam dance party. (Unfortunately, I didn't stay long enough to witness the "foam" part of it).

Foam Dance Party (without the foam)

I'll be back in a few days reporting on day 2 of frosh.

Do you still remember your first day of frosh? Any cheers that are memorable or unique to your school?

Exam Season

This week is the last week before exams, so I'll be studying and do some last minute craming. As an effect, the frequency of my blog posts will drop over the next 2 weeks (Possibly to 1 post every 2 days).

Not much of a post for today, but I'll do another post in regards to a Japanese game shows for tomorrow.

In the mean time, check out some of my older posts about games, food and more. I'll be studying.

Any tips for studying? How do you prepare for your exams?

University of Toronto Scarborough: First Impressions

So for many Canadians, graduating high school students heading off to post secondary school had to choose their educational institution for next year. I for one, accepted my UTSC (University of Toronto Scarborough Campus) co-op management offer. For those that are not as familiar with University of Toronto, U of T is actually made up of 3 campuses, UTM (University of Toronto Mississauga), UTSG (University of Toronto St. George) and UTSC

For the 2015 Pan Am games, an aquatics and athletics complex (such as 2 Olympic sized pool,
runnings tracks and other facilities) will be available for UTSC students in the future

     Well as I said in the last post (Japanese Treats! Meltykiss Chocolate (Part 3 of 3), I would be visiting UTSC today for the "Ready! Set! Go!" event which is to really get first year students familiarized with course selection and the next steps students should take.I also opt-ed to go for a residence and campus tour.

The infamous trios of smokestacks that
towers over the campus

Upon entering the campus, I encounter a figure that my peers have talked about, the infamous smokestack that makes the building look like a factory.









I also visited various wings of the campus and I'll have to say, some of them look really great and others look not too appealing in my opinion.


The one that didn't appeal to me were the ones that were structured by complete concrete (at least it looked like concrete to me). As you can see below, the whole building's interior is just this dull grey and looks like an unfinished basement to me. Another building also looks like this, but at least they painted a coat of white paint to change the scenery.

Concrete, Concrete Everywhere!

On the bright side, this is the new
Instructional Centre/Management building open for 2011

Besides the infamous smokestacks, some people also know UTSC for its lack of social life. Honestly, I really think this is up to the individual and their involvement in extra curricular activities (this university is a commuter school). I'll once again make a post about life at UTSC once I'm actually a student there. I might make another post about frosh/orientation week.

I do not own or take credit for all of the above images, if you would like them to be taken down, please message me.

So how was everyone else's first experience/impression of their post-secondary institutional? How did you transition from secondary school? Or how is/was your post-secondary school experience altogether?