I would
like to use the kind services of this medium to, as it were, cast a Light on
the University of the West Indies and the administration and its Students, who
appear, despite their Degree, to still be un-Enlightened!
Students
who, despite being aware that we are now in the midst of a recovery from the
effects of the recession in the United States of America, still is plodding
unwarily on as if none such event had occurred and all was as before as
evidenced form their reaction and comments as stated in the article “'Not
Credible'”, published Sunday March 28, 2010 by Daraine Luton, Senior Staff
Reporter, Gleaner Writer, The Sunday
Gleaner
For
albeit new and returning Students are now facing an increase in their tuition
to alleviate the shortfall in the UWI’s Budget resulting in the Government of
Jamaica having this grand educational institution support more of the cost of
privilege of tertiary education, UWI is still visibly spending on edifices and
unnecessary services and still not capitalizing on areas of revenue that are
yet to be fully exploited.
This is
by investing in technology that will future proof the University of the West
Indies by making its operations more efficient and cost effective via a Social
Partnership with the Private and Public Sector, both Local Corporate and FDI
(Foreign Direct Investors) to fund the overall cost of tuition at the
University of the West Indies and other Universities.
One of
these unexploited revenue opportunities for the University to increase its
revenues from Students is car parking. Currently on Campus, Students who are
privileged enough to have their parents loan them a motor vehicle or those who
have their own, can park on Campus completely for free.
Curiously,
lecturers’ parking spots, albeit reserved and erroneous usage by unwary
Students punishable by clamping and a JA$5000 fine (possibly increased along
with tuition?), are paid for by the lecturers, as evident from their salary
deductions noticeable on their pay stubs as well as the ‘M’ sticker affixed to
the windscreen of their various modes of transport, as varied as the Faculties
on Campus.
In the
tuition fee breakdown, which can be viewed on the University of the West Indies
website, it does not indicate where Students are paying for their parking
spaces, or should one assume that this “parking fee” is bundle somewhere under
one of the payments in the “Miscellaneous Fees and Charges Section” or an
unseen addend to the Tuition (highly possible, as UWI has never explained the
mathematics, despite however simple it may be, of how they calculate each
year’s Tuition increase)?
If it is,
as the case may certainly be, that I am getting blind in my old age, then it
would be good that the University indicate where this charge is to Students for
parking, otherwise it would mean that I am yet again correct.
It would
seem that Students are living the life, driving and getting free parking with
motor vehicles that may not necessarily belong to them, and thus the University
of the West Indies can charge them a fee (how does JA$3000 per month sound?) to
have the right and the privilege akin to that of a lecturer – not to mention
the sticker – that would allow them to park on Campus any at all.
Many of
these Students already flaunt Campus Security by parking in Lecturer’s parking
spaces, but get billed later around exam time, forcing them to pay or be unable
to sit exams. A similar deterrent strategy can also be employed to force
compliance i.e. Students registering the vehicle they use to travel to the
Campus, collect a sticker, preferably in bright yellow marked “S” for Students
and be made to pay a monthly fee of JA$3000 (or higher) per month to park on
Campus – with the usual clamping fee for parking in reserved spaces.
Thus
payment becomes my next carrion victim. I am glad that the University of the
West Indies has made strides and has now made it mandatory to have all Students
use the NCB KeyCard Cash facility Campus wide, as this makes all transactions
by Students with UWI cashless.
What
troubles me is there are still transactions that are still being done via cash,
despite the best efforts of the University, as overdue books payments at the
Pure and Applied Sciences and Main Library, payments for broken chemistry lab
equipment, payments for rental of lockers, and purchases from the various
vendors allowed to operate on the University Campus are still being done in
cash.
Efforts
need to be made to not only have these sources of revenue cashless, as it will
get Students more used to the eventual transition in Jamaica as the Government
moves to close the money loop by making all financial transactions and business
transactions cashless – and therefore more easily taxable.
I wish to also impart the fact
that a time is coming worldwide when learning a language will be a must in
order to get a job. Thus, I am hereby recommending to the Administration of the
University of the West Indies that every UWI Students will be made to learn at
least one foreign language (preferably Spanish) which will count towards their
degree in much the same way FD10A and FD13A passes are a current must for
graduation.
Getting employment at companies
as well as pre-selection by companies that are run by multinationals should be
tied to the successful completion and demonstration of fluency in the language
chosen. These measures, once implemented, should improve the overall quality of
Students coming out of the UWI so that they are not only employable outside of
Jamaica in non-English speaking markets but also can work as translators, a job
skill in itself which can earn the graduate additional revenue and may even be
spun off into an alternate career path.
The usage
of computers and the internet also needs to be more streamlined, with Students
access to downloading, video and audio streaming websites and social networking
websites and instant messaging applications capable of VoIP (Voice over IP)
being blocked, as these site are responsible for clogging the network with
traffic and exposing the delicate University ecosystem to viruses, previous
attacks having crippled the Universities Network, especially as more and more
Students have personal laptops and netbooks.
Additionally,
Students accessing the networks on Campus should be given a download/upload cap
per month of 3Gb in addition to logon times of one (1) hour per session, which
should decrease to half (1/2) and hour once the person has exceeded this
download cap for the month, so as to prevent persons from being able to abuse
their access to the Campus Internet.
More use
needs to be made of Open Source applications e.g. Ubuntu Operating system, Open
Office, OURVLE, etc. to replace those applications for which the University
needs a license to put on multiple computers, thereby lowering the University’s
IT costs in the long run.
Students
should only have the ability to use the IM and chat applications on OURVLE and
access to websites pre-screened by the Guild of Students deemed important to
learning and not able to allow Students to engage in downloading, video and
audio streaming, social networking and instant messaging applications capable
of VoIP (Voice over IP).
Computers
also need to be put on a regular maintenance schedule, with computers campus
wide being regularly defragged, virus scanned, software and files being backed
up and files taking up space on hard drives being removed by teams of Students
employed by the University on weekends.
If
Students wish to download what the University of the West Indies does not
allow, they need to purchase a 3G modem from Telecoms Providers LIME or CLARO
or a Digicel WiMaX 4G Mobile (IEEE 802.16d) modem (when it becomes available),
or better yet, a Netbook or Laptop from the aforementioned Telecoms Providers
with the modem already embedded in the Laptop – and see how it feels to have to
pay for your internet access, as most wireless internet access is capped.
Campus
security, long being the bane of endless Students Union Elections, needs to be
once and for all improved by the usage of RFID (Radio Frequency Identification)
tags being incorporated into the Student ID currently being used on Campus as
well as the placement of IR (Infra Red) cameras all over the University and the
improvement of lighting on every square inch of the Campus.
RFID
would allow Campus security to track Students as they move across the Campus
via RFID readers strategically placed at entry points to buildings all over
campus, interconnected via the Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11f). RFID does not require the
Students to visibly wear their Student ID and would help security to verify the
location of Students in case of problems on campus.
Cameras
would assist the Campus Security by altering the behavior of Students, who,
more likely than not, often avoid being caught on camera and thus would refrain
from activities deemed against Campus rules.
Lighting
would also have the same effect, as lighting on the University of the West
Indies is poor, allowing robberies and rapes to easily take place in regions of
the Campus that have no lighting.
Improvements
in only these three (3) aspects would allow for the physical security on campus
to be reduced, making it possible to reduce the cost of security as electronic
security systems are cheaper than armed guards and patrols.
The
environment, especially actions that are seen as Green and good for its overall
health, is now the big thing, and the University also needs to engage in an
expanded Campus wide recycling program, recycling wastewater, Styrofoam, PET
bottles, glass, paper, metal, etc. in a bid to earn revenue which can be given
back to the Students to support not only activities on the various Halls of
Residence.
This
would drastically reducing the money Students have to fork out to pay for Hall
shirts and other Hall related paraphernalia but also the off Campus Students as
well with bursaries for Students who are having difficulty financing their way
through University, as it was originally their waste that the UWI recycled for
cash, with no special requirements, as everyone generates garbage on Campus
that is recyclable.
All that
needs to be done is to demonstrate genuine need and apply for the “mad money”
that the University earned from the sale of the recyclable material, as most
Students, are literally throwing away millions of dollars in recyclable garbage
every month.
Books,
especially those sold in the edifice known as the Campus Bookshop, which
Students only visit to purchase pens, pencils, paper, notebooks and Digicel
credit (all of which are cheaper off campus) should have long ago become
obsolete on Campus, with books being instead being replaced by allowing
Students to rent or buy Amazon Kindle, Sony eReader or the new Apple iPad
eReader devices.
The
University simply needs to approach Amazon CEO Bezos, Sony Ericsson or Apple
and a Telecoms Provider to have the servers set up to allow for the eReader
service of Amazon, Barnes and Noble or Apple to be accessible in Jamaica.
This
would allow Students to purchase books via a facility set up by the University
on the eReader company’s website, once it can be ascertained by the University
of the West Indies that these software versions of the books are available on
eReader company’s website for purchase.
As the
books go straight to the device, copyright of the authors of the work are
protected, as Students cannot remove the books as they are stored on the
device. Best of all, it makes carrying books convenient.
To wit,
transactions within the Administration should have already gone paperless via
the implementation of appropriate software e.g. PeopleSoft, currently being
used at LIME or SAP, currently being used by CLARO and begin the process of
scanning documents into a database and backing them up on an offline Datacenter
e.g. Digicel’s new Datacenter as is currently being done by the NCU (Northern
Caribbean University)
With
assistance from the Physics Department, the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica
and the various generator contractors available island wide, the University of
the West Indies can have their backup generator facility on Campus upgraded, so
as to have all their generators operational whenever power goes away and switch
the entire Campus to the usage of solar power and wind power for air
conditioning, lighting and general power usage.
The
installations would be mounted on the rooftops of the Campus buildings and the
entire University would only revert to JPS Co electricity usage at night,
thereby cutting the bill in half. Also, phone calls can also be routed over the
Campus Intranet via VoIP for both on Campus and off Campus calling, with the
installation of a soft switch PBX (Public Branch Exchange) Server by Avaya,
similar to the system at ScotiaBank (Bank of Nova Scotia) significantly
reducing the cost of Telecoms services used on Campus, as the University’s
phone bill must be enormous.
Though
the cost of these systems may seem huge, the correct partnerships with the
private sector and FDI (Foreign Direct Investors) interested in investing in
the University of the West Indies Infrastructure in exchange for research being
done on their behalf for products and services that can be made profitable,
will yield the funding and the public interest that would make this major
initiative to save energy a success.
Digging
wells on the campus, an idea proposed long ago to the University of the West
Indies, must be revived, especially in the light of the recent water shortages
on campus.
More of
the degree programs being pursued on campus can be jointly hosted, such as the
new Engineering Degree program on campus, which can be jointly hosted with that
at the University of Technology, specifically in the area of Electronics and
Telecoms Engineering. This is as RJR and CVM Communications Group are slated to
go HDTV as per my
blog article entitled “LIME
TV and Broadcasting - Hunt for Red October”.
As such,
their transmission network can be loaned, along with unused microwave antennae,
radio equipment that are still functional but no longer used by the Telecoms
Providers to allow UWI and UTECH Engineering Students to jointly build out
their own network to do in the field testing to make them more well rounded
Electronics and Telecoms Engineers.
Students
must realize that these are very unique times and must seek to, via their
various on campus student Unions, make linkages with the Private and Public
Sector, both Local Corporate and FDI (Foreign Direct Investors) in order to
secure funding both for University and as an after effect, the quality of their
education, as this is how it is done in other foreign countries.
Tax
dollars should not be wasted on giving the privileged few who are part of the
25% who achieve University matriculation status to benefit from taxpayer’s
money, when most of these taxpayers themselves cannot afford to even go to
University, much less have a roof over their heads when their own.
Taxpayer’
money should be funding and reforming the Secondary and Primary education
system, as Tertiary Students are adults and as such more than capable of making
their way through the world, either by seeking out foreign scholarships or
taking advantage of entrepreneurial opportunities that abound.
Especially
with the recent trending down of interest rate spreads and the upbeat mood
among the business community who show a willingness to invest, so long as young
tertiary level students have bright ideas to give their companies and
organizations to maximize their profits and see them into a growth period
during the Recession.
These
measures can all be implemented under a Social Partnership between the
University of the West Indies and the Private and Public Sector, both Local
Corporate and FDI (Foreign Direct Investors) and result in not only a safer
Campus, but one which will be able to operate at a higher level of efficiency
and at lower costs.
This is
with assistance from various partnerships with the Private and Public Sector,
both Local Corporate and FDI (Foreign Direct Investors), as the Government of
Jamaica should in no way have sympathy for University Student, most of who
waste their time at the University.
The
Government of Jamaica can also play its part by forcing the Private and Public
Sector, both Local Corporate and FDI (Foreign Direct Investors) to invest in
Tertiary Education via the provision of not only employment at the companies as
part of their Undergraduate Degree Program.
It would
also provide an avenue for funding research programs for Postgraduate Masters
and PhD students, especially in the Pure and Applied Sciences, which has the
highest concentration of PhD candidates and graduates as stated in the article
“Record
number of UWI PhD graduates in 2009 - Figures attributed to more stringent
measures at the University”, published Friday January 29 2010 by Philip
Hamilton, Gleaner Writer, The Jamaica
Gleaner
This
would be in exchange for tax breaks and tax holidays, as is the case in more
developed Western Economies and Far East Economies such as the United States of
America, Britain and Japan.
In
addition, the links forged via the partnerships required to fund most of these
ideas would enable UWI to finally step into the 21st century, but
this time including the Students, and not just the lecturers and their
research, as showpieces for the Universities overall success.
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