Our RHCSA (Redhat Certified System Administrator)

Our RHCSA (Redhat Certified System Administrator) with their certs :-)

These people with many more behind the scenes worked hard towards acheiving RHCSA during the semester in Sept 2012.  Well done!  We look forward to many more to come :-)

CCN Day

Hi everyone!

On the 18th of May 2012, we had our Campus Care Network (CCN) Day. CCN Day Carnival is the signature event of the TP Campus Care Network. It is held twice a year and the whole polytechnic would come together in the spirit of sharing and caring. Staff and students collaborate to set up stalls to raise funds for TP’s needy students in every CCN Day Carnival. The enthusiastic participation of both staff and students shows the caring spirit in Temasek Polytechnic.

My class, C301, decided to set up a cafe style eatery in LT2. We were screening a movie while the customers would patronize our stall. Our stall's name was called 'Famous Lena's' because one of our classmates, Lena, made most of the cakes and pies. Aliah also helped in making other cupcakes and brownies.

Below are some pictures of what we sold.

We are thankful to have this opportunity where we could come together to help charity and also bond as a class. All the time and effort spent to set this up was worth it as all of us had enjoyed ourselves. I'm looking forward to the next CCN day! Are you? (:

Girls in Tech D+D Day

On 26^th May, Saturday, four girls from DFS, Verbena, Kiki, Xiu Mei and Crystal, went for Google’s D+D Day. It is in collaboration with Girls in Tech and Thought Works. It started from 9am with the opening speech by Girls in Tech Singapore. The speaker talked about 4 Es, engage, empower, educate and energize. To engage, empower, educate and energize like-minded, professional, intelligent and influential women in technology. That was in the context of Girls in Tech. In the context of DFS, it is to engage people in IT security and forensic to empower them with the skills in it by educating them with the required knowledge and skills. Hence it will energize like-minded, professional, intelligent and influential people in Digital Forensics.

The second speaker is by Thought Works Design Department. The most impressionable thing I remember from the second speaker is the democratization of design. How everyone should be a part of designing something so to meet the needs of the consumer better.

Then the third speaker is from Google. He talked about 6 things of Google. Google App Engine, Monetarism, Android, Google Maps, Google + and Google Chrome. It was the first time we felt that we know so much about Google. He also showed us an interesting video of Project Glass which they have already been starting to test it.

Last but not least, the last speaker of the day is from Thought Works Development Department. From him, we learnt a lot of important people in the history of IT such as Ada Lovelace, the first programmer in history and etc.

Then it was Tai Chi Session which was quite fun stretching after sitting for a few hours listening to the speeches. Then it was lunch and after lunch we get to choose which workshop we want to attend. There were 1 design and 3 development workshops. We chose to go for the design workshop and one thing we learnt in the design workshop is design can be done by just simple shapes.

Finally, it was Q&A session with the panel of speakers. From those questions, we learnt a lot about things that we would learn in school so overall it was a great experience there.

Girls in tech in Singapore 

Cambodia Trip :)

Hello :)

We are a the Pioneer batch of Digital Forensics!
A group of us went to Cambodia.

                                This is a group photo of us who went!

To find out more about out trip, click on the links below :)

        Schools!          Temples         the Royal Palace           Night Markets $$

Cambodia Trip part 1

Hello readers,

During our trip to Cambodia, we had an amazing time visiting Samrong High School over 3 days. On the night before visiting the school, we spent quite an amount of time planning and coming up with activities to carry out for the students whom we would be visiting the following day. Some examples of activities we came up with include 3-legged race, dog and bone, treasure hunt, monkey and many others. These activities were especially catered to address to their culture such that not much physical contact would be involved as after all that is part of their culture.

On the first day of the visit, we started out on the activities that we planned for the students. Of course, some self-introduction had to be done before we could carry out our activities, and from this we already noticed the communication barrier between us and the students there. Nevertheless, we carried out with the activities but we tried to accommodate for the communication barrier by speaking slower and in simpler English, once in a while repeating ourselves. When all these failed, we sought help from the tour guide to translate to the students on our behalf, especially in explaining out the activities’ details so that they would run smoothly.

One of the many things we noticed is that the students were rather conservative; boys and girls did not feel comfortable playing together and it was in a way not carried as we had planned it to be. Besides that, the tables and chairs weren’t suitable for some of the activities we had planned, such as musical chairs (the chairs could not be moved). Fortunately, we had some backup activity plans for such incidences but they weren’t enough to cater for the entire day. Despite that the students still tried their best to cooperate with us and play along with whatever we planned.

On the night of return, we brainstormed more activities and even resorted to forgoing our sleeping time to do so in order to have the second day run more smoothly. We did whatever we could and from there we prayed for the best for the second day.

So came day 2 of visit, we went much better prepared, thus the morning activities ran more smoothly. Everything seemed to run smoothly, until the rain came about, which totally dampened our mood. During lunchtime, we had to come up with activities that could cater for wet weather. Nevertheless, we still came up with the plans and our activities could be carried out once the students returned from lunch, and the day ran smoothly. To our surprise, towards the evening there were some activities planned for us by the Cambodians and this was our chance to have our first hands-on at the Cambodian games. It was awe-inspiring and much fun.

Finally, came day 3, the last day which we could have the bonding with the students of the High School student of Samrong High. However, activities on this day were much slightly different; instead of spending time with the students and planning activities like the previous 2 days, we actually paid visits to some of the students’ families residing within walking distances of the school. We observed, and realized that the houses had no toilets, no cooking appliances, and the living condition was rather cramped as well. After visiting the families houses, it was the finale; the closing ceremony. Samrong High school organized and planned more of their local games for us to experience, and in addition to those games, we learned their way of dancing. Finally, after well over 1 hour of dancing, they expressed their gratitude towards us and the closing ceremony came to an end. It was hard for us, to say our goodbyes, for we knew that, it was not just a goodbye, but a farewell.

Now that we’re back in Singapore, as we make a comparison of the environment between our schools and theirs, we realize the vast difference and how blessed we actually are. For example, Samrong high school had no canteens; during their lunch breaks, they went out of school or even home for lunch.  In addition to that, their classrooms had zero form of electricity, no fans, no air-cons, just the wind. The Cambodian school had very bad sanitation facilities as well; there was no flushing system in their toilets.

To sum things up, visiting Samrong High School really made us look at life from a different perspective. We really learned to appreciate what we are blessed with in Temasek Polytechnic.

Below are some pictures we took of the school :)