On 9^th August 2008, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS Civil Engineering Students’ Society (UCITY) organised AutoCAD and Geomatics Classes for secondary school students especially for students who were taking Technical Drawing. The programme is organised as a fund-raising activity for UCITY’s Educational Trip to Johor and Singapore. Among the program’s objectives are to share knowledge and give an early exposure towards AUTOCAD and Geomatics courses in Civil Engineering programme, to encourage the students to achieve their goals through tertiary education and also to promote Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS particularly the Civil Engineering programme.

  

          A total of 61 students have participated in this programme. The participants were from schools around Ipoh and as far from Taiping ; Sekolah Menengah Sains Teluk Intan, Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan (SMK) Matang, SMK Buntong, SMK Kampung Jambu, and SMK Taman Tasik. The participants were divided into two groups: group A and group B.

The participants started to arrive as early as 8.30am. Upon arrival they were provided with breakfast and the opening ceremony commenced at 9.30 am. This programme was officiated by Dr. Nasir Matori, a lecturer from Civil Engineering department. The campus and lab tour were conducted before lunch and after lunch the class commenced for respective groups.

            During the tour session, participants were brought to Information Resource Center (IRC), Chancellor Hall, Block 13 and Block 14. In Block 13, the participants had the opportunity to observe compression test of concrete cube. During the tour session, it had been noted that, the participants are very enthusiastic and amazed with the place they visited, especially the IRC. The tour session ended at 12.30 pm and proceeded with lunch break before the classes commenced at 2pm.

After the break, at 2.00pm, group A proceeded with AutoCAD class while group B proceeded with Geomatics class. The AutoCAD was conducted in Lecture Theatre C4 while Geomatics class was conducted in front of Block 14. The AutoCAD class was led by Mr. Kalaikumar, a lecturer from Civil Engineering department with assistance from several students as facilitators. Mr.Kalaikumar gave a brief lecture and continued the session with hands-on activities  in order to provide the opportunity for the participants to do some exercise by themselves.

Meanwhile, for Geomatics class, Mr. Dedi, a graduate assistant has led this session. The group was divided into five small groups and each group was led by 2 facilitators. During this session, the participants were given the exposure to conduct and experience the leveling fieldwork by themselves. The Dumping Level which is a new instrument for them was used to carry out their hands-on.activities. At 4.00 pm, the groups have swapped their session and it ended at 6pm.

It is hoped that activities such as this will be held more frequently in the future as it will be one of the ways for the students of Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS, to contribute back to the community.