UTAR Awareness Campaign 2021 promotes mental health

The Sky is Everywhere (Photo retrieved from Awareness Campaign Facebook page)

2020 was a year full of uncertainty and challenges. To witness 2021 filled with optimism and hope, the Awareness Campaign (AC) staged another comeback this year with the theme ‘The Sky is Everywhere’. It was organised by the UTAR Department of Student Affairs of Sungai Long Campus’ Counselling and Guidance Unit (CGU). The campaign saw various workshops and games hosted for its students and the public via Microsoft Teams.

The campaign aimed to provide a platform for the participants to seek their support system, enhance their knowledge, and improve their strength and self-skills throughout the activities. On top of that, it also aimed to create awareness on the importance of mental health while coping with the pandemic.

Hand gesture guessing in “Move Your Fingers” session

A virtual game session titled “Move Your Fingers” was organised on 8 Jan 2021. It was facilitated by its committee member Eunice Tiu Hew Voon.  To carry out this game, the game master will show an image of hand gestures for the participants to guess the word. Each hand gesture represents an alphabet. There were a total of 21 levels in the game session from guessing a word formed with four alphabets to a word formed with ten alphabets. Each word had its own meaning, “Confident” for instance; it means— we must always be confident with ourselves! It is important in every process we walk through.

Each hand gesture represents an alphabet

The hand gestures for the word “Love”

Participants guessing the answer in the chatbox (circled in red)

To become the winner for this game, participants were given 30 seconds to think and answer each question within five seconds. Marks will only be rewarded to the first participant of each level who answered correctly.

Eunice Tiu (first and second photo: top row, far left) with participants in session one and two

Exercise our creativity with “Scrapbook Making Workshop”

A “Scrapbook Making Workshop” was organised on 9 January 2021. It was facilitated by its committee member Lee Jie Anne. Invited to be the speaker was UTAR Department of Soft Skills Competency of Sungai Long Campus Assistant Lecturer Nur Farahin binti Bahari. Farahin has been teaching the subject MPU34072 Arts, Crafts and Design for four years in UTAR. She is experienced in conducting craft workshops and sharing sessions.

Farahin

Throughout the workshop, the participants were taught to make two patterns of Scrapbook, namely Waterfall Scrapbook and Diamond Scrapbook. To create the scrapbook, the participants were required to prepare cardstocks, colour paper, glue, pencil and scissors.

Waterfall Scrapbook

Diamond Scrapbook

“Scrapbook is an interesting way for us to record things that we want to keep. Last time, the scrapbooks were similar to the exercise books. However, as time passed, it has undergone a lot of changes. Nowadays, we can find scrapbooks in different patterns and shapes. We can also create our own scrapbooks. Usually, I choose colours that are contrasting to create the scrapbook because the purpose of having a scrapbook is to make it more vibrant; it helps our eyes to easily capture the things that we wish to keep in it,” said Farahin.

The making of Waterfall Scrapbook

The making of Diamond Scrapbook

Pretty handmade scrapbooks to retain the memories of the participants

The workshop was wrapped up with an interactive Q&A session and a group photo session. It saw the participation of more than 70 participants.

Farahin (second row, far right) with participants

Mental Awareness Testing with “Lightning Round”

Another game session titled “Lightning Round” was organised on 10 January 2021. It was facilitated by committee member Anna Sharmini.  To conduct the game, a link to join the Kahoot! website was shared by the game master. There was a total of 15 questions regarding the mental awareness topic.

Kahoot! Website awaiting participants to join in

Questions relating to mental awareness

Anna Sharmini (second photo: top row, far left) with participants

Basic Female Face Make-up Workshop

Aimed to provide a platform for the ladies, especially the beginners to learn make-up, a “Basic Female Face Make-Up Workshop” was organised on 10 January 2021.  It was facilitated by its committee member Mallini K. Selvarajah. Invited to be the speaker was UTAR Faculty of Accountancy and Management (FAM) Assistant Manager Helina Lopus.  Helina is a beauty practitioner who loves make-up and shares her make-up skills with people around her.

Helina

“Wearing make-up makes us look confident. It has been an essential part of women’s lives from ancient times. The trend has been changing and more trend and variant on make-up is being added up almost every day,” said Helina.

Helina explaining the steps for a beautiful make-up transformation

She then continued, “Before wearing a proper make-up, we must know our skin condition and skin type to look for the suitable products, so that we know which type of cleanser, moisturiser and make-up products can fit us well. It is important to use the right skincare for our skin. What works for our best friends, may not work for us. We can always look for pharmacy and lookup for the expert and they will do the recommendation. Avoid using cosmetics that may dry or irritate our skin. Try to invest in quality make-up products for the desired outcome. On top of that, it is also important to understand our skin index for the right foundation.”

Basic make-up essentials for a complete make-up

“I would suggest using dry compact powder to make our make-up stay longer especially for the oily skin type, instead of using sebum powder. Because sometimes sebum powder will rinse out the oil in our skin and make our skin look oily,” said Helina. Meanwhile, she also gave a piece of advice to the participants to use cleanser and moisturiser right after using make-up remover to retain a healthy and moisturised skin.

Make-up tutorial with Helina

Having to choose a suitable foundation is important during the make-up

Helina after a beauty make-up

Helina (top row, second from right) with participants

Relax with Yoga Workout

On 11 January 2021, a session titled “Relax with Yoga Workout” was organised. It was facilitated by its committee member Vaishnevi Nair Mohan. Invited to be the speaker was FAM Department of Building & Property Management Dr Sheelah Sivanathan who graduated from Shakthi School of Yoga (SSOY) in December 2019. For the past two and a half years, she had managed to grasp every spiritual essence of Yoga including Asanas, Pranayama, Meditation, Shatkarmas, Asthanga Vinyasa flow and other theoretical as well as practical aspects of Yoga. Through her passion for Yoga, she believes that she will be able to form a supportive community reaching each other with a healthy and strong body, mind and soul.

Dr Sheelah

“Yoga aims to balance and harmonise our body, mind and soul. Yoga is a mind and body practice, so that we will always be aware of our breathing. When we control our breathing, we can control our minds. It is done through the practice of Asana breathing, Pranayama and also meditation. The practice of Asana is very important in Yoga. We should always breathe through our nose and coordinate our breathing with Asana practices. It will help us become physically, mentally and emotionally steady, calm and strong,” said Dr Sheelah.


Some poses of “Hatha Surya Namaskar” demonstrated by Dr Sheelah

“Dhanurasana (bow pose)” effective for weight lose

“Shavasana” is a must to do after Yoga for relaxing our mind and body

The session saw the participation of more than 50 participants.

Dr Sheelah (top row, far left) with participants

Knowledge testing with “Understanding Surroundings”

With the aim to understand the sensory information that appears in our environment, a virtual game session titled “Understanding Surrounding” was organised on 12 January 2021.  It was facilitated by committee member Anna Sharmini. To carry out the game session, the game master will name a broad category and the participants would have to type out the answer as many as possible according to the category given. They will be given one minute to think and answer in the chatbox within five seconds. There was a total of ten categories to complete; the participant with the highest mark was the winner of the game.

The definition was given along in each of the categories for the participant to think and answer

Group photo session with Anna Sharmini (first and second photo: top row, far left) with session one and two participants

Guess “Who or What am I?”

An interesting game session titled “Who or What am I?” was organised on 14 January 2021. It was facilitated by its committee member Wong Zhi Qing. For this game session, the game master showed a picture of a figure, cartoon character and iconic building, to name a few, for the participants to guess the answer. The participants were given five seconds to think and five seconds to type the answer in the chatbox. The first participant for each round who answered the questions correctly was rewarded one mark and the participant who accumulated the highest mark was the winner.

Example of a question (left) and the participants’ answers (right)

Wong (left photo: third row, far right) with session one and two participants

Mastering skills in “Shooting Techniques and Sharing Session”

Another session called “Shooting Techniques and Sharing Session” was organised on 16 January 2021. It was facilitated by committee member Christina Choy Yee Lin. The sharing session was conducted by AMO Creative Media Founder-cum-Learnable Founder Robin Seng Chor Keat.  Robin Seng is also a Video Producer and Video Marketing Mentor. He has 14 years of experience in Practical Video Production; he has produced more than one thousand videos personally, trained more than 50 professionals and has interviewed more than 300 businesses. He was also a UTAR alumnus who graduated with Second Class Honours (Upper Dividend) in the year 2010 in Bachelor of Engineering (Honours) Materials and Manufacturing Engineering.

Robin Seng

Robin Seng began his session with a brief introduction about his background and achievement. He said, “The ultimate objective for businesses to make a video or take a photo of a product is because they need it to help them to generate sales. I make the video for marketing purposes. So, my goal is not to help them just take video or photo but to help them generate sales through my video and photos. I make online videos; I need to take care from the pre-production stage to the post-production stage,” said Robin Seng.

Robin Seng giving a brief introduction on how a photo or video is captured

“Light is everything. It is the key to shooting photography from the technical side. So, when we take a picture or video, we must pay attention to the light,” emphasised Robin Seng. He then continued, “The FPS in the video, we call it ‘Frame per second’ and in a photo, we call it ‘Photo per second’. A photo captures just a single picture, but a video is the combination of multiple photos within a period of time.” He then played a video clip to show the differences between 30 fps and 120 fps of a video.

“As one said, ‘One picture tells a thousand words’. It is important for us to understand the purpose of taking a photo or video so that we can convey our message clearly. A photographer is more important than the camera. We must grow our minds and feeling to come up with a good photo. When we take a picture, we must see with our eyes, think with our mind and feel with our heart,” said Robin Seng.

Robin Seng sharing the three stages of production for producing a video

While sharing the three stages of production, he said, “Pre-production is the key. If we plan wrongly, what we shoot and edit for the video will also wrong. So we have to spend more time on planning during the pre-production stage then only go to production and editing.” Meanwhile, he also shared some tips and tricks of photography.

Robin Seng emphasising on the importance of paying attention to the light direction for a good outcome

An example which shows the importance of capturing a photo from the right angle

Focusing on the subject is a must to avoid split scene shown on the left

A picture tells a thousand words with three steps

Some “behind the scenes” created with Adobe Premiere Pro

The sharing session then ended up with an interactive Q&A session and a group photo session. It saw a participation of more than 70 participants.

Robin Seng (top row, far left) with participants

Lightning Scavenger Hunts

The interactive virtual game titled “Lightning Scavenger Hunts” was organised on 16 January 2021. It was facilitated by its committee member Lim Fang Fang.

To execute the game, participants were required to download the Microsoft Teams application on their phones. The game master will then shows a picture for the participants to search and take a photo of the item based on the picture shown in 40 seconds. They were then required to post in the chatbox in the next five seconds. A total of ten items was hunted during the game session.

The participants posting the items found in the chatbox (circled in red) based on the picture shown by the game master

Mastering the art of interviewing with “Interview Skills Workshop”

With the aim to help the students to master the art of interviewing and gain some essential tips for a successful interview session, an “Interview Skills Workshop” was organised on 16 January 2021. It was facilitated by committee member Choo Dijane. Invited to be the speaker was Founder of Job Majestic Jess Low who has more than eight years of experience in the recruitment industry. Throughout her journey as a recruiter, she has successfully placed about 5,000 candidates for the job placements.

Jess Low

“Our resume gets us in the door, but our interview determines whether we are offered the position or not,” said Jess Low. She then shared and explained four important things to bring to an interview which were the resume, original and photocopy version of our education certificates, personal work or portfolio and a photocopy of our Identity Card (IC).

A video clip demonstrating a good self-introduction

“It is important for us to do some research on the company background, study the job scopes and get familiar with our resume to relate our experience with the job scopes before the interview session, ” said Jess Low. 

Meanwhile, she also shared the tips to stand out during the interview session and the common mistakes that interviewees usually make during an interview, such as forgetfulness, overly nervous or confident during an interview and wearing wrong attire, “Being arrogant and confident are two different things. Always be aware of our tone when we speak, try to be humble and show our sincerity while we are trying to showcase our strength. That is the way to showcase our confidence. Always greet the interviewer and do not forget to ask their names. Have a simple and concise self-introduction; try to keep it within three minutes. Keep smiling, be confident and be polite throughout the interview session. Attitude is more important than skill-set.”

Some tips to tackle tough questions from the interviewer

“Try to avoid answering interview questions with ‘I could learn or I am willing to learn’. Also, do not give negative opinions about our previous company or boss and do not talk about the terms before the interview session starts. Once our interview session is completed, always thank the interviewer; we can also write an appreciation email after the interview. Do ‘Ask Question’, this is important to show our interest to join the company,” explained Jess Low. She also shared some ways to adapt to sudden situations that may occur during an interview.

The workshop was wrapped up with an interactive Q&A session and a group photo session. It saw a participation of more than 150 participants.

Jess Low (top row, second from left) with participants

One of the participants, Nur Shafain binti Omar said, “Throughout the interview skills workshop, I learned to dress well and prepare for the tough questions which will be asked by the interviewer. Always have confidence when answering the questions because sometimes the questions asked is to test our strength and capability. On top of that, being confident is important to carry out our daily activities. With confidence, people can be persuaded by our capabilities.”

Another participant, Priyadarshini Visvalingam said, “The workshops organised were indeed beneficial. I am a person who has no make-up experience. Throughout the make-up workshop, I learnt about the products and the colours which are suitable for my skin. Most importantly, I get to know the steps to apply the make-up from A to Z. Besides that, the ‘Hatha Surya Namaskar’ and some breathing techniques which were taught in the Yoga workshop was very useful. I have learned to calm down and distress myself throughout the workshop. Last but not least, the interview skills workshop was also a fruitful one because I learned the tips to tackle the questions which will be asked by the interviewer and how I should use my body language correctly. Most importantly, I learned to greet the interviewer and be confident while answering the questions.”

Last but not least, Chye Ming Kang, who is also a participant said, “Among the games session organised, the questions asked in the ‘Lightning Round’ game session are much related to the campaign theme.  It was fruitful and meaningful. After all, it raises the awareness of students on their anxiety or stress issues that have been ignored by people because people do not see it as an issue. This game, it has pointed out the symptoms of a person who is overloaded with stress and how we can offer our help.  With this, we can help the people around us who are suffering from stress or anxiety in proper ways.”



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