General Education Is It Worth It?

Have you guys ever wondered about how our classes in high school or college would be useful for our future life? Is there one particular class that you feel wasted your time? If you ever felt that, I am on the same boat as you. As many of you guys have known, in our high school or college there is something called general education which serves a purpose to make our knowledge more broad and aware of our surrounding and know a little bit about anything other than our discipline. Indeed it is a good thing to learn and get to know other subjects, but is it going to be something useful for our future life? For me, it is debatable.

On my first blog post, I already introduced myself, but let me refresh your memory in case you forgot. I was a student in City College of San Francisco for 2 years before transferring to San Francisco State University this Spring 2012.  I would talk about the courses that I took in City College because I have only taken few classes here in San Francisco State. I have taken many General Education courses in order to be able to transfer, some of them though are not very enjoyable, yet very time consuming. Many of you might have taken History classes, some of you might find it interesting, yet for me it was one of those classes that I dislike the most. I took History 1 and History 17A back then when I was still in City College. Those two History classes are the worst in my whole college life. It is not that I do not respect American History, but I felt that I need to learn everything from zero due to the fact that I did not born here. Obviously, there were many people in my class that have taken U.S History class before in which would help them a lot to understand all the materials given in the class. That class had two research papers which were eight pages long each. What made it worst was that I did not really understand the topic because I had to do research about Indian tribe in which I never really learn or have a chance to get to know their history. Like what I have said in the beginning, some people might argue that it would help me to understand American history since I am a new-comer. However, as you guys know my major is in Information System which does not have any relation to U.S History. I am not saying that other general education classes are not the same, but due to the amount of work that I had to do for my History class, I would say that it was The worst general education class that I have ever taken.

My most useful class though would be ISYS 350 that I took in here in San Francisco State. This class is one of the required major class in order for you to be able to register into a higher-ranked class (ISYS 471, ISYS 464, etc). In my opinion, this class is very useful because it covers a lot of programming languages such as C# and Java Web Design. Even though some people say that this is one of the hardest class in ISYS major, yet I feel that this class is actually interesting because we will learn how to design a website and how to make it work. Furthermore, we also will learn how to use Visual Basic in order to be able to run C# . For those of you who have basic knowledge on C++ should not have a hard time learning C# since they are very similar. However, I also believe that this class become fun and enjoyable due to the professor who taught this class. He explains everything visually and do it step by step and open to any questions that the student may have. I always feel that teacher is one of the most crucial aspect in learning effectiveness. Unorganized and boring teacher will make student to become less motivated to actually pay attention to the lecture which resulting in bad performance in the class and learn nothing.

In the end, this is my personal thought and experience. Everyone can have different opinion from me and I am not urging anyone not to take History classes, but I am discussing about how I feel that some of my previous classes and how it would affect my career.

English Literacy in our Working Environment

Do you guys ever wonder about how our English class would be useful for us later on? For me, I do not see the connection between writing essay and doing Information System works. There is no way my boss would hire me based on how good my essays are, so I always feel that writing essay is only an obligation for me as a student. However, there is also a part of me that curious whether my belief is true or not, so I asked Cameron Taslim, one of my friends who I interviewed for my previous blog. He  is currently working in IT department, so I believe I can get an idea whether learning writing and reading in college would be useful for our work-life or not.

Cameron told me that even though the writing and reading that he does at this work is not exactly the same as the teaching that we get in our English class, yet it is still helpful for us to know professional writing skill, because nobody would hire someone that cannot write in a good manner. Meaning that it has to look professional, understandable, and clear. Furthermore, he told me that the only reading he would have in his department is progress report and technical report. Progress report is a report send to the IT department for them to see how the IT system working in the office environment, is it working properly? Is there any known issue going on? On the other hand, technical report is a report send to the IT department if there is any known issue that has been spotted before. These report requires a good reading skill because you have to understand all the small details, so he assumed that reading in school should help a lot in this area. 

On the other hand, Cameron explained to me that good writing skill is a must for his department. His department is the one who wrote all the company policies and web documents. So, without good writing skill there is no way you will be able to write a professional-looking policy. He told me a story about how there was someone in his department who never took English classes seriously, and when he was asked to write the policy he really had a hard time to do it, not because he is stupid or anything like that, but he does not understand the concept of a good writing. Even though many of you guys might never even bother to read a company policy, yet it is still important to write it professionally because for those who cares about the small details these kind of things would be crucial. So, obviously that writing skill that we learnt from our school would be very useful for our job later on.

Learning this from Cameron changes my perspective about English literacy that we learn in our school. Even though I still believe that essay is not the most effective way for us to learn it, yet now I believe that we should try to absorb as many knowledge as possible about writing and reading from our school life because it might be one of the things that determine whether we would get a job or not.

I found a very interesting video on YouTube about how a mute person trying to explain that writing skill is very important for our job. (For those of you that does not understand the sign language like me, you can click "show more" on the description box. Here is the video :

Information Technology Daily Life

Have you ever wondered what your future might be like? Well, I have, and I am always curious about it. Whether it is going to be fun or is it going to be a nightmare. On my first blog post, I mentioned that Information System originally was not my first choice of major, yet I finally decided to get into this discipline because I want to have a promising future, a job that could give me top notch lifestyle.

As I only have a limited insight to the working environment, I interviewed one of my friends, Cameron Taslim, who has been working first hand at Consensus Corp for about 18 months. Cameron, like myself, is also an Indonesian. He graduated from San Jose State University with a Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science. You guys might wonder why I chose someone from Computer Science when I obviously have explained before that Information System and Computer Science are not the same thing. The reason why is because he is not working as a software programmer right now. He is more into the Information Technology department which handles the company networking system, both software and hardware support; his job is to purchase IT related equipments, setting projectors and meeting rooms, assisting people who have problem with their softwares, emails, building security cameras or alarms, and many more things that are related to IT.

So, what is this Consensus Corp, you might ask. Not many know about its existence, which I also did not at first, because they used to be called LetsTalk.com inc which is a popular cell phone re-seller company. Brightstar corp has just recently taken over them and is planning to change the whole system of the company – from their company name, their products, and the infrastructure itself. Previously, LetsTalk inc was a cell phone re-seller company which sells similar things like any other well-known cell phone sellers such as AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, and Sprint would sell. One thing that makes LetsTalk different from other popular cell phone sellers, however, is that LetsTalk does not offer any call services, they basically only sell cell phones but in a much cheaper price than those other sellers. Take for example, someone who wants to buy Samsung Galaxy III from Verizon, T-Mobile, or Sprint might need to pay something around $200, yet LetsTalk offers the same phone for only $70, so you would save a lot of money if you decide to buy the phone from LetsTalk. The only downpart of LetsTalk is that they do not carry Apple products. LetsTalk used to be exclusive to only online business, but after Brightstar took over them, they now have a physical place which is located in Embarcadero area in San Francisco.

Cameron lives in San Jose area, so he commutes from San Jose to San Francisco almost everyday. It is about 50 minutes drive to Embarcadero BART station, and then he would walk from there to his workplace. I asked him about how he feels about his job – whether or not he enjoys it. He told me that he enjoys his job right now, but would love to work in a software programming company since he is originally a computer-science guy. Cameron then explains that his job does not relate with anything he learned in school. When he first entered the company, he needed to learn everything from basic. He even told me that after working there for 18 months he only knows a fraction of things that he should do in his department. This is true to a lot of people. Many think that school would prepare them for the real job, but it turns out that it is not necessarily true. What would probably better prepare us for what is coming up is an internship at a company where we can get a hand on experience working at the field. I then asked about the average income one would receive working in this career; Cameron told me that because he is a newcomer, his annually salary is about $60,000 which is not bad for a starter compared to other jobs. I was curious with the advantages and disadvantages working as a full-timer compared to part-timer. Cameron said that the obvious benefit of working as a full-timer is the working hour. A full-time job would have a much more working hour than a part-time job, resulting in better income for full-timers. Also, aside from the hours, working full-time means employees will receive medical benefits that the company would provide, which is one thing to aim for when looking for a job. There is a disadvantage, however, of working full-time job – because employees are paid annually, working overtime does not mean they would get paid extra.

Next, I asked Cameron about the relationship between employees at his workplace – whether it is more of a horizontal or vertical. For those of you who do not understand what horizontal and vertical relationship is, you could click on this article, Differences Between Horizontal & Vertical Organizations by Arnold Anderson, Demand Media which would help you a lot in understanding the differences between the two. Cameron then answered that it is more a horizontal relationship due to the fact that they are a re-starting company, so that there is no real hierarchy between the managers and the staffs. In most cases, the manager would work together and help them in order to achieve the outcome they have targeted, which is good to hear since it seems to be less tension at his workplace.

Sadly, that was all I could ask him because he needed to finish up his work, however, I received a lot of useful information about the work field. Even though I have never worked here in United States before, yet Cameron's explanation gives me an idea of how real working place would be like. Right now, I feel a little anxious knowing about how our school education would not help a lot in our work life. However, that does not reduce my impatience to immediately enter the working environment.

What pro says about Information System (Review)

In my first blog, I wrote about my major, what I want to do with that major, and what my major offers me for my future. In the second blog, I wrote about blogging -- what it is and what makes it different from other content writings. In this blog, I would like to talk about the combination between those two blogs -- combination between talking about my major and blogging itself; also, how I will try to see other people's blogs that have similar discipline and interest with me.

The first website that I would like to talk about is a blog by Tim Funk, What the Heck is Information System. This article can be seen by clicking this link: http://www.mycollegesandcareers.com/2011/03/what-the-heck-is-information-systems/ In this article, Tim Funk talks about how he meets a lot of people who try to act like they know what Information System is when they really have no idea what it really is. This is not a super-long blog, yet I feel that it conveys the important points of what Information System really is and what kind of jobs are available in this discipline. Another pro that I see from his article is that he uses a laid-back, conversational language to speak his words; this writing style makes his writing become much more enjoyable and easy to follow. It is also a good thing to have "about me" section on his blog because it shows the readers that he has a good knowledge in this type of work-field. However, there are a couple of things that could be added into the article which could improve his blog. The first one would be providing outside sources that would strengthen his points and gives more credibility to the writing. Another thing that I feel could be improved in his blog is the development of the context. Even though his blog touches a lot of important things, yet there are many sentences that need to be explained in better detail. For example, Funk says, "It is one of the best degrees in a down economy because it is essentially a combination of two degrees(accounting and business and will help open twice as many doors after you graduate" -- why Information System is combination between accounting and business? This sentence is confusing because he does not say anything about how Information System and accounting are related.

Another blog that I find really interesting is Career Options in Information System Management written by Rhonda Campbell, Demand Media. This blog is much longer than the previous one, focuses on the type of job that Information System students can expect when they graduate from school. This blog is much more solid than the previous one because it clearly shows the direction that the writer is focusing on. Campbell explains each job with great details and provides the salary information for each job and what is being expected to be done. Another strong point on this blog is that the writer provides the sources that strengthen the points. The only thing that I feel that is lacking is the visual of this blog, the writer could have added some videos of people who are currently working in this discipline. This blog can be seen on http://work.chron.com/career-options-information-system-management-2323.html

Blog, is it fun or not?

Blogging – we often hear it – people getting popular because of their blog sites, gaining fans as they add the contents of their pages. Many people might think that a blogger is the same as a magazine writer or newspaper editor. However, they are not the same in terms of interest and writing philosophy. Every blogger would or should have his own writing style and his specialties; there are bloggers who love to talk about their own personal experiences and there are also bloggers who prefer to discuss popular events around them. There are many different genres of blogs, from sport blog to cooking blog. People choose blogging as a way to express themselves, like they would make a personal diary for themselves, except blogging means their personal diaries would be seen (or intended to be seen) by the whole world. But really, what is a blog? What differentiates it from other types of writing? Is it something similar as our essays or is it more like our Facebook posts? Every person might have different answer for this, but for me comparison between blog and other writings would be very objective, because all of them have their own uniqueness and have their own “fun.”

My sister used to be a blogger back when she was still in college. At that time I did not know what a blog was and what differentiated it from an article in a magazine. I tried to read her blog, yet did not find it interesting because she wrote about dietary procedure and things that were related to it. Thinking of that makes me wonder, what is the real “genre” of a blog itself that really differentiate it from article, essay, or journal? I feel that blog is much more entertaining than an article, because in most articles, the writers will only state facts and the researches about the topic that they are writing about. On the other hand, blogger should be able to express their own opinion, spice up the argument by raising controversial arguments, yet is still able to provide credible sources in which support the arguments. Without those sources, a blog will look dull and unprofessional, who wants to read a blog that full of lies anyway?

Here is one article that talks about what differentiate content writing with blog writing, (Difference Between Content Writing and Blog Writing). The author of this article, Vivcek Sharma explains in depth the difference between article and blog. Unlike article, he believes that in blog there is a room for improvement for the writer to edit the blog later on, which is a good thing since it is very flexible for the writers. On the other hand, in an article, the final post has to be perfect or else the writing will look amateur and unprofessional. Basically, what I learnt from reading this article is that writing a blog is a never ending process. Readers will simultaneously give feedbacks to the bloggers on what they think could be improved, and bloggers may take note on that for future. Blog is more laid out writing process in which the basic idea is to engage with other person, try to get feedback as much as one could. I believe that this is a much more efficient process for “student writers” because, unlike the experienced writers, we as students are still learning all of the writing processes. We are still experimenting on what is our best writing style, which way do we enjoy our writing the most, and more, so blogging could be used as a practice tool to improve our writing and conversational skills.

So, can we write a blog very informally unlike those essays that we do in most of our English classes? Well, yes we could, but our blog will most likely to lose its credibility and professionalism. Even though blogs certainly are not as formal as our essay assignments and those articles in newspaper, yet it still requires a good grammatical structure, a valid point and argument, and of course it has to be entertaining. In fact, there are many blogs that look like article or vice versa. (Difference Between Blog and Article) I found this link which discusses about this argument with much greater explanation. The author of this post explains about the difference that really divides these two are writing into two different things. "By writing an article instead of a blog, readers perceive that care has been taken in writing an article and therefore the information contained must be trustworthy. On the other hand, customers may suspect that a blog will have a personal spin to it and the writers are trying to promote something that they have vested interest in. If your aim is to market a product or service, then better use an article. If you have no marketing intention but merely want to get something off your chest, by all means create a blog."


In the end, I think that blogging would be much more interesting for those who do not really seek for a writing that will give an intense feeling when reading it, yet still would give them, as readers, a new fresh idea of the topic that the writer brings up. I feel that blogging is intended for those writers who love to express their thoughts and feelings without being judged and criticized by other people yet will still be able to get feedback and comments on what could be improved on the writing. Unlike articles and essays which focus on the content and the structure of the writing, blog is more like a continuous writing process that focuses on the interaction between the writer and the reader. However, it all comes down to personal taste – some people prefer to read an article because they believe it is more reliable, while others might find article boring and prefer to read a blog because there is more interaction between the writer and the readers. So, which one do you prefer?