Community Service Initiative
001
This module was involved in service learning which will assist us in developing personal and social responsibility.
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Our project was to rejuvenate a library for the Orang Asli children to provide better education environment and resources for them.
This module involve students from different semester given with different task to achieve. Semester 6 were given the task on finding sponsorship based on information and contacts gotten from our internship company to assist our findings.
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We were later assign into groups to receive specific sponsorship that we are focus onto. I joined the furniture group where we are suppose to find sponsorship for children furniture and donations for this service.
initiative:
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"acts that have been act out within you."
INFORMATION
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4 - 18 years old, children and teenagers.
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Designing based on the age for 4 - 7 to encourage schooling.
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20 UPSR students, 5 PT3 students, 3 SPM students.
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Overall site dimension: 10800(L) X 7300(W) X 5000(H)
SPONSOR TEAM INFORMATION
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Paint​
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Bookshelves
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Reading materials: books, magazines (kid & teenager - kindergarten, primary & secondary)
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Stationary
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Furniture: Tables, Chairs, White board, Wall fan
For the first week, I contacted my previous senior colleague, hoping to obtain contacts for furniture suppliers to donate for this service​. I managed to get one contact from them, however I was told that the supplier most likely would not willing to donate.
Although it was a disappointment, I decide to keep this contact as back-up, in case we could not get any donations at all.
002
For the second week, our class were cancelled as we do not have sufficient information to proceed to the next step. However, we still had a group meeting, discussing about each member's progress and ending up developing an issue. Therefore, we have to come up with different options to counter the regarding issue we face and the task we need to accomplish.
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TO DO LIST
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Official Letter
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Finding sponsors / companies
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Amount for furniture needed
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BEANBAGS !! x4
PROGRESS
By far, only 1 person of our group manage to get sponsor on furniture as it is still in pending state to get the correct amount of furniture we wanted for this project. As most of us did not have contacts for furniture suppliers, we came out with a solution which is to either to have the sponsors to sponsor more in trade of a token of appreciation (TBA) to support this service or asking for donations from our internship companies to purchase sufficient furniture for this project in trade of a token of appreciation as well. However, this suggestion have to be confirm with lecturers first to gain permission on proceeding to this plan and also have official letters provided as proof to use in this plan.
003
Continue from the previous issue, as a whole class we finally had our meeting with our lecturer, Mr. Edwin, discussing our current progress and taught us on what and how should we manage our respective task. We requested for an official approval letter from him so that we can proceed with asking for sponsors.
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One of the issue we faced was actually worrying that the companies will think that we are scammers without any official proof. However with this letter, we can approach companies much easier.
PROGRESS
Once we got the official letter, we quickly proceed by searching for furniture companies. Some of the members had dealt or had a list of suppliers taken from their company. However some of us have little to none contacts of suppliers. I personally do not have any experience or contacts of any suppliers even asking my previous colleagues, it turns out they have none as well. Therefore, the member with the most contacts, Yan Cheng, shared her list with us so that we can approach more companies (those unfamiliar) while they will contact those that they are familiar with.
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Another issue was about the amount of furniture we need to get from the sponsors. Since Yan Cheng successfully obtained the sponsorship, the amount is still unknown. We later received the site's plan from the junior team and estimate the amount of tables, chairs and bookshelves with CAD to confirm the amount we need.
004
For week 4, we finally had our presentation proposing & updating the current state and process of our community service work.
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For our furniture group, we currently received sponsors of:
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12 tables & chairs
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5 beanbags
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1 small bookshelf
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1 black cupboard
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4 rattan chair
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2-3 children table
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4 children chairs
However, we had to change our direction from now, instead of looking for sponsors for furniture, we will be asking for donations.
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This is because after reviewing our sponsored furniture, Ms. Norji said that the furniture were not consistent, as the styles and features differ from one another, causing the whole space to look inconsistent. Due to this, there are several points we had to take note to proceed to the next step.
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Quality and condition of furniture need to be suitable for children
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Colors for furniture need to suit the design of the space
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Shelves cannot be too high (for children)
Besides the donations, we still need an empty space in campus to store all these sponsored furniture as those companies and suppliers may not be able to keep those furniture in their space for us.
005
For week 5's progress, we set our target fund donation around RM 3.5k. We will be receiving RM1000 from the finance group which we previously contribute RM100 from each person. Another RM1000 would be from supplier which we manage to get donation from. Therefore we still have to obtain RM1.5k more to reach our target.
Sample of Donor List
We are currently in the process of calling and emailing suppliers and companies for donation. However, the progress did not go well. Therefore I was suggesting a way where we could approach the employees instead of the head of companies.
After discussing the idea with Mr.Edwin, we decide to modify the letter provided previously especially the benefit section.
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Instead of having advertising, we will be giving out certificates and free designed T-shirt for individuals who support and donated.
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Therefore, a list should be created to record the individuals who donated.
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There is also an additional request by Ms. Norji that we have to find sponsor for big whiteboard or 2 small whiteboard to fill up the space.
006
We had an in-class meeting for this week, we had to report our current progress to Mr. Edwin, we were told to obtain the fund as fast as possible because if the fund is insufficient, the other groups cannot proceed with their work. Therefore, we had to reach our target latest by next week. We were also told to visit IKEA to choose the right furniture because it is getting closer to the visitation date, we had to purchase the furniture and request a space to store those furniture in campus.
As for the individual donation, I receive around RM90, around RM10 - RM20 individually from people, which is a good sign, we could at least purchase 2 or 3 furniture with this amount.
From there, I tried to work on the IKEA furniture listing which includes dimension, colour, quantity, price and total pricing. While the others work on selecting the suitable furniture.
007
Week 7 is a hectic week for us semester 6. We couldn't able to progress much on this week due to submissions that are due this week. However, we tried to make some progression by asking the amount and type of furniture Ms. Norji wanted for the renovation before we make our move to IKEA. Somehow we need to refer to the drawing plan from the lower semester to get the information we need. AND ITS NOT COMPLETE YET.
We also had our presentation this week to allow Mr. Edwin to know about our progress.
Group discussion about the plan we received from juniors
As great news comes last, at the end of Week 7, Bryan's internship company finally agreed to sponsor RM1500 to this project.
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For now, our total collected funds will be RM2590, just RM410 more to reach the target.
As for now, the furniture and drawing plan is still on hold, our fund collection is still not going very well. For now we have only RM1090, we still need RM1910 to reach our expected target.
008
As usual for Week 8, we have to report our progression for the project to Mr.Edwin in class. The progress we have currently is that the RM1500 sponsor from Bryan's internship company is confirm. However we still have to wait for Group 4's FLP to be done in order to get confirmation on the quantity of furniture so that we could visit and purchase the furniture from IKEA.
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Other than that, we still have to request on getting back our RM1000 from the finance team which was previously mentioned to use it for meals on the renovation day. This process is still under discussion with Ms.Norji & Mr.Edwin for approval.
009
For week 9, the group leaders from every group and semesters had their meeting with the lecturers about the progress of the project. After the meeting we received information and feedback on our group progression through our leader. Based on the information our progress and task would be:
1. Receive RM300 sponsorship (have not receive yet)
2. Received RM1000 back from Ms. Norji to purchase furniture
3. Aiming for Thursday or Friday to purchase furniture from IKEA
4. Receive RM1500 cheque from Bryan's internship company OD&A (have not receive yet)
5. Receive RM100 donation
6. Purchase whiteboard
7. Public donation RM90
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Other than that, I myself together with Yan Cheng and Bryan did our visitation to IKEA to confirm on the types of furniture, pricing, quality of furniture that we need. The following furniture are the ones we had our eyes on and also previously metioned by Ms.Norji.
Bookshelf with
removable platform
RM199
Bookshelf with
removable platform
RM199
Chair with option of RED, GREY, WHITE
Stool
RM38
RM17.90
010
Week 10 is consider as a Raya Break Week therefore we do not have any class or meeting going on for this week. However, we still continue to have our progress discussion in our group Whatsapp.
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Based on last week that we visited IKEA, apparently the furniture were too expensive, Ms. Norji decided on not to consider IKEA's furniture first and reconsider the donated furniture we previously had that was kept in Bryan's church. We have to check the quality and measurements of the furniture next week to decide which can be use.
Other than that, our plan was to purchase IKEA's furniture by early next week, 10th June. As we were told that IKEA's furniture were not considered for now, we lost our direction on what we should do next. Group 4 were told to survey cheaper furniture yet similar to IKEA's before 10th June and confirm about it so that we can proceed with our original plan if this doesn't work out.
011
After all those confusion from the previous week. Our group decide to meet up with both of the lecturers to prevent the confusion from going on further.
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From the meeting we had, we were finally able to confirm:
1. Confirm purchase furniture from IKEA
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Table
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Chair
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Stool
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Rugs X2 (if there is leftover money after purchase) ​
2. Quantities of table chair and stool will be confirm after FLP is complete
3. Shelves will be purchased separately from other store.
FINALIZED
FURNITURE
LIST
Besides, the donated shelves and small tables were confirm to be used for the project after measuring, checking the condition and FLP had been made. On Thursday, the furniture were brought from IKEA and was sent to the project site on Saturday.
Other than that, I was told and helped the books team to receive some donated books from our juniors in the Foundation classroom.
012
It is finally the launching day for the mini library. On the day, we had to arrive early for setting up and decorations. I followed the books group to the venue and help them to prepare some ribbon and tying for the opening ceremony. I also help setting up the drinks, utensils and bean bags in place.
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While we were preparing, the guests and children came little by little, we also offered some extra leftover balloons to the children.
From the event, we did sang, dance and play along with the children. I can see that the children really did enjoy and like the newly renovated library, they ran around, they start going through the books, flipping it, looking through the graphics, they even know how to put them back in the same spot. Therefore this project is quite enjoyable and looking at thee result, it was an amazing experience.
Community Service Initiative
- The End
In conclusion, with the given opportunity to take on this module, I have learnt many lessons that I could not gain from other modules which is to volunteer yourself into helping the community under real life situation. I get to approach people from different background asking, conversing and understand the things they have offer. Other than that, through the process I learnt to be responsible and creative through managing and solving different tasks. Last but not least, it was a great experience to participate in this project knowing that the Orang Asli children would be that happy and able to obtain more reading experience and knowledge through this mini library that we accomplish but most importantly, the greatest of all was to be able to participate this project with the whole Semester 6 as this will be one of our memories spent and working together before we leave the University.
