New semester has begun. Lecturers and senior students have started doing their normal routine just like in the past semesters. Lecturers are busy preparing for weekly lecture materials and teaching aids, giving lectures, tutorials and quizzes, preparing attendance sheets and so on. Senior students, on the other hand, are busy attending classes and labs, participating in co-curricular activities, organising programmes, attending student association meetings and others. Nothing new to them as they’re used to doing all those activities in the previous semesters.
However, new students might be struggling a bit to adapt to the new environment and need to explore new things in the beginning of this new semester. Fret not, this few basic information might be useful for you if you are a new UTHM student.
- First of all, welcome to UTHM! You are now part of this excellent university. The very first thing you need to do once you are matriculated as a UTHM student is you need to register and login to the SMAP application. SMAP or SMAPOnline which stands for Sistem Maklumat Akademik Pelajar is the official UTHM application for students to get all academic-related information. Only students with ‘active’ status can use this application. This is where you can do online course registration, check your exam results, read bulletins, and so on. Basically, all academic information and announcements will be posted there. Hence, you should check these apps often so that you don’t miss any important updates or important dates.
- UTHM students also need to register to their official student email or known as Google Siswa. This email service is also offered and valid for students with ‘active’ status only. With this education email, you can separate your personal email with emails related to academic purposes. Additionally, you can actually get so many benefits using this email which you can explore later. But, one thing you should know is that you can communicate with any UTHM staff or students via this email. You can connect with your lecturers via this email and mind you that, sometimes your lecturers will find you via this email too!
- Most universities have their own official learning management system (LMS). Same goes to UTHM which has Author as its official LMS. Author stands for UTHM Academic Online Resources which was developed to support online classes. Most lecturers use this platform to share course outlines, learning materials, conduct quizzes, collect assignments and so on. So, make sure you login to this platform to connect with your lecturers online. However, please note that there are also lecturers who prefer to use other LMS such as Google Classroom, Microsoft Teams, Edmodo, etc. So, make sure you are in contact with your lecturers so that you know which platform they are using.
- Class WhatsApp groups apparently have become a must for each course since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. It is now continued to be used by lecturers and students even after we are allowed to have face-to-face meetings to communicate before, during or after class time. Therefore, make sure you join all the WhatsApp groups for the courses you are taking this semester so that you don’t miss any important information and updates.
Some courses are still conducted online due to certain circumstances while many are already conducted face-to-face. For example, English courses, some are conducted in physical classrooms while some are still conducted online. Hence, make sure you are aware of how the course will be held.
Being a student myself, I know how challenging it was to explore so many online platforms and applications that I needed to register and login at the beginning of my journey as a student. It is safe to say that if you get a hold of all the applications above, chances are your life as a new student will be easier.
Suzilla Jamari
Language Instructor
Centre for Language Studies
Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia (UTHM)
