Looking back

As another academic year draws to a close, students will walk out the doors of their universities never to return. Armed with degrees, they venture off into the big wide world just as incoming students enter the halls of academia. Notes speaks to students about their year's highlights. We also explored their ideas and opinions about Notes' past issues, which stirred up some interesting debates.

What you liked

Notes invited some students into the Gulf News offices to review this year's issues of Notes and debate the stories and topics they found most interesting. Some students pulled no punches in their assesment of Notes stories while others were positive about the types of issues aired.

Scanning through past issues of Notes the students unanimously found the story on reckless driving to be the most pertinent. "Yeah that was good. I think it's amazing because most of the accidents that people get into are caused by kids our age. They are either caused by reckless driving or driving under the influence. It's nice that students who have actually been affected by it are speaking out about the matter," said Neha Riyaz Khandwani.

"You'd want to see something like that because everyone thinks 'oh it's never going to happen to me!' But it did happen to me. I had a car accident and broke my back. It makes a difference and is nice to see that something like this has actually come out," said Khandwani.

Adnan Al Othman, 23, is a recent advertising graduate from the American University of Sharjah (AUS), agreed with Khandwani. He said: "This is interesting in a way because it relates to us." Al Othman is one of 18 students who worked on the Point of No Return Campaign, targeting reckless drivers. He was hand-picked by the university along with 17 of his peers to pitch the idea to the Sharjah Police, who ultimately bought the whole campaign.

Of one of Notes' most recent issues, sporting a cover story about internships, Khandwani said: "I like this one, everyone is looking for internships but paid internships would be better."

What you disliked

"Some of the stories are just not capturing the interest of students," said 20-year-old Hassan Al Hassany. Referring to the topic of the increase in academic book prices, Al Hassany said: "I really don't care. What am I going to do about it?" A fellow student of Al Hassany's at the Canadian University of Dubai, Khandwani, 21, cut in to say: "The thing is Dubai and the UAE are generally not really known to be university cities. So Notes is trying to increase awareness. They are trying to let us know there are people studying here in university who are actually doing things equivalent to what other kids are doing in other parts of the world, at different universities. I think it is pretty cool." Al Hassany later went on to agree that a story about students' plans after graduation could be somewhat intriguing. "Plans after graduation," he said reading the headline. "This might be interesting. I might want to see what other people's plans are."

Al Othman agreed to some extent with Khandwani and said: "It's interesting in a way, it relates to students but I don't see it [Notes] distributed widely on campus." His friend, Fawaz Al Muhandis, still a student at AUS agreed with him and said: "I'd read it if I saw it around. We need recognition; we need something related to students, so where would you put it if you don't put it in a student's magazine." The critical Al Hassany then piped in and said: "Of course if I do something nice I'd want people to know about it."

Looking at the cover page of Notes with a headline which read Home grown Hip Hop, Al Muhandis said: "In this one it's like your pushing it. The topic is nice, like Arabic hip hop, but the colours and the whole thing makes it look... girlish!" Al Othman said.

What do you want?

Admitting that she scans through Notes every week, Khandwani made a point that students want to see themselves in the publication.

"People want to see themselves, especially when they are out and looking their best," she said. Al Othman added that "a few interesting giveaways here and there would be more attractive to us in a way."

"I guess what would be interesting and I think everyone would agree with me on this one, is, if we could have a section in the paper about events in Dubai. That would be nice," said Al Hassany. "I don't know about others but I'm really interested in sports too," he said.

Academic year in review

Name: Neha Riyaz Khandwani
Age: 21
Nationality: Indian/Tanzanian
Degree Title: BBA Marketing
Year: Third
University: Canadian University of Dubai

Her most memorable moment this semester: "The most memorable thing I did this year would be auditioning and getting a role in the Annie production. It was not part of the university curriculum but I enjoyed it."

Why: "As I am majoring in marketing I saw certain interesting aspects. I got to see how the sales and ticketing worked and how certain people reacted to certain things. Personally, I got to meet many people, with different career choices and different paths and how they were pursuing them."

She learnt: "How to get up in front of hundreds of people and perform shows back-to-back, day after day. Also, how to deal with a lot of people of different age groups, nationalities and interests. I learnt choreography which used to freak me out before. I learnt how to work with professionals. Being an amateur, an experience like this can help you in every field you're in. You have to learn how to blend in. If you're not particularly strong in something you have to catch up and learn."

Regrets: "I hope more universities encourage students to take part in theatre productions. There weren't many university students at all. It was just me who was at university; everyone else was in either high school or elementary school. I guess many people think their professors won't give them the leeway to miss a few classes. Or the university won't bend the rules a little, as you can't be there for all your classes [during rehearsals]. In the end I did have a bit of a problem with attendance. I wish things could have been different."

Name: Zia Mohammad Khan
Age: 18
Nationality: Indian
Degree title: Architecture
Year: Second
University: Canadian University of Dubai

His most memorable moment of the semester: A rather quiet and shy Khan, after pondering the matter for a while, said: "Literally the only memorable moment I have is participating in my university's global day, where we attended stalls and put together a fashion show."

Why: "Because I participated in the fashion show, modelling clothes for India."

Name: Hassan Al Hassany
Age: 20
Nationality: Irish
Degree title: Architecture
Year: First
University: Canadian University of Dubai

His most memorable moment of the semester: "The most interesting course I took this year was called critical thinking. I got an A in it. We had a project to do at the end of it, which consisted of a debate. We had to organise a debate with two opposing parties. The members of my group were basically freeloaders and they all depended on me. I did all their work, all my work, my supporters work and my opponents work."

Why: "Our debate was the best, we performed well. Critical thinking taught us a lot, basically communication and analytical skills."

He learnt: "I learnt what I could face in university. I studied a course and I finished it having actually learnt something."

Personal highlight: "We did have some nice events. I participated in the dragon boating event. It was a nice change. The after party was nice"

Regrets: "We finished last in the dragon boat race, twice in a row."

Name: Adnan Al Othman
Age: 23
Nationality: Saudi Arabian
Degree title: Advertising
Year: Graduate of the Spring Class of 2009
University: American University in Sharjah

His most memorable moment of the semester: "I'd like to say graduation because I'm glad it is all over; but I have to say being selected to work on an advertising campaign for Sharjah Police." The campaign is aimed at reckless drivers. "We worked on it two semesters ago but due to some technical problems we were only able to launch it last semester. They came to us and selected 18 students out of which I was one. They [the police] had an open target audience at first, but we narrowed it down to Emirati males between the ages of 18 to 35, because it seems they are the ones causing the most chaos on the roads."

Why: "Because you get a chance to work in a proper campaign. It's really interesting because you get to do something that is real; a real advertising campaign. I've worked on a lot of campaigns before but most of them were hypothetical. This one was different because of the fact that it is going to be implemented. We were on the news and everything. After what we presented they like it so much they bought the whole campaign."

He learnt: What it feels like to work in the real world of advertising, "We had to pitch our campaign to the Sharjah Police as a real client. It was interesting."

Comment: "It was a special moment for me because you get invited to this type of thing. You are selected and can't just sign up. So you feel the pressure of having to do something."

Name: Fawaz Al Muhandis
Age: 22
Nationality: Bahraini
Degree title: Business administration
Year: Final
University: American University of Sharjah

His most memorable moment of the semester: "I took a music course as an elective and thought it was going to be an easy A. I was doing well in all my courses except the music course. My professor informed me I failed the course and now I have to stay behind just to take something else because of the silly music course. We have to elect a course in humanities so I chose it because I thought it'd be easy. It turned out to be a history of music course."

Why: "It was supposed to be my last semester at university, so I started applying for jobs and attending career fairs. There were places that did accept me, having applied in both Bahrain and the UAE, just in case."

He learnt: Not to opt for the easy way out.

Regrets: "The fact I tried to get out of hard study and took an 'easy course' and failed it, which has made me not graduate this year."