Dubai: The Higher Colleges of Technology called on its students to stop spreading rumors on Twitter and focus on their studies instead.
The university made the statement on Twitter after the hashtag ‘Higher Colleges of Technology’ (in Arabic) was one of the highest tweeted and trending topics in the UAE on Tuesday with over 6000 tweets.
The topic went viral on the social media platform after the university’s students took on the social media platforms to share their concerns about the implementation of ‘new laws’, regarding class hours, online classes to name a few.
The university denied issuing any new laws stressing that they are just implementing existing laws and called the students to stop spreading rumors.
The students mainly protested against, the time duration of classes. They claimed the ‘new law’ requires all students to remain in class for the entire two hour duration, even if the lecturer was done explaining the topic of the day.
Students also claimed on twitter that the university cancelled the online classes and so they must attend all the classes on campus for the full two hour duration.
“We finished class in an hour and a half but we are stuck in class, the professor won’t let us leave until the two hours are done. What is the point of just siting there doing nothing?, ” Twitter user La Maith siad.
Another student, Sultan Al Shehy tweeted saying: “If the class is for two hours and the professor finishes in 45 minutes, then unblock Snapchat, so time passes by faster while we wait doing nothing,”
The students felt that by implementing the mandatory class hours, they were being treated as schools students, not responsible university students.
“The new laws make you feel that you are a middle school student not a university student,” said Saud Al Zarouni.
Another tweet said: “A person graduates from school to enter a university, what is happening here is that we are graduating from school to enter another school!”
Responding to the students concerns, the university responded on their twitter account, saying that it did not introduce any new laws.
“We did not issue any new laws; we are making sure that the current laws are being implemented. We received questions asking us if we have cancelled our online classes. We did not cancel them we are just organizing them based on the academic accreditation requirement,” the tweet read.
The university also said via twitter that they have not changed the duration of classes and that the lecturers are teaching the course in theory and practically during class based on the academic time table.
The university called on students to stop spreading rumors, saying: “As the end of the second semester approaches, we ask you to please focus on your studies instead of spreading rumours.”
