This is really annoying me.
Let me give you a brief overview.
Basically, NTU students are required to take some "general electives" subject that is out of the scope of their school.
Like if you're studying engineering, you have to study some subject from business, science, arts, etc... etc...
Fine. Widen your horizons and everything. I'm totally supportive of it.
...
Now, obviously I want to pick something that I think is useful, or I'm interested in. But since I'm NOT from that particular field/school, I wouldn't know much (if any) about the elective.
I have to pick like ONE elective out of a dozen choices given to me. How do I pick? There is barely any information available about what each electives are.
And this is the main issue that I want to address here.
The only place available is a webpage which give a SHORT description (about 5 lines) of what each elective is. And sometimes, the description is so worthless you might as well forget about drawing any useful information from it.
Give you an example... Like, say I'm interested in this module "GAME DESIGN". So I read up about it.
"Game Design Workshop I focuses on the elements of gaming. How do narrative, characterization, & level design play a role in the gaming experience? What elements found in causal games are common to most of our daily interactive experiences? We will address these issues through the creation of causal games. "
...
That's it.
WTF? Are you kidding me? What good use is that?
It looks like they just cut and paste 2 lines from the first chapter of that module and paste it as the description.
So, is it about programming? Or is it drawing stuffs? Create using what? Is it more theory or practical? How many hours practical/lecture a week?
Bottom line: That description is a worthless piece of crap.
It doesn't tell you the workload, the assessment criteria, what software (if any) that you'll be using, whether it is group or individual, and all the useful information.
...
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And GUESS WHAT.
That is the ONLY piece of information you'll be able to find about each elective.
Yes - A short, worthless piece of garbage text.
And this 5 lines of text will determine your fate for the whole semester.
So, unless you've got some seniors or friends who have taken the module before, there's basically NO WAY you can find out more about what the subject is about.
Tell me what good is it that they only give you this information AFTER you have registered for the subject, during the first lesson.
What's the point?
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....
So, how do you save yourself the headache?
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You can't.
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So screw it.
Next time, just throw a dice and randomly pick one.
And pray that you've chosen something good.
Side Note:
I believe this is why the popular modules continue to be so popular year after year. And the less popular ones start to fade into oblivion.
You know why? Because it is a risk to take the lesser-known modules. There is so little information available about it that it becomes a big risk to take it.
:(
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