#3179 Staff Association 好鬼煩， 又整多封信。 ------------------------- Dear Colleagues, University is an interesting place where divergent opinions often exist and are, in fact, respected. The issue of “student chanting” is no exception. Some colleagues have even found time to write in and I would like to list their opinions in full and classify them into for and against taking actions categories. ------------- Against taking actions: 1. Please SHUT UP. You are making the noise and you are killing the creativity of the students. I am shocked you claimed to be a faculty. 2. Did shouting contests ever interrupt or disturb your teaching? If not, do you mean to resort to legal measures to suppress students? I understand that they can sometimes be loud, but that is part of the fun of working in a young and energetic academic environment. I hope you will reconsider taking legal action. This is, after all, not a cemetery, expected to be solemn and quiet. 3. I’m not sure why your email is copied to me but since it is two thoughts: •Yes the law must be obeyed and some measurement of the noise levels to confirm it is should be done. •Who are the most important people on campus? In my opinion it is the students. CityU’s prime mission is to give these young people not just an education but a character and team spirit building experience which will help them succeed in their careers after university. The rest of us should be willing to accept discomfort to achieve this objective. For taking actions: 1. I cant agree with you more. I cant stand the nonsense behavior of the students anymore. Thanks for expressing my opinion! 2. I couldnt agree more. 3. Total agree and support your view! It’s a kind of noise pollution. Window of my office is facing the tunnel. You can imagine how noisy it is when I am working in my office. Thanks for voicing out for us! 4. John, You have my support on this one. Both for the volume and the senselessness of the whole process. 5. I agree! This is noise pollution at its worst! 6. I fully agree with your opinion. 7. Yes, something to unite us all! My office is on the inner courtyard in yellow zone on the 7th floor and I came home this afternoon early because the chanting was disrupting my work even from that level. 8. Yes, absolutely right. 9. Ban the stupid shouting. It does no good to students either, the sds have been spoiling them. 10. In CityU Im amazed, and often found it amusing and comical that many students while extremely docile and indolent in classrooms could be so energetic to make enough noise to bring down AC3--as if for these infantile busy people screaming loudly and rudely were the only evidence of being youthful and being creative--This reminds me of the shriek of locomotive that rudely disrupted Nathaniel Hawthornes reverie in the quiet Sleepy Hollow. It has been for too long! 11. Thanks so much, Dr. Tse. Fully support! 12. Wonderful John. 13. Totally agree your views. 14. Support you in any form! 15. Thank you very much. Dr. John. 16. Thank you for this. And probably not even limiting the shouting at the outdoors, yes, but unavoidable corridor between the tunnel from FW and floor 3 is not a solution… 17. I totally agree with you that the students are creating too much noise every year. I understand that they chant to seek passers-bys attention but they are also disturbing and irritating us. I work on Kowloon Bay CCCU campus but I remembered that last year when I was passing by CityU main campus, I felt so irritated too. They were not just shouting in the outdoor area but also round the podium, which caused a nuisance to other students and staff having lectures! I do think that CityU Admin should handle it, e.g. issuing regulations and laws to warn students joining the Committee not to create any more noise to disturb others. Kids shouldnt be just taught how to acquire knowledge but they should be disciplined and nurtured to behave properly and considerably. Thank you for your note, and I sincerely hope that the Administration Unit could kindly deal with this matter seriously. 18. The let-the-students-do-whatever-they-want-to-do attitude has obviously backfired. Claiming shouting as something educational is ignoring the root of the matter: it disturbs others and interferes with normal university activities. It becomes problematic in a noisy condition when students are chanting at the top of their voice and customers (students and staff) have to resort to shouting (in order to be heard) when placing food orders to cashiers in the Student Canteen. It is wrong to let students’ happiness be built at the expense of others’ suffering. It is another mistake to allow such silly activities to go on and on, year after year without directing students to a proper track. There are only two places I can think of where loud noise at 110dB is tolerated: a rock concert and the airport runway for airplanes to take off. Of course, we are talking about proper behaviours in a university setting—not rock concert nor airport runway. If you do not consider those chanting as blast, there may be something wrong with your hearing! If the Administration calls it creativity or team building, you must be joking. Creativity is not just dressing up differently or shouting endlessly--to the extent that even the targeted audience does not know what they are shouting about. Creativity has to involve something new and with a functional purpose. Of course, there are better ways of team building than staying up overnight, attending and answering questions in an empty forum in early morning hours, not being able to attend classes in the morning and failing the courses. These are some of the costs of running for offices in those students’ clubs. Is it worth doing? At the end of the day, students’ (club) activities are to be judged by the quality of services such clubs offer, and certainly not the loudness of the campaigns. It is just superficial! Would someone then tell us what have the students’ clubs produced or provided for other students after they were elected? How about the quality of these programmes? Does the end justify the means? -------------- I might not have expressed myself too clearly in my earlier correspondence when I suggested that the proper authorities should be called in to investigate the noise pollution. In reality, it is somewhat difficult to differentiate between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour. But if noise is defined clearly in the Noise Control Ordinance, it can, then, be objectively quantified and we all have some guidelines and law to follow. Attempts have been made to accommodate student activities. The Staff Association has repeatedly offered to assist by encouraging colleagues to give time in their lectures for different student groups to make direct presentations to the students. This offer was not accepted as student representatives claimed that not letting them shout would be against CityU students’ culture. Colleagues, I think I have said enough and staff members’ views are clearly shown here. If the university administration claims the racket to be educational and soothing, I can only add by saying res ipsa loquitur--the thing speaks for itself. Given the university’s obsession of climbing the rung of the university ranking ladder, and students’ (rowdy) behaviour is not a part of the formula, I do not have high hopes of resolving this noisy matter in the near future. Thank you. Regards, John
Posted on: Tue, 15 Oct 2013 04:18:11 +0000
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