Engineering Minds – An interview with Dr. Mok

UCSI University’s Faculty of Engineering, Architecture and Built Environment is one of the largest and more popular faculties among its students. Many local and international students are enrolled in these programs which range from foundation to the latest Masters programs. Faculty Dean Dr. Jimmy Mok Vee Hoong said that even though there were not many activities during the short semester, the faculty does have interesting events throughout the year, where students are encouraged to participate in competitions and events.

“Students should not only hold good paper qualifications, but they should also have the strong leadership skills to give them the edge in the real world,” said Dr Mok when met for an interview. He told Frontiers that they have introduced the ‘Zilog Workshop,’ where the staff chooses a certain group of senior students and train and instill in them leadership skills. These senior students will then mentor the juniors in both academic and extra-curricular activities. Dr Mok, however, told us that the case is different with the Architecture students.

“By nature they are very different; all their projects are in the form of presentations. Therefore, their leadership and communicative skills are being trained even when they are still learning basic theories,” noted Dr. Mok.

Even though there is subject called Technical Communication for the engineering students, to boost their leadership skills, Dr Mok acknowledges the importance of students’ participation in extra-curricular activities to improve their communication skills. Therefore, Dr. Mok is all for introducing the ‘Junior Chamber International’ program to provide more avenues to help students inculcate these necessary skills.

“I must say that this program is not popular among Malaysians, and was actually started by the African students. In this program, students are encouraged to organize events and learn how to work as a team. Membership is open to all UCSI University students,” he said. “By joining this program, students get the chance to learn how to blend in a multiracial community, and this will be very helpful when they meet different kinds of people once they step in the working world,” he added.

When asked about the specialty of the Faculty, Dr Mok said he is very happy to see many local and international students enrolled in this program where students are exposed to different cultures, ethnicities and races before they venture out into world.

“Our students will be able to blend, communicate and adapt to any kind of work environment in the future and that is one of the specialties I am proud of in the Faculty of Engineering, Architecture and Built Environment,” he added.