USM Top Malaysian Research University

Saw this article in The Sunday Star - Education section.

Last month, USM was named the top research university in the country by the Higher Education Ministry.

This is based on a five-year evaluation against eight criteria: research quality, research quantity, researcher quality and quantity, postgraduate quality and quantity, level of innovation, support such as facilities and human expertise, level of networking and internationalisation, and number of awards and recognition received.

According to Prof Dzulkifli, the university scored high marks in all eight areas used in the appraisal, which took place from 2000 to 2005.

USM received 100% for innovation, awards and recognition and at least 88% in most categories.

A lot of interesting points brought up in the article such as a better remuneration scheme to attract more postgraduate students and how USM will spend the RM153 million grant received by all research universities.

Read the full article here.

In memory of Rockey

"Here lies Rockey:
Son, brother and friend.
He will be missed by all who loved and knew him."

Rockey*, may your soul rest in peace.

*Rockey was a teensy baby rat...the cutest. A pest, some said. So he had to breathe his last. it was to be. he was laid to rest in the fish house grounds...even found him a nice tomb stone... :(

jerk, watch your derriere!

the damn celaka guy.
i am so proud of myself that i kept my cool...and didn't scold him (or rip his ears out off his blinking skull).

what did he do?

1. he tortures 4 zebrafish - by keeping them in the lab, in a teensy container (those choclair kind of container...dunno if u can understand...). it's been a few weeks already.

2. he put ICE into their water today. and just let them be while he does his experiments.

damn jerk. he made the water so cold the fish stopped swimming properly. they had sunken down to the bottom. and he didn't even give a wink when rerama made some sound regarding the fish condition.

couldn't take it anymore, i just went to his blardy container and started to pour out the icy cold water and replace it with new water slowly. in the end they seemed to have regained their usual prowess.

DAMN HIM.

but i am still happy that i didn't make things ugly by saying anything. haha. i am trying to be patient...BUT if he goes on doing this, i am going to panggang his behind and feed it to the haruan.