Picture by Margarida Pang

Members of FBASA learn a lot through organizing FBA Day

Celia Lei, president of the Faculty of Business Administration Students' Association (FBASA) and a fourth year student majoring in Marketing, said that the purpose of the annual event was to provide an opportunity for lecturers and students to have fun together.

“I think a good relationship between lecturers and students could be developed from the event.” Lei added that the election of favourite lecturers, which was included as part of the event every year, offered a way of narrowing the gap between students and lecturers.

Lei shared that it was an advantage for the whole team to understand each other and the objectives of the project clearly. “No matter how bad my temper was, I would not use my members as an outlet. No one could work alone. It's the cooperation that made the things work out,” Lei added.

Picture by Margarida Pang

Celia Lei (middle), president of FBASA

Lei said besides the assistance obtained from her members, she could get support from FBA. “Just before the event started, I tried to ask our faculty [FBA] for another laptop [computer], and they agreed without hesitation,” said Lei.

Through the organization of FBA Day activities, the President was aware of the value of the knowledge she learned from classes. “When we want to get sponsorships from companies, we have to make ourselves as a kind of product which is intended to be sold to those companies, so that we can get budget for our activities,” said Lei. “Moreover, I can make use of human management skills learned from my teachers to communicate with companies.” Lei and her members learned how to be flexible when facing changes. “If performers were late, we would reorganize our rundown for the show,” Lei said.

Lei and her members agreed that they have learned something through organizing FBA Day.

Cathy Lam, a public relations officer for FBASA, said she developed a good relationship with the exchange students, who were performers of the FBA Day, and understood more about the ways of inviting VIPs.

Angela Tam, a vice president of FBASA, shared with UMac Bridges her experiences she obtained from organizing FBA Day activities. “Though it was a hard job, I have learned how to prepare for events, and write letters to sponsors,” Tam said. “I believe I could organize other activities as well because I already got familiar with the procedures of an event.”

What happened on FBA Day this year? On 14 March 2003, FBASA held their annual FBA Day at the Cultural Centre of the University. Several groups of exchange students from Germany, Japan, Portugal, Finland, Holland, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Sweden, France and China introduced their cultures by performing some specially designed activities. For instance, a Dutch student wore wooden shoes made of paper, while a Chinese student performed bamboo dancing. In addition, a first year FBA student, and Michael Gift, an FBA lecturer teaching accounting, sang their songs on stage. A game was also played between lecturers and students, requiring them to search for items on a given list. Moreover, there were an election of the three most favourite lecturers, and a performance by a Hong Kong canto-pop singer, Man Lok Yue. Prior to the FBA Day, there was also an FBA Week which was held from the 10th to the 13th March 2003. The activities of FBA Week included seminars in which representatives were invited from companies like Companhia de Electricidade de Macau (CEM), Companhia de Telecomunicações de Macau (CTM) and Macao Water to give speeches about their companies, where students could raise questions and opinions about them. There were also exhibitions throughout the week which provided information about the faculty to FBA students, and students from other faculties as well. The main objective of the FBA Week was that students from FBA could have more knowledge about their faculty. The FBA Day would thus be served as a closing ceremony of the FBA Week.