Critical reflection on SIE 2016 Effective Communications

Looking back at my learning journey at SIE2016 Effective Communication, I am sure that it has been a meaningful experience filled with lots of different exposure. I felt that communication takes place almost any time in our life. To have the ability to communicate effectively not only comes from experience but also through learning on the basis of this communication course. After attending in midst of the module lessons on verbal and non-verbal communications skills, I realized that communication is more than just a simple communication.

Throughout this course of study, we were tasked to set up a blog and be given different assignments weekly. As we progress through our blog posts, our classmates would exchange feedbacks and points out the positive and negative aspects of each assignment. Having such a feedback system, allows us to widen our vocabularies and be exposed to different writing structures. The greatest takeaway from this learning basis is that I can recognize the mistakes that I made and be able to work on my weaker parts.

Apart from that, I can hone my writing skills and understand how communication skills can benefit me. I was able to pick up informative tips on presentation skills, such as the Monroe persuasive speech and Garr Reynolds presentation tips to better prepare for my presentation. There are other written skills which I had learned along the way, such as the seven C’s in communication. However, there are much more areas of improvement which I will need to work on, such as my grammar and sentence structure, in addition to expanding my vocabulary knowledge. Communication skills do not stop here once this course is over, in fact, it is just the beginning of the end and there are much more to be learned as we continue using communication skills to enhance our development. This course had taught me the importance of communication and prepared me for the near future. In overall, it had been a great learning journey with my peers and professor.

Analytical reflection on oral presentation

Personally, I am aware that presentation is not my forte. There is a tendency I get nervous during a presentation and I might forget my train of thoughts throughout my presentation. This will affect my confidence and a possibility of transmitting a poor delivery of contents or ideas to my audience.

With the guidance of my professor, I can find ways to present my ideas more coherently. The objective in which my team wants to achieve is not to bore the audience with too many technical terms and able to catch their attention by conveying our ideas. It is important to understand your presentation content beforehand so that the ideas will be fresh in our mind. Before the actual presentation, I meet up with my groupmates to rehearse repeatedly so that we will be able to present our ideas in a coherent manner. That being said, I was able to maintain a good pace during my presentation.  However, there were certain parts where I stutter as I wasn’t able to recall my lines. There was a moment, I felt that I was going too fast but I was able to regain my composure.

In overall, I felt that our team was confident in projecting ourselves during the presentation. Each of us has their own strength and style in presenting. However, there are much more improvements that can be made such as improvising our way of pitching in a captivating manner. I felt that I did averagely well for the presentation, however, there is always room for improvements. After receiving feedback from my peers and professor, I am able to identify my flaws and improve on them. In the future presentations, I feel that I can improve my facial expression, tone as well as eye contact.

Technical Report - Purpose Statement Final

3. Purpose Statement

This report proposes a “smart lighting” system to the Division of Estate SIT with the use of a sensor and a wireless technology. This report will describe the use of its proposed solution and explain how to constructively manage the electrical wastage problem of street lights. Additionally, the report aims to present an overview of a greener solution to street lighting.

Technical Report Background Final

1 Background

With the rising concern of increasing energy consumption, the Energy Market Authority is reviewing new ideas and solutions. Currently, enormous electrical energy is being consumed by street lights controlled through the time of the day. In Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT), the streetlamps are using LED’s (light emitting diode) in the carpark. However, there is an inadequate lighting control which means that the lights will be on at full intensity throughout the night. This results in a significant amount of electrical wastage and contributes to SIT's total electrical bill.

 With the development of urbanization, the usage of street lamps increases rapidly due to high traffic and human population density. The roads in Singapore Institute Of Technology must be adequately illuminated to provide sufficient visibility for the safety of pedestrians and vehicles. These street lamps are illuminated for 12 hours from a timing of 7 pm to 7 am, and this results in a need for a  huge amount of electrical power to light them up. According to the article," Singapore Energy Statistics," (Energy Market Authority, 2015) there is an annual increment in electricity consumption which grew by 2.4% in 2015. This shows how high the spending cost of electricity is.

 At any specific point of time in the night in SIT, there is less vehicular motion. Moreover,  some of the roads in SIT have little to zero pedestrian or vehicles movement at night. This is a problem as it means the streetlamps are turned on but the streets are empty at night.

A good street lighting system should provide sufficient lighting and be efficient on electrical consumption. However, such a system is not implemented in SIT. We propose a motion-detecting sensor for the streetlights, such that it will only increase in its light intensity when pedestrians and vehicles are of a certain distance. By implementing this smart lighting system, a huge amount of electrical power would be saved.

Technical Report Executive Summary Final

This report addresses the electrical usage contributed by streetlights in carparks that impacts the overall power consumption in Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT). The existing street lighting system in SIT is switched on to full lighting intensity from 7pm to 7am on a typical day. However, due to poor dimming controls, electrical energy is wasted.

The report also aims to propose a smart lighting system that uses advanced street lighting controls such as sensor and wireless technology. If the division of estate in Singapore Institute of Technology chooses to implement this adaptive lighting system, the street lights in SIT will be able to adjust their brightness according to the changing ambient conditions and activity levels. The benefits of implementing the proposed system and suggestions to tackle the current issues will be discussed.

A feasibility study was done by the team detailing the requirements and constraints considered in the design of the system, as well as a technical overview of the solution. Methods of research were involved to obtain information from existing solutions as well as a third-party interview to verify the feasibility of the proposed system. The primary research method includes conducting interviews with the staff of SIT. Secondary research methods involve obtaining statistics, articles and referring to reports of current implementations internationally.