How the IT guy suspended me from school.

Contrary to what you may be thinking after seeing the title, this story is not about some ridiculous secondary school tall tale. It truly happened to me just within these two days.

It made me realise the shocking lack of logic in the system.

This bizarre string of events started off in the midst of add/drop madness. After getting my best realistically possible timetable (which can really feel like heaven if you know what I mean), my tutor cancelled my tutorial slot and I had to join one of the remaining three slots.

Slot 1: Clashes with my core tutorial
Slot 2: Clashes with my Japanese language tutorial
Slot 3: On Fridays, a day which I don’t have any other lessons.

Common sense told me that the third option would be the final resort. So I decided on the second one because I wouldn’t want to mess around with my core courses.

So, before going to bed that night, I sent out an email via NTUmail to everyone in HMJ1, looking for someone interested in a swap. I’d think chances would be high as last semester, I managed to find many willing parties. And in the semester before that, I replied to someone’s mass email requesting for a swap too.

After all, such emails are common during add/drop period, and I was sure the kind souls out there understood my situation.

The next morning, I woke up to learn that not a single person replied to my email, because I could not even log on to NTUmail, or StudentLink, or even Edventure! I called the Centre for IT Services (CITS) and was informed that my account has been suspended for a week due to mass emailing.

I sensed trouble, but there turned out to be more ahead. I walked into the lecture theatre, and realised that I can’t get my lecture notes. I turned on the laptop to try to find the CITS number again, but I couldn’t even log in to the Internet.

Soon, I realised that I wouldn’t be able to access STARS. I wouldn’t be able to obtain my readings. I wouldn’t be able to, basically do anything much in school. All that and more for the next seven days. Then the worst of it all, I wouldn’t be able to apply for an exchange because the deadline would be in two days.

I have been suspended from school.

I asked friends around me whether or not have they heard of students getting accounts suspended for mass mailing or any other reason. Every one said, ‘nope’.

According to CITS, “mass mailing is a serious offence as it used up (sic) resources and could be inconsiderate to other recipients,” and it is the university’s policy to suspend culprit’s account. Well, surely executing such a serious action against me would have been discussed between one or two professors maybe? But no, it was solely the mysterious postmaster who suspended me.

Well then again, surely such a serious punishment should act as a deterrent right? Maybe not in the past since nobody around me seems to have known about it. But not anymore; I have been made the best example.

A CITS staff told me that I was caught because someone who received my mass mail complained.

All I wanted was simply a timetable. One that doesn’t make me stay too long in school. One that gives me enough time to pursue my hobbies. And maybe, just maybe, one free weekday.

The good news is that I can still keep my Fridays free as I have been told that my original tutorial group will remain as it is. You know, that tutorial group. The one that was available for registration a few weeks ago, the one that got cancelled by my tutor after I got it. Yes, the one which made me have to rearrange my timetable, which then made me decide to find someone to swap another course’s tutorial with, when then I decided to send an email to a couple of hundred people. Which then irritated someone, and made him/her call up CITS. Which then got me suspended, I mean, my account suspended. Which then made me realise that the university treats mass mailing as ‘a serious offence’. Which got me really feeling like a fool after my tutor kept that tutorial slot. That made me think why tutors can be free to choose a timetable, which suits them best while students often have to worry away precious hours away just to try to get a decent timetable. That then got me really bewildered by the lack of logic, fairness, justice and organisation in the one of the world’s top 100 universities, Nanyang Technological University…

PS: Through this episode, I have been assisted greatly by my school’s (by my school I mean the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, which is sadly in Nanyang Technological University) Chair and staff. So I shall keep to the objective of this story and save their kind deeds for another time, another story…