Curtin Sarawak students compete in ‘Wit Wars’

Miri – 8 November 2016 – It was a real battle of wits and minds at the recent SPE (Society of Petroleum Engineers) ‘Wit Wars 2016’ event at Curtin University, Sarawak Malaysia (Curtin Sarawak).

Organised by the Curtin University Sarawak SPE Student Chapter annually for students of the university since 2013, the quiz-type competition is aimed at encouraging active learning through a fun event and promoting the student chapter’s membership drive and activities.

In this year’s competition themed ‘Knowledge is Power, Information is Liberating’, participants were required to choose from questions from five topic categories: General Knowledge, Science & Technology, Wildlife & Geography, Sports & Entertainment, and History.

Divided into five teams of five members each, they competed in a preliminary round, semi-finals and finals where each round had its own unique set of rules to challenge the participants’ cognitive skills as well as their teamwork in answering the questions.

Finalist teams ‘The Johnie’ and ‘A-Team’ were tied at 1,200 points each and had to go through a gruelling 20-minute tiebreaker. Eventually, ‘The Johnie’ emerged the clear winner.

Organising chairperson Timothy Chuen-Peng Yuen and vice organising chairperson Muhammad Dary Mahadika commented that educational activities can be made more interesting if fun elements are injected into them, like the Wit Wars. They said students at Curtin Sarawak are always keen to organise or take part in such events to improve their knowledge and relevant skills.

Group photo of the Wit Wars competitors.

‘A-Team’ hard at work.

Yuen (2nd left) and Muhammad (3rd left) presenting prize to ‘The Johnie’ team.