I H S L E C T U R E R S P E A K S A TI N T E R N A T I O N A L W E B I N A R O N D I E T &C O V I D - 1 9 I N B R U N E IDr. Rohaiza (Biomedical Science Programme) who has research interests in nutrition and universityteaching and learning was recently invited to speak at two international virtual seminars. In August, shepresented at the International Virtual Seminar organised by Health Polytechnic of Bali in August. On thetheme of 'Sharing experiences of nutritionists and dietitians in COVID-19 management from Malaysia,Brunei Darussalam and Indonesia', Dr. Rohaiza explored her topic on ‘How the Food Environment Changesduring COVID-19: Perspective of Brunei Darussalam’. She had the pleasure of discussing how the foodenvironment in Brunei had changed in response to the emerging COVID-19 pandemic. She explainedseveral public health measures which have been implemented in reaction to the growing pandemic thathave impacted on Bruneian food consumption. From limiting social access to public eateries andpermitting only food take-outs in the beginning of pandemic, to carefully re-opening dining-ins incalculated phases when the situation was improving; Brunei has proven itself to be competent atcontrolling the outbreak. She also underscored the functionality of the 'BruHealth' application which isdesigned to trace the movement of people between premises and only allows restaurant admission if theindividual is showing 'green/yellow' following in-app health assessment. A set of rules and regulations wasalso imposed on food operators, including the wearing of face masks, to help prevent the spread of theoutbreak. She highlighted that this pandemic has created a new norm where it may have influenced theway Bruneians make their food choices and therefore diet and health in general, which would represent aninteresting future study.Another seminar that Dr. Rohaiza had the opportunity to speak at was Riau International Webinarorganised by the Midwifery Department of Health Polytechnic. Held last July, this webinar focused on thetheme of 'Learning Management to Achieve the Competency of Health Workers Graduate'. Her talk on‘University Teaching – Effective and Fun Student Engagement in Class' saw an audience of almost 8,000people who were invited from various countries. She highlighted the effectiveness and engaging values ofvarious learning e-tools such as Kahoot, Quizalaze and Padlet. She also offered the relevance ofworkshops or small group teaching which can adopt a variety of useful activities such as role-playing,video competition, debate, and other creative methods such as poster or model designing and illustrativejournaling. Dr. Rohaiza regularly promotes her ideas on teaching and learning through TLC workshops thatare organised by UBD which she encourages teachers to attend.Dr. Rohaiza also noted that despite the social restriction, her seminar delivery was hardly affected, thanksto online conferencing tools such as Zoom application and the live-streaming function of YouTube. Sheconsidered the pandemic limitations as an opportunity for exploring these online tools, and foresaw thatsimilar large scale conferences could potentially be achieved by UBD through the same methods.B E Y O N D | J U L . T O S E P T . 2 0 2 0 | I S S U E 2 1 6Dr. Siti Rohaiza Ahmad, Assistant Professor'Being together apart'. Online conferencing tools are replacing physical academic networking events. Left: Dr. Rohaizaspeaking to her virtual audience. Right: Health Polytechnic Riau holding a webinar on Zoom platform that attracted thousandsof international participants last July.
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