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Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) captured the headlines in the local news when 2 of its graduates, Teresa Kok and Tan Hoon Cheng, together with Raja Petra were arrested under the infamous ISA law. Coincidentally both Teresa Kok and Tan Hoon Cheng were graduates from the School of Mass Communication in USM.

Teresa Kok is a three-term Member of Parliament and a senior exco member in the new Selangor State government in charge of investment, trade and industry. In the recent general election, she retained her Seputeh Parliamentary seat with 36,492 majority - the largest in the country.

Meanwhile, Tan Hoon Cheng, an award winning journalist from Sin Chew. She was released after 16 hours of detention.

Raja Petra needs no further introduction. He is the editor of the famous Malaysia Today website.

Both Raja Petra and Teresa Kok are still under detention at the moment.

A quick flashback to my days in USM. When I was a under-graduate, I used to have lengthy discussion with my friends from School of Mass Communication to understand what were they learning. The most memorable qoute that I learned from them is the definition of news. From news perspective, if a dog bites a man, its not a news. But, when a man bites a dog, its a big news. Many of them ended up as journalists. Tan Hoon Cheng is one of them. I am sure her lecturers like Zaharom Naim will be proud of her.