To the good life.

either way, cheers. let’s hope we all have a good life out of this one.

And there is no such thing as too late. Things -might- get harder to do after a certain phase of life, or time, but it’s never too late (pardon me for being cryptic… and excuse the pun) until we are 6 feet under.

and based on what i have heard from some professors, their attempts to make the system less singaporean (ie. less tests, more project based learning) failed because the students wanted more exams (more singaporean ma..) and when the students feedback forms make up such a big part of their performance appraisal, the professors find that they have little choice but to comply. in other words, singaporean-ness has entered the system and turned it upside down. i don’t think we can say that we are different any more. the grade chasing, in fact, is not as bad in nus from what i hear. that is the singaporean aspect i speak of – the grade chase, the paper chase. yes, it could be considered the ks thing.. (the here or there in my previous post was here: smu, there: nus/ntu – apologies for being unclear..)

no, i hope that there is no significant difference. however, in the context of our nation, past affiliations count. it happens all the way from secondary school, to junior college, that i think people get used to using schools as a way of pigeonholing people. a previous employer i had preferred to hire full time employees with overseas degrees – and while there is some merit in that.. oh well.

haha. i agree with you. here, we have specific courses and requirements to fill, and even those there is a veneer of being flexible, the courses choices are so limited.. as for spoon fed, hey, look at all the letters every year about junior college students not being able to get a place in university – we have gotten so used to meritocracy that it has been turned in on its head. people think that if they do a, then they are entitled to b, rather than thinking that if they do a to a certain standard, then they are entitled to b. where did those other words go?

you might say that the industry argument fits for singapore because of the difference in academic independence, but do you really feel that smu has benefitted any from just being closer to the ‘industry’? perhaps for corp comms, but to me, all it has done is exacerbated the ‘mustgetajobatallcosts’ mentality.

i think the herd mentality is that even though people know or feel or at least have an inkling that such a life is not for them, they follow because everyone else is doing the same thing – and the irony is, everyone else is possibly doing the same thing because they do the same thing: classic prisoners’ dilemma.. and then, i am not sure if the school is even pointing the students in an appropriate direction.

(the thing is, i fear that many smu people may very well turn around in their lives later on, and think what if, instead of doing what our school seemed to promote, they should have done what they enjoyed. and by then, it will probably be too late.)

thankfully, i know what i want to do. phew.

As for being “singaporean”, there are different aspects of being Singaporean I guess! What’s not to say that I am more “singaporean” overseas just because there is a starker contrast between me, and a non Singaporean for example. I guess you are referring to how “KS” students here can be?

I suppose on the grander scale of things, like I mentioned in the post.. out of Singapore, is there really a significant difference as to whether one is from ntu/nus/smu? No. So as mentioned in the post, credentialism will only get you so far… after that, what you accomplish (ideally) takes over.

I have to say that it is different overseas though. First year college students are given far more liberty to mix and match modules, and are accustomed to actually doing some THINKING. Whereas we, on the other hand, have been spoon fed and followed a guided academic path for the most of our lives, contributing to this “anxiety” when we finally graduate… and then the options that we have are seemingly mind boggling. That is why I don’t discredit the industry argument for the specific case in Singapore, because how else are we going to get that experience, or environment to facilitate any kind of thought? Quite different from overseas, is it not? Not just in terms of environment, but also in terms of student composition. UVA had a far more diverse mix of students than we can boast of here, and that in itself also creates a different learning environment that students interact in, not just banking on obscure physical locations itself.

I would just say that at the end of the day, the onus is on yourself to find your own path. Sure, the school can point you in a certain direction, but if you know that it is not for you, nothing but yourself can stop you from pursuing what you want. Maybe most students just feel helpless in this sense, because of that ‘herd mentality’.

We just need to take more responsibility for our own actions. If the wheels fall off, then who was the one who followed a direction as dictated by another? If we don’t follow what was dictated to us, then we are taking control of what we want to do, and any consequences, again our responsibility.
It’s tough being marginalized all the time, but such is life…

as for the located right next to industry argument, i find that to be a rather weak argument, considering the size of singapore, and the wide range of counter-examples. wharton is a top business school, but it is 2 hours away from wall street, for example. similarly, uva’s business school has been rated as the 2nd best undergrad business school, and it is probably even further away from a lot of ‘industry’.. (of course, it is close to the washington lobbying machine, heh.) if being located in an obscure place is a problem, there would be many other excellent universities and liberal arts colleges that would be doomed to fail, would there not..

perhaps i am over-reacting to an unwelcome change, but who doesn’t? perhaps smu has been good to some people by giving them a sense of direction (ie, a job, although i think this is a flawed compass), but sooner or later, the wheels will fall off.

I am actually rather envious of the “student life” in NTU, or even NUS but I’m sure we have our own merits… like being located right next to the industry for one. Our environment shapes much of how we function, and our city address is pretty much unparalleled… as opposed to being located at the outskirts of town. I’ve heard sentiments expressing doubts about the location of the new uni near the expo for the very same reasons – what can that industrial environment offer (that is different from the others)?

Regarding institutional choice, I don’t regret coming to SMU. While not an entirely clear cut choice in the past, I don’t think I could have grown so much in any other local institution, nor been given the same opportunities that I have been blessed with!

hmm.. as for cip, think about it – for the comm service report, we are asked to write about whether the experience has made us more receptive to a career in social service, but it blatantly ignores the fact that the same office of career services behooves us to get a job all the time.

i wonder why i choose smu. hmm..