Many singaporeans have their routes on the journey of education set out for them. education is of course a must have in our knowledge-based economy. not only that, the importance of paper qualifications has been emphasized not only thru our political figures but also thru our very beloved endearing teachers and very doting parents. you would hear phrases like:
"University graduates can get a better starting pay than a poly graduate!...you think its so easy to go into university after poly? u must be one of the top 5% of poly graduates applying for university in that course okay!...poly graduates' pay can only go so far. if you have a degree holder and a diploma holder working together doing the exact same job, the degree holder will pull a higher salary okay."
most of us has this route planned out for us by our parents: pre-school. kindergarten. primary school. secondary school. junior college. university.
don't we, as students, find it tough on us to follow a route that has been set out so rigidly for us? my father's route for me is obviously this, even if it has been unsaid. it has always been given that i, as his daughter, would eventually end up in university. my father doesn't care how i get there as long as i get there. but as mentioned above, taking the poly course (albeit which i find more desirable) is not practical. lets face it. i am a decent student. i reckon (im not sure. but i sure do hope) im better than the average. but im not top notch quality.
i have been involved in this paper chase and rat race (though i'm friggin tired of it) for as long as i can remember. my father, though he has gave me
very very obvious hints that i shud go to JC, is deceptively okay with me going to poly. but only if i cannot make it into ANY JC. but with the polytechnic course i actually have an interest in would take less than a 20-odd pointer to get a place in. (the lower the score the better) -shakes head-
so today, i went for a Singapore Polytechnic course where it introduces polytechnic life to us. It showed us the aftermath of polytechnic life and the prospects of having a diploma. however, informative as it was, i only found out that i don't want to go into SP, and not the entire polytechnic life. It's not tt SP is a bad place really. its just that the course talk didn't leave me salivating as the talk about mass commications made by Ngee ann Polytechnic had done. NP's courses seemed much more appealing for me because it is what i want.
i had thought of choosing an alternative route. that is to go overseas to get a degree. to go Aussie to be specific. but then, that costs a bomb. like about 5 times more expensive than it would take to study in singapore. so i thought, to go to poly. study in NP, get a scholarship and fly to aussie. seems pretty simple? NOT! well firstly, its not
that easy to get a scholarship that is obvious. 2ndly, NP doesn't offer after grad scholarship. i can't count one on the govt and the aussie programme doesnt offer one to singaporean students. added to that, the universities itself have scholarships but, as i've been so condescendingly told before, they're about as easy to get as "striking lottery".
Something that keeps me from choosing a definite path on the junior college side of the fork is the fact that, the good JCs would have a high number of independent/convent school girls & boys who would be difficult to get along with since we're kinda on different wavelengths. the fear of not being able to fit in grows bigger every day that i get closer in going into JC. Since these schools have affliation to the JCs, it is more likely that the schools would have a higher number of these poeple than people from BP-like schools.
the thing is, i'm a social misfit. i find it difficult to get along with people. maybe i'm socially inept. i dunno. i can't get along with people in the public neighbourhood govt schools. and i can't get along with people from the independent/covent schools. so really. where do i stand?
