The poor life of an arts grad...
Just read the article in today's papers about graduates being unemployed. It's worse than I thought. What's more, arts grads in particular are at a losing end. Only 64% of last year's NUS cohort were employed by the end of last year. Darn...
At times like this I can't help but think about all the choices I made that landed me where I am today...
In secondary school I was in the pure science class in Sec 3/4, the best class in the school. Didn't have much of a choice there 'cos we were streamed according to our results in Sec 2. I could do all my science subjects and really liked Bio lots but I still enjoyed my humanities subjects better.
So, after the 'O's I decided to switch to the Arts stream in JC, following my interests. My first 3 months were in CJC and after the results I decided to stay in CJ eventhough I could make it to alot of other JCs. In my year, I missed the VJC cut off point by about 2 points but I still met the criteria for other good JCs like TJC. But since I already had friends in CJ and was comfortable there I just stayed on.
CJ was really loads of fun and I did have memorable times, but it was really very slack. And I'm a naturally lazy person. I need a competitive environment to keep me going.
Oh, but just read that since Bro. Paul came to CJ things have been alot better. CJ is the JC with the most improvement academically based on this year's 'A' level results. Sigh, my batch was stuck with SML.
Anyways despite the unstimulating environment I got decent grades for my 'A's. Wanted so very much to go abroad but parents wanted me to stay here.
I got accepted in NUS Arts and SMU. Again, I followed my interests and decided to forgo a business degree in SMU, which would be alot more marketable.
So, here I am today, a Theatre Studies and English major.
I can't say I regret following my heart but at the same time I can't help but think of the "what ifs". Like I always feel I didn't work hard enough in school. If I just bothered to study even a little but more maybe things would be different.
Yet, I know there's more to this than just grades. I've met amazing people thru' out my school life. And if I didn't choose this path, I wouldn't have ever met them.
Well...just something that was playing on my mind since I read the papers this morn...
At times like this I can't help but think about all the choices I made that landed me where I am today...
In secondary school I was in the pure science class in Sec 3/4, the best class in the school. Didn't have much of a choice there 'cos we were streamed according to our results in Sec 2. I could do all my science subjects and really liked Bio lots but I still enjoyed my humanities subjects better.
So, after the 'O's I decided to switch to the Arts stream in JC, following my interests. My first 3 months were in CJC and after the results I decided to stay in CJ eventhough I could make it to alot of other JCs. In my year, I missed the VJC cut off point by about 2 points but I still met the criteria for other good JCs like TJC. But since I already had friends in CJ and was comfortable there I just stayed on.
CJ was really loads of fun and I did have memorable times, but it was really very slack. And I'm a naturally lazy person. I need a competitive environment to keep me going.
Oh, but just read that since Bro. Paul came to CJ things have been alot better. CJ is the JC with the most improvement academically based on this year's 'A' level results. Sigh, my batch was stuck with SML.
Anyways despite the unstimulating environment I got decent grades for my 'A's. Wanted so very much to go abroad but parents wanted me to stay here.
I got accepted in NUS Arts and SMU. Again, I followed my interests and decided to forgo a business degree in SMU, which would be alot more marketable.
So, here I am today, a Theatre Studies and English major.
I can't say I regret following my heart but at the same time I can't help but think of the "what ifs". Like I always feel I didn't work hard enough in school. If I just bothered to study even a little but more maybe things would be different.
Yet, I know there's more to this than just grades. I've met amazing people thru' out my school life. And if I didn't choose this path, I wouldn't have ever met them.
Well...just something that was playing on my mind since I read the papers this morn...