⇦ FOLLOW? ⇨

Lately, the HCI confession page has this huge outrage against the high school's chemistry department or something that caused everyone to do really badly for the chemistry paper. Everyone's MSG is apparently sky-rocket high and they are lamenting over the 'guaranteed' route to poly because of the poor results.

...

I can't even begin to believe how annoying and elitist people actually can be. We're from Hwa Chong Institution for God's sake but so many people are acting as if going to poly is like a 'dead end' for those who did not meet the school's expectations to enter the college It is very disappointing to know that Hwa Chong students see poly as a place for people who can't do well academically. It's a stigma that is still so prevalent in Singapore even though that impression is completely false.

I have many friends who had an L1R5 score of 6 and 7 - perfect or near perfect scores to enter the best junior colleges in Singapore - but they chose the poly route because they found their calling in a skill one cannot develop in a JC. Hell, even I was considering the poly route at one point of time because there was a course which I was interested in. However, after much thinking I had a stronger calling for other subjects/particular occupations I want to pursue, so I dropped the idea and went to Hwa Chong Junior College, my dream school.

Even though I'm not involved in this saga directly, I'm highly offended by some of the responses submitted by my fellow school mates. I was in the worst 2 classes in the cohort, many people (including students) looked down on us and there was additional pressure from the school just because we always felt that there were few teachers who had faith in us. Faith that every student, no matter what, could succeed. I don't talk about this but a handful of my sec 4 classmates who made it to JC were unfortunate to retain because the system was too stressful. Another handful of my friends went overseas in search of better education systems. Sometimes I feel happy that they've found happiness in learning in another school overseas, because right now, from what I'm seeing, the students that are being developed here are so self-centred with zero empathy.

I'm so proud that I proved my teachers, on behalf of my class, that even a student from the bottom ranked classes could get 6 points for O levels. I defied my expected score of 17 points. Who's laughing now?

This whole saga is also motivating me to show to all these people that they are so, so wrong.

Sorry for the rant.