IDP Education Pty Ltd - Singapore

IDP Education Pty Ltd - Singapore is an organisation which helps Singaporeans to apply for Australian schools, I personally sent my application through this agency and soon was greatly disappointed at the actions carried out by this agency. Firstly, in October 07, I was surfing the internet to find out about education in Australia and I came across IDP's website and through this site, I learn about the 'Study in Australia Fair' for Singapore students and was interested by it. Therefore, I attended the Fair held at Orchard Hotel during that period and applied for University of Melbourne and University of Western Australia. In November 07, I received the acceptance letter from UWA but as University of Melbourne is my first choice, I decided to wait for the latter it to reply me then I will make a decision. As time passed, in December 07, I still have not received any form of reply from the University of Melbourne after I was told verbally by the agency to send in details of my Mathematics studies to the school. From November 07 onwards, the agency told me week after week, day after day the same thing everytime I call them.("We are chasing them on this issue, most probably/hopefully there will be a reply next week"). In Jan 08 to Feb 08, there was no reply and also the dateline for UWA was closed and because of this, I was held back one semester of my University studies. The actions by the agency was (1) Never reply any of my Email because they don't want this issue to be black and white. (2) Keep giving me false hope by telling me the same thing week after week. (3) Keep telling me that it is the Universities's fault as it should reply within 4 weeks - 6 weeks, saying that there is an administration lapse over at the other side which I can't see. In the end, I had to apply for semester 2 for the same course which wasted 6 months of my life and I have to personally call University of Melbourne and ask them what happened to my application and a miracle happened when they reply me within a week about my application. After this issue, I finially decided to submit my application to UWA but another story came out of this. After confirming my payment to UWA, I was urged by the agency to apply for my accommodation to Currie Hall, they tell me to make payment on the day itself when I make payment to UWA. Once again, there wasn't any form of Email or Black and White for this from the agency. IDP tells me that there will be totally no more available accommodation in UWA for July 08, you must apply for the last 3 places which is available in Currie Hall. I got suspicious about this, I don't believe that there will be totally no places in all the 5 residencial colleges in UWA so I decided to give trinity hall a phone call and this is what I 've found out. "The February 08 in-take accommodation are all full, the July in-take is not open yet" said the people from Trinity Hall.

Mathematics

Mathematics is the body of knowledge centered on such concepts as quantity, structure, space, and change, and also the academic discipline that studies them. It is essential for everyone, to obtain this knowledge. Hence, it was introduced to every student in Singapore, but for some unfortunate students, Additional Mathematics has been deprived from them due to their not satisfactory performance in Mathematics. In my point of view, this shouldn't be the case as Additional Mathematics is essential for higher education and people who didn't perform well in Mathematics doesn't mean that they will definitely do badly in Additional Mathematics. For example, I took both English and Literature in my Secondary School but I failed my English and got an 'A' for my Literature. Now I need to learn Additional Mathematics on my own expenses for overseas higher learning. Since, the government have high expectation for our students, the MOE might as well combine both Additional Mathematics and Mathematics as a single subject so that students will not lose out in anyway.

Pathways

I am not good with my words though I got a 6.5 average for my IELTS (basic requirement for Australia University and 6 for Singapore University).

Our local government always wonder why people keep moving out of Singapore and not returning, actually we don't need rocket sciencist for this question, maybe just a simple survey will do. In 2006, I applied to the so-called prestigious University in Singapore aka NUS they replied me with a rejection letter without any concrete reason, the reason given was "Admission to NUS is very competitive as a large number of talented students, such as you, apply each year. However, the number of places for the course you have applied is limited an hence, we have arrived at this very difficult decision" by Assoc Prof Tan Thiam Soon. This looks like a good rejection letter from NUS, but let me show you how University of Melbourne handle my case then you will know why UniMel ranking for the world top University is higher then our NUS. University of Melbourne actually offered me a place for "Bachelor of Commerce" the course I wanted, but they give me a conditional entry, meaning that I need to go to Unilearn to enrole for a Mathematics course before granted entry and I need to complete a test before I am given a full entry, that's a way out for my case. I applied to 7 of the group 8 in Australia Universities and all has offered me a place and UWA even offered me a unconditional 6 months exemption, that means my length of course is only 2.5 years.

Million thanks to Australian Universities, they helped me so much, I am so grateful to them. It is a very clear picture in my mind Australian University offered me the course I wanted and accepted me and my own country, the country that I serve 2 years of national service for rejected me and I can't even get into the course I wanted, even in for my diploma in Information Technology selected me, I didn't choose the course. 2 years of my life wasted in the Army for the country and the country can't even spend more time on my application to the University. This is a very clear cut case to tell which country is better in terms of Education.

I remembered Mr Goh, lable people who left Singapore for other country as 'quitters', in my case Mr Goh, I didn't quit, this country despise me and refuse to give me a chance, the school didn't even a second thought to reject me. I was abandon by our beloved country after serving NS. That's how I looked at it.

Uchiha Itachi

ok over with the lousy education system of some country. Lets me introduce you to this video in youtube. I like it alot, it's about naruto a Japanese anime series, this is what they call AMV aka Anime Music Video. It's about uchiha itachi a cool naruto anime character. Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osOP7AlUIQM

Heart Broken Student/Soldier

This evening 'MP' came to my house for a visit, my dad was speaking to them and I was busy surfing the net. After my brother told me it was a visit from the MP, I went to the door to have a look. They spoke to me with extremely friendly attitude and shook my hand. One of them, asked me this, "Are you going to Australia for overseas studies?", and my answer was "Yes, I am going over to UWA to study for Bachelor of Commerce". After a short chat, they left, I went back into my room to arrange my books and out of a sudden, I came accross a letter. I took a closer look and it was the rejection letter from NUS aka National Univeristy of Singapore, there was this sad feeling rush in and fill my heart.

Here is the story, I completed my Full-Time National Service with an Outstanding award with "Very Good" remarks on both performance and conduct, I have got a Nanyang Polytechnic Information Technology diploma with a score of 3.4/4 as my GPA, all I asked for is a place in NUS/NTU/SMU. I applied for all 3 of them, and got reject by either with a letter or a no notice rejection repeatedly until I give up on them. I don't want to get disappointed anymore, I decided to give overseas University a try. So I went to open house located at Orchard hotel and to my surprise I felt so welcomed there. Every single University makes me feel welcomed, they looked at my results and told me this "You have very good results you can apply for our University we will most likely take you(UWA/UQ/UniMel/UNSW/Monash...)". I found out that I was so demoralised by Singapore's Universities and Australian's Universities brighten up my life. As a Singapore citizen, I felt "second classed", thoughts of migrating to Australia or staying there as a PR beckons me. Few of my friends ask me, "why go and be a 'second class' citizen/resident in Australia when you can be a first class citizen in Singapore?" I question them with back with this "Are we 'first class' citizen or 'second class'?" Does 'second class' citizen in Singapore need to serve National Service?