Joe was born exactly a year earlier than me and lived with me in Raub for 9 years of his life. At 17, he was one of the pioneers of the Permata Pintar project in Malaysia to be sent overseas and studied at Brown. Now at age 21, he is now going to study in Stanford for his PHD, while I have just begun my degree at SUTD.
How our lives took a twist of a turn, for two guys with the same birthday.
He said that overseas universities are probably comparable to universities anywhere, but the only thing different is the experience and exposure of studying abroad. How would you adapt, fit in and get exposed to the bright lights and beautiful sights. I sighed. I probably only get to see that in my exchange to UCB next year.
Of his admission to Brown, he simply commented that he was very lucky. I was intrigued by his analogy of saying that admissions to top universities in the US is akin to throwing all the forms in a box and picking the admits by lottery. I couldn't agree more - with top universities admission statistics at single digits nowadays, how do you discern who deserves to go there?
That is also his reason for not providing a motivational story whenever anyone asks him about it. "What can I say beyond I'm lucky?". I immediately withheld from him the fact that I wanted to ask him to write a "Project Insights" blog post for me. I could detect his reverence to Lady Luck in his tone. "I think that if you don't do anything stupid, you should have a shot of studying in the top university and the rest depends on luck." I disagreed, what happens to those who were never exposed to the overseas universities application system, those who were doomed to never have that rich experience?
"Well, you could certainly help them up to a certain level, but beyond that is luck."
I sort of get what he meant now, due to his triple pronouncement of "luck" like some ominous warning. Luck sort of meant opportunities, which are now non-existent since JPA (Public Service Department) pulled the plug on sponsoring the bursary students overseas. With the old JPA scholarship scrapped and the new scholarship deal changed to a local loan, one could only fight for the smallest chance of sponsorship by the corporate world. No more sponsoring of students abroad en masse.
With the lack of scholarship, if one could not secure the necessary finances to study overseas, what is the point of one trying to apply to universities abroad nowadays? The pain felt was most acute as the offer letters from top universities abroad became spectres that haunt and taunt me. Never have I felt that achievements could bring about such despairs. Even I who is so well-versed in the world of higher education only managed to land myself in a not-so-famous university in Singapore called SUTD. So why do I still continue my blog, when obviously we wouldn't have any great opportunities?
It is precisely because of the lack of opportunities that you must try.
When you don't have the money or when you come from a rural background, your stakes are higher. The magnitudes of you changing your families' life for the better is higher than the privileged. The privileged would just be investing their wealth to accumulate more privileges while you would be trying for a better future. Despite the claims of hard luck and tough applications the chances still sometimes fall in your favour. The only way to have no luck is to never try.
I suggest a double whammy to trying. Even in the process that you failed, you will still gain considerable knowledge of the competition worldwide. Every test taken, every essay written, every interview spoken makes you realize the sheer number of people who are in the same boat as you, and who are trying very hard to gain admissions. Then you would be able to better gauge what a good education is and know what you want out of uni life. Those people who merely followed their parents' decisions can't know this more than the person who tried to get into the best university in the world. Never mind the actual fact that the person did not succeed.
In the end, most people in Malaysia are not aware of the tough competition to top schools. Like Joe said - those who went there had a life changing experience and I believed in this as well. But to get there you must first try. I am not painting an idealized picture of the road ahead: it is definitely fraught with many difficulties and heartbreaks. Nevertheless, Audentas fortuna luvat - fortune only favours the brave.
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