Nowadays, with college advertisements bombarding all of our senses, it is hard to tell whether what the university offers is a good deal or just good marketing. We frequently see and hear advertisements on the radio, in the newspapers or even near our school compound. I should know because I've seen Taylors College and Inti College banners just outside my secondary school in rural old Raub. The internet is helpful too but the info is seldom centralized, meaning that you would have to digest all the bits and pieces and convert them into useful information. And with the variety of Grade 12 (STPM level) programs you can take, no wonder most students would be paralyzed by fear just trying to decide.
So the question is how do you find out.
As cliched as this seems, the first step to knowing where you want to study is to find out what you want to study.
There are a few easy steps to obtaining the answer. Some people usually have a passion towards a certain subject and gravitate towards it. For example, people who have a heavy leaning towards Maths and Physics will probably choose to study engineering. If you are have a tick in such a category, congrats! You are probably on the right track and can find your college accordingly. If you are unsure of your passion or having a hard time to pick between two subjects, don't worry - you've probably haven't seen all your options yet. One way is to obtain information through fairs and well, books!
Books are called crystals of knowledge and its for a good reason. Usually the books on higher education are curated by authors who have gathered all the information in one place and easily understood. My first approach to anything that I don't understand is to read a book on it, and it has served me well so far. In the early stages of deciding what to study, I found this book to be very useful. Let me introduce the first book I've ever had about further education. The first of the 3 gems that I am going to introduce today.
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| Subtitle says it is for "geniuses and idiots", but anyone in between could also read it |
I still remember this yellow book being distributed by my Chinese language teacher who was passionate towards further studies. Everybody got one, and everybody was asked to complete the exercises within the book which consisted of writing down basic information of what you like and what you want. However trivial this may seems, it certainly helped me crossed out several options in my list such as the medical professions. This book is good because it acts like a counselor by letting you analyze your own strength and desires, there are rarely any books that do this. In this light, I totally commend FSI (Further Study Interactive) for their effort to come down to rural places like Raub and expose the students there to different education pathways that they can take.
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| Further Study Bible? |
This is the second book - for those who can't read Chinese, this book is titled the 2016 Complete Guide to Higher Education in Malaysia. It is, as its title suggests, a very complete guide to the various private universities and colleges in Malaysia, including its location, student population, courses and scholarships offered. My brother first brought it home after attending a talk in Bentong. Again published by FSI, it is a very comprehensive book and showcases a lot of choices in terms of higher education. However, conspicuously missing from the book are well-known colleges like BAC and Inti, probably because they don't need the publicity anymore.
With this book, my brother did what I could not have done during my time - to think about his career plans and identify his prime choice efficiently. So I highly suggest you get a copy of this book. Together with the first book, you can basically make an informed choice on your institute, instead of just relying on guesswork or a few auntie's opinion. The internet is often a good source of information too. For figuring out what's after SPM, you can visit unidigest, eduspiral, easyuni, eduadvisor and FSI, all of which offers you the opportunity to compare and contrast the different options to a higher education.
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| The title says it all |
So what's really after SPM? If you still don't know what you want after reading the two books or searching the internet, I suggest giving this book a read. The first two books just give you basic information of the different colleges and universities, but "What's After SPM?" gives you insight into the experiences of the students themselves. Maybe you will be inspired after reading the often unorthodox pathways that the students themselves have chosen, who knows?
There is a funny story on how I obtained this book, which I got during the USAPPS workshop 2015. There were 5 copies of this book to be given away to people who had valid reasons to own this book. The person who gave it away asked me what I was going to do with it and I said that I was going to bring it back to Raub spread it around to my friends. Spread it around I did, I remember lending it to one of my friends and asking him to share around after he had finished reading it. Much later, one of my friends even thanked me personally for the good book! I really wanted to buy more copies of the book to give it away. And that tells you all about how much I value it.
So this are the 3 books that I am reviewing today and I strongly recommend everyone to read it (Hey! Even my mum finds it entertaining). Just give it a go! The time after SPM is truly a crossroad for you to discover your future.
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