It's really extraordinary in the Singapore Institute of Management (SIM), where I currently study a degree in Accounting and Finance.
Given that society in Singapore in really hierarchical, there is no place for failures, or lower-than-expected outcomes for all students. The prevalent mood is, if you're in SIM, you'll just be a third- or fourth-class people in Singapore. You can't compete with the graduates of local universities. So this is why friends in my school say their degrees are not recognised.
But facts have proved people wrong, which we as a student group are not aware of.
Students from SIM had gone on to Imperial College, London School of Economics, Cambridge, Oxford, and even Singapore's NUS Law School, where 2nd-tier talents are supposed to head to. A few even got into LSE on scholarship. It is even more encouraging that people from all backgrounds do succeed, whether they hail from Junior Colleges (preparatory high schools), Polytechnics or even Institute of Technical Education. In addition, whereas local audit and banking firms are reluctant to hire SIM graduates because of the extensive alumni network in the established universities, comparatively smaller banks in Singapore, such as Standard Chartered Bank and Credit Suisse, are more than welcome to hire SIM students at graduate positions.
In the end, it is the person and his character and competence, that brings him (or her) to places as far as he pushes himself to go. No parent, 'alumni network' or even society can really dictate where a person can head towards his own success. He will have to keep on searching for his success, in the face of challenges ahead.
I believe the same could be said for people with autism in many countries. We may not get the full set of opportunities because of our social impairment. But so long as we keep on working hard to understand our gifts and societal opportunities, and work towards them on our free and complete will, then we'll definitely achieve tremendous amounts of success, on our parts.
Given that society in Singapore in really hierarchical, there is no place for failures, or lower-than-expected outcomes for all students. The prevalent mood is, if you're in SIM, you'll just be a third- or fourth-class people in Singapore. You can't compete with the graduates of local universities. So this is why friends in my school say their degrees are not recognised.
But facts have proved people wrong, which we as a student group are not aware of.
Students from SIM had gone on to Imperial College, London School of Economics, Cambridge, Oxford, and even Singapore's NUS Law School, where 2nd-tier talents are supposed to head to. A few even got into LSE on scholarship. It is even more encouraging that people from all backgrounds do succeed, whether they hail from Junior Colleges (preparatory high schools), Polytechnics or even Institute of Technical Education. In addition, whereas local audit and banking firms are reluctant to hire SIM graduates because of the extensive alumni network in the established universities, comparatively smaller banks in Singapore, such as Standard Chartered Bank and Credit Suisse, are more than welcome to hire SIM students at graduate positions.
In the end, it is the person and his character and competence, that brings him (or her) to places as far as he pushes himself to go. No parent, 'alumni network' or even society can really dictate where a person can head towards his own success. He will have to keep on searching for his success, in the face of challenges ahead.
I believe the same could be said for people with autism in many countries. We may not get the full set of opportunities because of our social impairment. But so long as we keep on working hard to understand our gifts and societal opportunities, and work towards them on our free and complete will, then we'll definitely achieve tremendous amounts of success, on our parts.
