The First Week: Confessions of a Year 4

Current mood: Sick and hungover from NYE, Week 1 and BFF’s 23rd birthday party.

Term 2 has a distinctly different flavor from the beginning of Term 1.

Unlike Term 1, there is no orientation period for the Spring term. We are thrown straight into work from the first week of the New Year, regardless of whether we have properly recovered from our NYE hangovers, or from the roller-coaster ride that was the previous sem, for that matter. Perhaps those that have it the worst are my fellow seniors returning from Winter exchange: not only do they have to re-adjust to the humidity, but also the fact that they have to study and actually attend classes.

Term 2 has a different effect on each batch:

For the Not-so-fresh-men, they are no longer riding on the high of orientation camps, although some may have acquired a whole new bunch of soul-mates during their OCSPs in December. Most would have been properly hazed by Term 1, but a fair few would also have secured an Exco position or another. From facing a field of endless possibilities, many would have found one niche or another in school- and that’s important.

Their status would also have changed since 20th December 2013- their first ever GPA for SMU is revealed. Like it or not, friends are ranked, and I have known that to change the dynamics of study groups. Beware of that.

In any case, instructors show no mercy. We are fully expected to know how academics work at SMU, so by Week 3 we will start having assignments due. The same goes for the sophomores, many who would have taken on heavier responsibilities in their co-curricular activities and assumed their term as the new year begins, making it harder to juggle: if so, you are not alone. It was also time to make bigger decisions on which majors to take.

I wasn’t here for my Year 3 Term 2, but I knew by then I had enough of SMU and was ready to explore a new environment, otherwise known as EXCHANGE!!!. I imagine “jaded” would be a good blanket description to some extent or another for these poor “juniors“.

But nobody had bigger decisions to make than the graduating class of Year 4s (or 5s).

A Tale of Two Modules

Image source: Google

Happy 2014! School starts tomorrow, and my last ever winter break went by uneventfully. As the new school term is about to start, I am determined not to care about my GPA anymore next semester.

Instead, I am going to focus all my energy on learning, regardless of whether it will help me score in the finals. Of course, I realise I am in a better position to ignore GPA, being Year 4. But the real push for me was what happened last term.

I apologize for not updating after October. Amongst other reasons, I realised that my assignments were not scoring as well as I would have been happy with, so I threw myself into “pushing up my grade”. At the back of my head I knew I was being hypocritical, being the writer of this blog and all, but I convinced myself it was an exception because my CGPA was X.X9. A 0.01 increase would have pushed me into another Laude altogether.

But as luck or karma would have had it- there was a module, Strategy, which I was struggling a lot in. But I enjoyed it in a masochistic way, because I felt myself intellectually challenged every lecture, and my groupmates were driven as well. The professor, Mats Lingblad, was a very intelligent mentor, who is not afraid to call out bullshit. I respected him, and was determined to do my best, although I was pretty sure I was only going to get a B+ at most.

There was another module (which I would not name) which I felt was a waste of time. When I realised how much it was a fluke, it was too late to drop my module. Despite approaching the prof a few times to suggest improvements, it did not get better. When I was able to score full marks for the mid-terms by merely memorizing the textbook, without really learning anything, I decided that it was going to be an A+, just for the sake of the grade.

And of course- on 20th December, the heavens decided to show me 4.3s are awarded for effort, not for examinations. I got A+ for Strategy and B+ for the other module.

It seemed like the moral of the story was a little too cliche to even be true, but there it was, incredulously. Do what you love, and rewards will follow.

This post is just a kick-start to blogging again. This is my final semester, and I aim to make it count!

Haters don’t have to hate.

Ouch.

Most of my friends know that I am no big fan of SMU Confessions. The founders are ingenious and the admin team is evidently a hardworking bunch, but sadly most of the posts are groundless, trivial, and/or negative. Yet, it is the one platform which attracts the most honest opinions, such as the one above.

I stopped very long at this one, because it amplifies the mission of this blog. And my heart sank because this student’s points are very, very real. What happens if you hate your university?

As of now, there are 39 likes on this post, indicating that at least 39 people resonate with this post to some extent. I have long recognised that I am somewhat of an anomaly to love the school as much as I do, but I also know that I have been very blessed by circumstances, opportunities and my personality fit to SMU. What happens then, when negative experiences, bad fortune and an ill sense of misfit has beaten one down, to develop an express hate towards the (school) environment?

I took a screenshot of the post and thought very long about it. This post is going to try to address not just this poster, but most of the jaded students in SMU in general. So here goes:

1. If you hate something, don’t try to force yourself to love it. 

It places immense stress on oneself. To straddle the two extremes of love and hate causes a huge cognitive dissonance, resulting in more stress and frustration. In other words… it places one’s expectations way above reality, causing disappointment.

This is the one time to ignore social pressure, even if “so many other SMU students” seem to know where they are going- As individuals, we do not share the exact same circumstances or conditions as anybody in this world. Besides, one must recognise that people, including our own selves, put up masks from time to time: and what others portray to the world may sometimes betray what they truly feel. On that note, it is OKAY to admit to hating something at the moment- better to be honest than to lie to oneself.

Once that is established, we will look at how to COPE with it.

The First Day: Confessions of a Year 4

Lim kopi only.

It’s good to be back! As a Year 4, this is my 6th time experiencing the “First Day of School” high- everyone is dressed incredibly well, freshies are all out to impress, and squeals of “Hiiii how are you!!!” are heard everywhere. I am fortunate enough to be a Teaching Assistant for the very first time in my SMU life this semester,  for Creative Thinking at that, so once a week I get to become very young again for one and a half hours.

School is in full swing. The Tea Party queue is back. The one-and-a-half-hourly rush of students going from class to class recommences. CCAs are filling up the T-junction and CCA halls with sounds at night again. I can only imagine how a freshman feels: eyes wide open, negotiating the overwhelming activities, looking out for friends they made in the past month of endless camps: “This is university life.”

The Year 2s, sophomores, can now bask in the fact that they are no longer the youngest and most inexperienced. This new-found seniority is readily enjoyed as they become facilitators, class part initiators, and CCA ambassadors.

Juniors by this time are pretty jaded and annoyed that they are juniors even though they have already survived SMU for 2 years. Fresh from internship, looking forward to exchange, managing an Exco position, they are pretty much in the zone.

That leaves us, the Year 4s. Seniors, in every sense of the word. But where the hell did all the Year 4s go?

4 Secrets for 4 Years of Happy SMU Life

A lot of people raise their eyebrows when I declare that I love my university- SMU, with its competitive environment, sometimes crushing workloads, and presentations where students try harder than getting their bf/gf to marry them (with sometimes entertaining pressie results). But before you write me off as a sadist/elitist/nerd/some other equally nasty label, here are some 4 tips that have helped me maneuver SMU life, which might be useful for you too. 2 are DUH, 2 are a bit uncommon, starting with:

Do NOT aim to stay overnight in the school library.
aka don’t perpetuate stereotypes. I sometimes do Jackie Chan faces at Facebook posts that go:

Unless they are naturally nocturnal creatures (as many SMU students are, for other reasons…), having to stay overnight to mug in school seems like a mismanagement of time to me. Besides, it is also unhealthy to stay up all night and mess up sleep cycles. Sometimes there’s no choice (5 mods where the profs collaborated to make it due on the same day), but what worries me are peers and juniors who think it’s cool to accumulate so much work that they have to mug overnight. I think it’s symptomatic of an unbalanced lifestyle. Avoid if possible.

JOIN a CCA and/or an OCSP.
This is where the best friendships are formed. There is nothing like sweating through killer training sessions / endless dance rehearsals / planning large scale events / enduring 10 days of unsanitary conditions in a foreign country together that can bond people together. (NS men would know even better.) 3 hours of class per module every week isn’t going to cut it, and projects can downright create enemies out of group-mates. At the end of the day, when you graduate, it would be the CCA/OCSP who have been with you through 4 years of thick and thin, who you will think of (and shed a tear for) when you sing Au Lang Syne.

Google “SMU graduation” and this is what I get.

CCAs are also essential because they give students a life outside of studies. Without CCAs, university life can be reduced to merely studies- going to school for class, and going home after class. Let’s face it- not every hardlyany classes are that exciting enough to motivate the 1.5-hour journey to school (yes, I live in Woodlands) without friends to hang out or talk cock with afterwards.

Learn the Art Math of Class Participation.
There is a misconception that in order to score an A in The Most Subjective Component In The World, one has to become Class Part Prostitutes. Otherwise, just settle with a B or below. But active participation in class actually make classes fun, and more importantly, prevents one from falling asleep/logging onto Facebook. The sweet spot (A+) is actually somewhere between turning up in class and hogging air-time.

Hermione would love this shirt.

The Class Part W****’s problem is that he/she probably has the mistaken impression that participation = talking. In truth, participation is actually equals to talking PLUS listening. The second part of the equation is often neglected, but even if one is not very vocal, active listening is an important skill set to have in order to get the most out of lessons.

As a guide, I try to speak up at most thrice every class, and shut up and listen before/after that.

Be Grateful.
This sounds DUH but it is truly Greatest Advice You’ll Ever Receive. (GAYER)
Gratitude can be applied in all areas of life, but I’d like to share a story that makes this especially poignant. Flashback to Year 1, I was an overly dressed-up Freshie (eventually you graduate to singlet, shorts and slippers uniform) caught up with assignments, projects and CCA trainings. And I was whining my head off to a senior.

She listened patiently to my rant about how “everyone’s so competitive, there’s so much work, classes are fluffy, etc etc”, and then said,

“Whenever I feel like complaining, I just remind myself that in order to be here, I have taken the place of another student who could have really, really wanted to be in SMU.”

And I was just Stun for a while.

Do you know anyone who really wanted to get into SMU, but couldn’t? I do. My BFF. We had made plans even before A levels to choose SMU together, do projects together, graduate and get great jobs together.

But when results were released, we were unfortunately separated.

I was lucky enough to end up in SMU with the course of my choice. And there I was, whining about the environment in a city campus, no lectures, where seminars encourage discussion, where professors are willing to have coffee with us instead of sitting in their ivory towers. Where, if I wanted to be a leader, opportunities are abound instead of being limited to the elite few. Where, if I disagreed with the professor, I can feedback immediately. Where, if I wanted to know people from the industry, they’re right there in the campus. Where, if there’s something I want to do and there’s no CCA for it, I can just start it. And, if I wanted to do freakin’ yoga, I can.

Check out our gym’s fitness classes.

 

At SMU, there is no lack of opportunity, if we are determined to grab it. But that’s the thing, we have to actively look for opportunities, instead of waiting for it to fall into our laps. I hope the above tips have helped, and if you liked it please do share with your fellow SMUdents.

Haters gonna hate, but I love my university.

\m/ xo
Ivy WAH
aka The Happy SMUdent

Do you love or hate SMU, or am simply indifferent? Do you have advice for SMU students to lead a student life full of awesomeness as well? Do share with what you think in the comments sidebar, I would love to hear from you! xoxo ivy WAH.