Friday, August 17, 2018

To Sleepydevil: Making good use of your time in NS

This post is dedicated to Sleepydevil, who is enlisting soon.

During this period, you may find it more comfortable to follow the herd and allow your mind to stagnate. In this piece, I hope to encourage you to focus on maintaining or, even better still, to improve and allow your mind to flourish.

There will be pockets of free time here and there. There will be weekends for you to pursue your interests. The point is to incorporate bits and pieces of self-improvement into these pockets of free time. Push yourself a little each day and, over the 2 years, your hard work will surely compound. The key is moderation, so that you will develop into a well-rounded person. I am sure this is not new to you, so let me share a few examples to get you all fired up.

I have a friend in army. Let us call him "A." "A" is from Raffles JC with very good 'A' level grades. One critique that is often leveled against the JC system by poly students is that JC students do not have advanced standing which they could use in the university level. Not for "A" though. During his 2 years of NS, he signed up for a University of London diploma programme. With this, he effectively had both good 'A' level grades and a diploma (which confers advanced standing) to boot.

After NS, he only had 2 more years of education to go before he got his degree. He flew to LSE and completed his degree. Today, he is rising up the ranks in the corporate world (based on what I found on his LinkedIn page).

Next, we have yours truly Unintelligent Nerd. For context, I am a Polytechnic student. During my 2 years of NS, I accumulated plenty of module credits for a particular post-graduate programme in humanities which I was interested in. At the same year I got my degree, I got my graduate diploma as well (the prerequisite for graduation is that I have to have a degree first). With the benefit of hindsight, while I did make good use of my time in NS, my prioritization was way off the mark. Studying for interest should not come before studying for practical reasons such as earning a living.

When I went for the graduation ceremony for my graduate diploma in humanities, I came to know one other chap who did the same thing. Let us call him "B." Similar to myself, he took up the programme for personal interest. This is where the similarity ends. He majored in law, a profession that could well support any of his interests. Based on a search of his LinkedIn page, he is currently upgrading his graduate diploma in humanities to a masters in humanities.

I do not directly know the next person in my sharing. According to one of my friends who spams specialist diplomas in the local polytechnics, he had the pleasure of getting to know a polytechnic graduate who took a specialist diploma while still serving NS. While in polytechnic, this young fellow already had good grades. The specialist diploma, along with some personal projects he is involved in, is the icing on the cake.

Not all tales end happily ever after right? Finally, there was another guy I know from camp who commenced on his studies. Halfway through his studies, he was posted out to another unit. There, he had less flexible superiors who disallowed him to continue his studies.

I hope these examples will motivate and encourage you. I know that they revolve around getting a certificate from a brick-and-mortar educational institute. Focus not on the examples, but on the underlying principles of personal agency and self-improvement.

Also, know who and when to ask for permission. There is a season for everything. Asking when the stars are aligned yields a more favourable outcome.

Hope this helps!

Cheers

4 comments:

  1. Hi UN,

    The post comes in extremely handy since I was looking to take up an education while serving the nation, so that I would spend more time outside in the future.

    I had been researching for a couple of weeks recently and good to know that you’ve walked through the same journey.

    Do allow me to research a little more before consulting you once again. Thank you for the dedicated and informative post :)

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    Replies
    1. Hi Sleepydevil,

      Glad that it is of help. You might wanna check out this same post on InvestingNote here. Plenty of people have given you their well-wishes and advice as well.

      Cheers!

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  2. Hi guys,

    I'm here to tell of a story of my student (i'm a tutor) who took Alvl during NS. He was from poly, so wanted to get his Alvl in the first year during NS. I think he overestimated himself and underestimated the effort needed to do it, hence he didn't do well enough to make it worth all the time and effort. What i'm saying is that you should be prepared to work like a dog to get what you want. It's not easy, trust me, but it can be done.

    Be prepared to sacrifice a lot. It's not going to be a walk in the park juggling both commitments.

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    Replies
    1. Hi LP,

      Thanks for sharing. Good to know about cases that did not work out as intended. It will provide Sleepydevil with a holistic view on this matter. Cheers!

      Delete