:: My Drama-Rama Mind ::

:: comeback kid! ::

i finally went bac to sch to collect my diploma.. after having graduated for almost a year! i think i've been too comfortable in sch.. either tt or i've spent too much time in sch.. (who, me??) cuz even after a year, walking on tt familiar corridor in sch has not made me feel out of plc.. nor did i feel peculiar.. it felt like any other day where i wud stroll into class late and haf abt 20 pairs of eyes stare at me as i walk in nonchalantly. :p actually it felt quite good to b walking in sch.. maybe cuz i haf oredi graduated. :)

holding the piece of paper in my hands.. means a lot to me. i kno some ppl feel like, wa lao.. it's only a piece of a paper after having slogged for 3 years in sch.. to me, this is the fruit of my labour.. the very thing i went thru ITE for.. the very thing i put up with wat ppl might say 2 years of embarrassment for having failed my O's and gg to an ITE. i may haf taken the longer route, but wat matters most to me, is tt i reach the end state.. tt is attaining my Diploma in marketing. :) for the 1st time in my life, i felt a wee bit proud.. of my determination and capabilities despite a discouraging father and misunderstood frens. *big pat on my own back!*

i am not sure wat ppl think of ITE now.. those days, ppl labelled ITE as "it's the end". but i am sure tt if i had not gone thru ITE myself, i wud haf the same steoreotype thinking abt ITE. in fact even on the 1st day of ITE, i was not able to walk with my head high.. in tt dreadful uniform. i had refused to sign up for ITE and my mom had to drag me to bishan ITE the day after the O'level results were released. i was still in my rebellious phase and i did not want to repeat a year at my secondary sch.. i had wanted to do privately to repeat my O's. however, my family is not a well to do one therefore my parents cud not afford to put me in a private institution. i only had 2 choices, i either go bac to secondary sch to repeat one more year, or go to ITE and at the same time enrol with MOE as a private candidate to repeat my O's. this way, if i failed my O's again (how negative, i kno), i can still fall back on my ITE cert.

to this day, i thank my mother for dragging me to enrol for ITE tt day.. she knew i wud not haf the discipline to study for my O's independently.. and insisted i enrolled into ITE. mothers do know their children best, i'm sure of tt.

to b able to explain and decribe how it was like to b labelled an ITE student.. is not easy. but it is also the exact thing tt made me work damn bloody hard to b different from the regular ITE student. i did not wan to b stereotyped as one of them, but the elites of them.

during my time, the ppl who went to ITE were not interested to study, they jus didn't wanna go out to work so young an age. for the guys, it was to escape army. so u can imagine, under such circumstances and in such an environment, it is not exactly very conducive for succeeding academically. however, i made use of the opportunity to excel since no one wanted to. and it was easy, cuz there were hardly any competition, plus the teachers there were more than happy to teach an eager student. i turned the disadvantages into my advantages. i participated actively in all the sch events and i was almost the sch ambassador for every one of them. as such, i got to kno my sch principal and was on good terms with a lot of my teachers and mentors. when i graduated and earned a place in NYP, all of them were eager to vouch for my credentials in ITE, including my principal.

thus, i started my journey in NYP.. sadly, it was not half as interesting as ITE was for me. ciz it was there tt i truly excelled as a student.

ITE has done me a big favour in my life and kinda gave me a 2nd chance. therefore, i detest those tt make ITE look bad or even those who still continue to stereotype ITE to this day. ITE has evolved from a place for rejected and unwanted students to a place for those who want a second shot in their academic life.

i hope ITE students will not look down on themselves, but take the opportunity to strive towards their 2nd chance at getting a diploma or even a degree, which is wat i intend to do.

today, i think of ITE as "I'm The Elite". :)

lastly, i want to say tt there r many ways of getting things done, jus because u do it a different way, does not make u wrong. so go out there, and show everyone wat u can do! cuz if u dun, u will nv kno wat u r capable of.

CHEERS!

posted by Mrs. Lee @ 7:53 PM