<p>hey reika! yay! another J2! and another non-rafflesian! (y) (jk)
well, i think (i'm a n00b myself, but yeah...) you have quite a chance at these schools; for as much as i know, singaporeans, for the most part, apply only to god-likes like HYPSM and other univs of that league! that bio olympiad sound impressive to me (but again, it's just me, a kid who takes PCM!), and so does the LSAP thing! so as for chances, i think it looks bright! :)
as for retaking your SAT, if you really think you can improve, you can go ahead and do the december SAT i.e. after a-levels! (though i think 2130's good enough for these colls!)
don't really know about the supplement part. anyways, if you don't mind telling... kinda curious... WHICH JC... because you sound like someone i know! :)</p>
<p>actually regarding what lisieux said I have to agree to a certain extent, cuz from what I see, hwachong doesn't do as much for their students on international applications as compared to schools like rj, and even vj. I get the feeling that hwachong cares more about local reputation than international reputation, so in that sense the school does not do very much to help send students overseas.</p>
<p>hwachong is more of leaving it to the students to take care of everything, checking up and following their own deadlines, running around to ask about things, checking out schools and navigating around the place. apparently vj has a better system, with their own internal submission deadlines & teachers, I heard. don't know what rj does, but since they do have a substantial no. of students overseas, well...</p>
<p>if anyone's keen for hwachong, your chances for anything would be quite good if you keep urself in the top 10% of the cohort, from which the school regularly pluck students out for competitions & tea sessions w/ scholarship providers & such. otherwise you'll have to work hard to keep a look-out for opportunities on your own. hwachong uses a buffet style system, & the school is perfectly fine with you not doing anything, not joining cca, & throwing away your 2 yrs. In a sense it's good cuz it preps you for self-discipline needed for uni & allows lots of freedom, in another perspective it feels that the school cares little about you aside from your role in bolstering school reputation.</p>
<p>I wonder if the other top JCs are like this too? given that we're all quite similar in the kiasu department.</p>
<p>and oh, i'm from hwachong. suffers a love-hate relationship with the school since I'm sometimes in that top 10% and sometimes not.</p>
<p>The question I suppose is why you feel compelled to go overseas?</p>
<p>This is just a routine question -- that is, to ask yourself whether the financial costs would be worth it, so you can make an informed decision.</p>
<p>
[quote]
hwachong is more of leaving it to the students to take care of everything, checking up and following their own deadlines, running around to ask about things, checking out schools and navigating around the place.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Many students in the US do all of their applications with no help except to get their guidance counselors to send transcripts and ask teachers to make recommendations. I spent my whole Christmas vacation writing essays. ;)</p>
<p>Don't you plan to apply online (Common App, etc.)? Why would there be internal submission deadlines? I'm just curious</p>
<p>Anyway, asking for financial aid often hurts admissions, since admissions for internationals aren't need-blind. But you're applying to overseas LACs, and international admissions is often less competitive there (compared to say, Ivies or MIT), so that's a plus. </p>
<p>BUT even if you are accepted, you must ask yourself this: What do you want out of an undergraduate education? What is it about an overseas LAC that would be worth the extra 215k SGD, as opposed to say, NUS? (If I didn't have my green card and I had to ask myself this question, personally I would be worried about being stifled, etc. That's my reason.) But it's struck me that many Singaporeans look at international schools only because that's the social expectation for the academic top, regardless of the actual benefit to the students.</p>
<p>Here on CC you will come across the school-individual debate -- whether it's so much as the school that makes a person's education a success, or the person him/herself. And in the US people give up their dream schools all the time for financial aid reasons. After all, this is the undergraduate level -- what about the graduate/professional level? Just keep this in mind.</p>
<p>That said, I don't want to discourage anyone if they have a really good reason for applying overseas. My friend was accepted to the British SOAS but turned it down in favour of NUS eventually for financial reasons (even though her family could afford it) -- she wanted to use the funds for graduate school.</p>
<p>hey! just wondering... for US admissions, are foreign students in singapore considered in the singapore lot or the lot for their country. as in, if i'm an indian scholar, would i be considered to be an indian applicant or a singaporean one?</p>
<p>you would be considered to be an indian living in singapore</p>
<p>lol, yes, just that singapore students are more used to being herded, thus the sudden lack of care from the school does result in people migrating to extremes in the cohort.</p>
<p>Thank you very much for the reply~</p>
<p>I started looking around at university choices starting end of last year after promos ended. Initial choice was cambridge, cuz I've been there before, and it's so stunningly beautiful that looking at the drab NUS makes me weep. Since cambridge is popular choice for our school I was more or less looking at it, until I realised that I don't really have a major in mind.</p>
<p>Basically I chose US schools over NUS precisely for the same reason that I decided I'll live without that ravishing campus of cambridge[plus really cute bunnies]. I can at least experience what the courses at university level are like before settling down in a major.</p>
<p>I know NUS is a great choice too. Actually I'm probably going to apply just for the top universities that I might get into, since anything less is probably not much point with NUS being here and local and quite decently good.</p>
<p>As for LAC vs. non-LAC, my choice is mostly based on my decision that I want a solid, well-rounded college education that's purely for the sake of having a good college education, rather than the reputation. I'm pretty much split over the two loves of my academic life--the arts and biology. And from my 8 weeks of solid 8am-6pm lab work, I'm pretty much decided that research will have to come after I've gained some real passion of high-level deep science. The one push factor that finally got me over to the LAC side is that profs teach over at LAC while in conventional uni profs are meant for doing research. We all know researchers don't necessarily make good teachers.</p>
<p>One more consideration would be that coming from one of the so-called elite schools, I'm pretty much fed up with the amount of fuss the school gives to maintaining its reputation rather than doing solid work. Good teachers don't get retained and students aren't very much cared for. The impression I get from LAC is that they care more for their students; and being small schools, they're more smooth on the administration side.</p>
<p>At any rate, I'm planning on finishing college in 3 years [using Alevels to get some credits] and go on to a graduate school that's [hopefully] internationally reputable. </p>
<p>All that plan is derived from my current knowledge of how things work. correct me if I'm being too hopeful.</p>
<p>as for individual-school debate, I've been in neighbourhood schools that's totally mediocre, and so called good schools, my take on it is that it depends on individual if you're a bright and intelligent individual, because the school will groom you, especially if you're in schools ranked near but not at the top. However if you're an average student, go for the good schools because they'll push you further. Basically, the ideal situation is to get to the best possible school where you remain near the top, because better schools do come with better facilities and better connections thus better programmes, but they'd care less about you if you're not in the better half of their students. However if you're in a school too much below what you can do, you'll reach the celling very soon and be stuck there.</p>
<p>As for financials, thanks for the reminder. since my family won't be able to afford it anyway, so I'll stick to asking for financial assistance and keeping an eye out for scholarships. Otherwise it's off to NUS I go, plus whatever scholarship that's suitable.</p>
<p>Afterall, with good old NUS around, we can all take some risks.</p>
<p>umm... so does that make any difference to my chances? i mean, as far as i know, it might be relatively easier to secure admissions from a certain country over another; India seems to be the easier one to get in (from what i can see)... so what does it mean for me and my admission application?</p>
<p>there are no lots; both India and Singapore are overrepresented so it wouldn't matter anyway.</p>
<p>What does it mean to be overrepresented?</p>
<p>Because if we're talking about per capita, then India's huge population relative to the world means that Indians are underrepresented; but if we're talking about numerical ratios of students relative to the US population, then Singaporeans would definitely be underrepresented while Indians would be overrepresented.</p>
<p>Reika</p>
<p>I think you're on the right track and have a healthy attitude with regards to college selection. I totally agree with you on the LAC take.</p>
<p>But take one step at a time and concentrate on the near-goals first. Don't think too much about how each step is interrelated or how a small setback in your workplan is going to affect the big picture. That usually demotivates and do more harm than good.</p>
<p>BTW, I was a hwachong student, then a hwachong teacher and now in the US for graduate studies. So I'm well informed about 'fuss over reputation rather than doing solid work'</p>
<p>Been such a long time since I posted here.</p>
<p>Another plug for doing your education in an LAC.</p>
<ol>
<li>The profile of LACs will rise in Singapore as the government works to institute a national LAC of sorts and implement the same guiding principles of an LAC into Singapore's tertiary education landscape.</li>
</ol>
<p>Singapore</a> education draws global interest</p>
<p>President Oxtoby, mentioned in the article, is president of Pomona College, which is part of a Claremont Colleges consortium. He actually had lunch with us Singaporeans before leaving for the Asian tour, where he was the spokesperson for Singapore. You know, get to know what Singlish is, what Singapore students care about (like constituency boundaries -- no I kid.) Presidents from the other colleges like Claremont McKenna, Harvey Mudd, Pitzer and Scripps were spokespersons in Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing.</p>
<p>You will find a surprising number of employers that know top LACs. If you work for places like Merill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, heck, even DBS, they will recognize your degree and to a certain extent, will be impressed that you chose a way that is shunned by many (due to prestige and recognition problems, or peer pressure (what the hell is Williams, apply to MIT la)) I have met students from Bangladesh who hold Macalester College in high regard because they have students going there before. An Indian colleague of mine in the consultancy firm that I am interning with went to University of Rochester because he didn't want to be stuck with a degree he did not want (computer engineering) at an IIT. </p>
<p>My take-away point - recognition of LACs is rising. Right now, it is indeed still at a rather pitiable level. But with increased links LACs and our JCs, LAC's stock will rise and the chances that you will not get a supercilious look from your peers or your potential employer when you name "Swarthmore College" as the provider of your BA will rise dramatically. </p>
<p>Top LACs give very good financial aid. Slightly more than half of students in Pomona are on financial aid with an average grant of around 30,000 USD per year. For 2006-200, Pomona provided 22.6 million dollars in scholarship money to 800 students. (Pomona is 1600 strong) BUT, right now, in general LACs are still not as generous as we internationals would like with international students. We are trying to make Pomona need blind not only for US residents, but also for internationals, and the administration is definitely headed in that direction.</p>
<p>Having said that, I understand that most Singaporeans will need lots of financial aid to study in the US (even with the US exchange rate at 1.35 Sing for 1 USD). Most top private unis and LACs will cost you a whooping 45,000 a year to attend. I was lucky because my parents had enough money to send me without fin aid. My friend, even though he got 15,000 a year to attend Columbia Fu School and 23,000 to attend Harvey Mudd, couldn't go because he needed a full ride. </p>
<p>So at this moment, I would agree with screwitlah. If you know your family does not have the financial wherewithal to support 4 years of LAC education, or if for some reason, you absolutely have to work outside of the States after graduating, due to preference or otherwise, it will be wiser to choose a well known university like U of Michigan over Pomona or Macalester or Colby or Carleton. But with a degree from a top LAC, you get one of the best education experiences in the world, because you are taught by the professors, current in their field, and current with their students. Not in a hit-or-miss TA. You are to a larger extent, forced to be exposed to people of different cultures, and not be naturally drawn into a huge bubble of Singaporean students in school such as _____ who LOVES Singaporeans, and dare I say it, Rafflesians. <em>ducks</em> (You guys should know what uni this is but I am not putting it down, it's just the way it is - Singaporeans can make an effort to befriend many outside the Singaporean circle). Surrounded by peers with multiple interests and talents. Having commencements by Bill Clinton or J.K. Rowling. Attending talks by Bono. Attending debates on the role of the IMF. Those things you read about in your JC Econ textbook. The politics you see in CNN. Right here. </p>
<p>To me, that is value for money, paying top dollar for top education, in every sense of the word. And of course, great career support centers, research grants during the summer, internships and the like to help you become "employable". An LAC degree is certainly employable in Singapore. Just not at a local SME. (don't quote me for truth over that) =)</p>
<p>So again,</p>
<ol>
<li><p>An LAC offers an unparalleled education experience. To me, there was no way I was going deeper into the Singapore education system after JC when such a great opportunity existed. I've raved enough of the merits of an LAC earlier in this thread. And I've also said enough about NUS in another thread.</p></li>
<li><p>An LAC does not have widespread recognition back in Singapore. The recognition is growing, but right now the level is clearly not enough for it to be a sole justification for going to an LAC. You will need other reasons for wanting to attend one. Grad school is one reason. Getting a damn fantastic education is another. Staying and working in the US is another.</p></li>
<li><p>Many top LACs offer generous financial aid. Don't be turned away by the high price tag. In addition, financial aid offers are often negotiable. The same applies for many private unis. HOWEVER, right now, the level of financial aid available to internationals are clearly not where we want it to be. Fortunately, more unis are recognizing the need to attract 'foreign talent', ironic given the prevalence of that moniker in Singapore.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I will also maintain this - going to a US undergraduate school is a VERY different experience from doing your studies in NUS and then going to grad school.</p>
<p>Bear in mind that your college years are one of the most impressionable years of your entire life. If you can afford it, and are comfortable being overseas, the US is the way to go.</p>
<p>There are people who will disagree vehemently with me and say "who say must go overseas?". It's up to your personal choice. I challenge anyone in this thread. Talk to friends who have studied in Amherst, Williams, Harvard, Yale, University of Michigan, University of Chicago, Caltech, Brown as undergrads. Then talk to your friends who currently attend NUS, NTU, or SMU.</p>
<p>Ask them this question. Do you like your school? If so, why do you like your school? What amazing things have you done here that you did not think you would have done before you entered uni?</p>
<p>And listen to what they have to say.</p>
<p>Sorry guys for the third post, not that I like to hear myself "talk" in cyberspace, but this thread will be very useful for many a Singaporean agonizing over the LAC dream due to employment and recognition concerns:</p>
<p>Provides another useful perspective.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone. </p>
<p>I suppose I can do without widespread recognition. As long as the right people/school/company recognises me for what I am, that would be enough. And I might stay overseas, depending on the situation.</p>
<p>to limnieng. oh hi to fellow hwachong-nian. did you hear about the hwachong diploma thing? the school had a hard time convincing us that it's meant for us not for the school's sake. The cohort almost rioted.</p>
<p>By the way, any idea on the arts supplement submission?</p>
<p>lol you will be surprised... rj does close to nothing for her students in terms of overseas u apps ><</p>
<p>For the Arts Supplement, they generally ignore it unless you are applying for a BFA (Bachelor's in Fine Arts) program. Amherst and Williams are going to be hard for any international to get in, but you can look at schools that offer merit aid to internationals as well.</p>
<p>Reika: </p>
<p>Amherst, that other school in MA (gotta start the rivalry early), Middlebury are needblind, but you probably know that already.</p>
<p>Macalester, Grinnell, Oberlin and Vassar are also rather generous with aid. </p>
<p>NUS may be "good", but they are spectacularly different educational systems, but you should know that, too. The purpose of the Singaporean education, unashamedly stated by the Education Minister, is to help Singaporeans secure jobs. I'm not touching that with a 20-meter pole.</p>
<p>to Nadash, didn't know the 4 schools u mentioned are generous w/ aid, thanks for the info. </p>
<p>& Yes I'm aware of the 8 need-blind schools. I'm actually looking between amherst & williams for a school to apply for in early decision... though I'd probably retake SAT in october for that.</p>
<p>I'm quite tired of the singaporean education system. learn whatever that's in the exams, and no questions please on the rest. I don't want to keep on working my way around that system doing all the extra reading & things anymore. same sentiments here, education's way more than 'securing future occupation'</p>
<p>and to 1234d... then we're all pretty much on our own then, lol.</p>