Monday, April 16, 2007

5 years of life in East View Secondary School

I was a student of EVSS from 1999 to 2003. 5 years, terrible. Lots of memories though.

I always go around saying, if one day I'm successful, I wouldn't be thankful for this school. Really. This school simply gives me the feeling of reputation > student. All they did that claim to be for the good of students ended up it's for their own reputation sake.

Scandal of life, no need to be told.

One important thing, I'm from Express stream although I studied in that school for 5 years. I'm not from Normal. Heard of retain? Read here if you want more information about it: Why I fail my Secondary 3.

Times in EVSS changes me from a boy to a man. Lots of things happened. 13 years old to 17 years old in a school with your classmates becoming friends, friends becoming buddies, buddies becoming enemies.

I was quite small size when I enter secondary 1. It was afternoon session. My last afternoon session. Every morning, I would wake up and start preparing for my day in school. No time to crap around. Every afternoon, the boring afternoon weather will accompany through my lessons. Ever evening, it will be a nice moment queuing up at the parade square, singing national anthem and getting ready to be dismissed.

Can't remember much about the things that happen in secondary 1. However, there is one incident that I will always remember. Me fighting with another classmate. He's Eugene Chong. Doesn't wish to comment about the incident.

Secondary 2 onwards, it was all morning session! Personally, I prefer morning session to afternoon session. After school in morning session, you will have the whole afternoon to study, do homework and play. This isn't the case for afternoon session.

Mrs Ngiam and Miss Kew (then principal and vice principal) decides to step down. Meaning I will have a new principal and vice principal during my secondary 3.

Life is quite peaceful for the first two years. I'm not a troublemaker and most teachers and classmates have no problem with me. I'm a quiet student too, that leaves me with little friends. Haha, I guess I'm quite nerdy too.

The boat of life sails me to secondary 3. A year of total change of Jerry. I became lazy, noisy, troublemaker and got disliked by most of my classmates. Because of me, they can't study well. Forever, I didn't hand up my homework and assigments. Never did I pass any of the subjects. Yes, straight fail for every test and exam. Got chased out of the class by teachers countless time. Everytime I'm chased out of the class, I prayed that the principal is not doing his rounds or I will get canned. Yes, I'm very lucky.

Of course, I can sense that the teachers are losing hope on me. They are treating me as a problem student and rotten apple. One teacher even asked me in the face, "how did you get into this class". Thinking of it, I also don't know what came into me. Puberty?

2002, I repeated another year of secondary 3. Only then I realise that I have been a folly for a year. I began to work hard again. It's not easy as I'm now in a lousy class. A class so lousy that teachers even have problem teaching. Those students are like me in the past. Now I know what a clown I was. Due to the fact that I'm a retainee, I scored well in every test and exam. In fact, always getting first for maths and science is no problem at all. I studied for it too. The feeling of everyone knowing it's you before the results are announced and everyone looking at you when the results are announced is great. My name always appeared at the ranking board.

Because of "I'm too good", some people disliked me. I tried to befriend them instead. We ended up as good friends. This is the time I widen and broaden up my social circle by alot. Got alot of buddies and friends. They are nice! Now I know how to balance my work with my friends.

Secondary 4, I did it again. Challenging the teachers. Not one, not two but three teachers!

The first is my maths teacher. I did not do my homework and was instructed to stay behind in school to complete my homework. I disobeyed. I look up the teacher in her office and reason it out with her. I questioned her, "what's the point of handing up homework when most of the students are just copying". I did not make up any stories, indeed there's alot of people who copies homework in school. Then the teacher just replied "no, I can tell that they are not copying". Now, she's telling me that she's not fit to be a teacher.

She ordered me to complete my maths assignment or she will report me to the head of mathematics. "I will report you to the head of mathematics instead", that's my reply. No joke. I really reported her. My message to all my teachers teaching me: "don't force me to do homework, I will do it if I want". Cheers for me! No more pressure for homework.

The second case is my chinese teacher. She's the head of Chinese and mother tounge. She's quite bossy and impose strict rules. Afraid that I might get punished, I always pay 100.5% attention during her lesson. Somehow, she still don't like me as my chinese isn't very good. The dooms day. Once I forgot to bring my assignment and I was forced to stay behind to write the chinese idioms (cheng yu). I have to write all 150 idioms 20 times each. THAT'S INSANE! She claims that it's a beneficial punishment as I will also learn from it. There's about 10 people staying behind to serve the punishment. I spoke up.

I went to confront the teacher and tell her that "a chance should be given" instead of punishing on the spot. I really forgot to bring my assignment! She ignores me and instructed me to go back and write the idioms. FINE! I went back to my desk, collect my bag, walk out of the classroom and slam the door. When I reached home, the teacher had already called home and spoke to my mother. My mother is the understanding type and understands my situation after I explained to her. She agrees with me that the teacher is just being fussy.

The third case is my art teacher. HEY! I NEVER LIKE ARTS! I'm forced into this art class for no reason. I appealed to the vice principal that I want to change to D&T but was rejected. My D&T has better grades than my arts yet they put me in arts? It was then I understand that the school never cared for their student interest. They wanted me to fail instead of excel. Nevertheless, I still give my utmost attention and participation in art class. Never cause or create problems.

My art teacher just dislike me, she picked on me on every little thing. She says I can't draw well, can't paint well. I then nicely request her to teach me drawing and paininting yet she replies "you should already know how to draw and paint". Yeah, who doesn't? Then there's this time she held up my art piece in front of the class and commented that my drawing and painting standard belongs to kindergarten level. This really annoys me. I complaint to my parents. The very next day, my father went down to the school to talk it out. Things got better for a while. My arts teacher started to treat me nicer. Nicer means she's ignoring me. Not long, she's gone. Hearsay that she's undergoing some consultation. E8 for O level arts on my certificate, who's fault?

The days of us studying really hard. I mean REALLY HARDWORKING studying for the O levels. Everyone was so hardworking and nice to everyone. We helped out each other. Questions and questions from ten year series. Tips and tips from teachers. The tip was "do more ten year series". We were so united when it came to O levels. Those scenes of studying together in a full blast air-conditioned underground room will stay in my brain forever.

Thanks for all my classmates and friends for being there for me. And thank me for being there for you. Not easy to go through but at least we all passed! No effort, no gain.

5 years of life in EVSS is not enough to put it out all into words. There are alot of things I have yet to write about; camp trips, toilet shots, TTT nonsense, basketball matches, video cam-ing in class, visiting to friend's house. Too many.

Thanks.

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