Boarding school: Did you go to one?, Will you send your kid to one? Options

[forrestcat]

These prestigious skools like MCKK and Yayasan Saad are good schools but most students there are children of rich people and big people, and these kind of students are not really motivated to excel and depend on cables and their seniors to get jobs in the future.

Talking about students from boarding schools,I am kinda irritated that some MRSM and SMS students think they're so special. They have this arrogant attitude towards non-MRSM/SMS students and know it all attitude, though nowadays most National School students actually perform better them academically.. . It's kinda difficult to mix with them eventhough we're of the same race/religion. Yeah and they're kinda simple minded...eventhough they're smart.

My 2 cent based on my experience with MRSM/SMS students.

This post has been edited by forrestcat: Jun 3 2006, 09:36 AM

[yana19384]

i hate the MRSM schools...i dunno whats so special about the students or the school or anything....these people play dirty cos most of the questions set for the SPM and bla bla are set by the teachers teaching in those school and the questions are disrtibuted even before exams and they call it the "SPOT questions"

thats cheating to me

lame

[forrestcat]

i hate the MRSM schools...i dunno whats so special about the students or the school or anything....these people play dirty cos most of the questions set for the SPM and bla bla are set by the teachers teaching in those school and the questions are disrtibuted even before exams and they call it the "SPOT questions"

thats cheating to me

lame

Huhu..some MRSM students are extraodinarily smart. One of the girl in my program who scored 99 in her SSABSA was from MRSM. But there were more students from National Schools who got 99 ... ...so the argument tha these boardin school students are so damn smart dun hold water.

I agree, these students get spot questions. Heck...some SPM questions are so similar to trial exams at SMS/MRSM schools. . That's why National Schools always try to get sample questions from MRSM/SMS schools.

But getting to do pre-U levels is different thing and the spoon feeding stops. I had some MRSM students in my program at INTEC who has better SPM results than mine, but their SSABSA scores were lower than mine( a student from a national school out of nowhere), some of them even failed to fulfill the sponsors requirement of 80.

[yana19384]

im very shocked to know that some of the scholarship sponsors like MARA did not have minimal standard requirement...because in my college some of the scholar holders are those who have to drop batches

[forrestcat]

im very shocked to know that some of the scholarship sponsors like MARA did not have minimal standard requirement...because in my college some of the scholar holders are those who have to drop batches

Hey, MARA does have minimal standard requirement...usually even stricter than JPA's.

[yana19384]

but most of my seniors are stil stuck there in india when they are under mara scholar

[alphaz]

ehem... actually MARA do have minimal requirement (at least for medicine). there are MARA students from my college who couldn't fly because their pointers are less than MARA's requirement, although they passed the minimum requirement in their universities' conditional offer letters. PETRONAS put higher pointer requirement than JPA and MARA students, and my friend from INTEC couldnt fly because JPA changed (sic) the minimum requirement to study in Germany.

I personally dont agree with doing spot questions because it seems like cheating and doesnt reflect the true knowledge of students. Besides there are times when spot questions miss.

It seems like I took so much thing for granted. So when I went for my preparation programme I was amazed at the degree of maturity and perseverance of National School students. With regard to academic performance, I couldn't see any big difference though. The best scorers are mainly National students, but in terms of overall (i.e. inc extra-academic activities) the best student is from MRSM. His score were less one point than the maximum score. (NB International Baccalaureate has a max score of 45 points; 42 from subjects + 3 from 2 paper assignments.) Knowing him as a very2 diligent and hardworking guy, I really respect him.

On the other hand, I have twin friends and we were rivalling each other during primary school. We scored the same in UPSR, I and one of the twins got SBP (Sek Berasrama Penuh) offers. I went to the SBP, but my friend didnt because his parents wouldnt want to separate the twins, so the twins went to National School. After the PMR, both of them scored well, but this time only the other twin got SBP offer, incidentally for the same school as the one the other twin had. He didnt go either. It was very sad to me, because I know them really well and we are close friends. They're really smart and active in co-curriculum. When the SPM results came out, one of them told me things might have been different had they went to SBP (IMO their results might have been better).

No one can say whether boarding school would do better or worse for them, but my point here is that - whatever school you came from, that doesnt matter. The mentality that you find in SMKs, you can also find it in SBPs/MRSMs, be they good or bad. IMO it really depends on family upbringing rather than the school.

[pancaindera]

never been to one. so far only heard the negative side of boarding school, so atm, will not send kids to one ..

[alphaz]

dont know about MARA requirements to study in India though, cant comment on that.

by the way forrestcat, did you have to take ISAT test?

[alphaz]

to pancaindera:
had I heard all the bad things I wont go either. what people usually made mistakes when commenting about boarding schools is that there are several kinds of boarding schools - or schools with hostels: SBPs (co-ed or single-sex), MRSMs, KMYS, SMKAs, Maahads, some daily schools (e.g. technical schools) also have hostels for students that come from far places. In the case of my parents most of the negative things about boarding schools they heard came from non-SBP and non-MRSM schools. However boarding environment is not suitable for everybody I must say. I've seen a junior who cried by himself almost every day for his first 2 weeks, yet when he reached fom 4 he turned into a gangster sort of. It all comes down to who the friends are.

[forrestcat]

dont know about MARA requirements to study in India though, cant comment on that.

by the way forrestcat, did you have to take ISAT test?

MM..FYI..I took SSABSA(South Australia Matriculation) last year and before that I had to sit for the IELTS. I am in Engineering. Never heard of ISAT,Is that an English proficiency assessment test?

but most of my seniors are stil stuck there in india when they are under mara scholar

What do you mean by stuck, they failed subjects and have to repeat is it? As far as I know once u fail any subject, MARA send u home pronto.

[samheisfl]

Ahh.. i'm from boarding school..

[forrestcat]

Ahh.. i'm from boarding school..

Nothing wrong being from boarding schools and I am also not against u guys. It's just that u guys act kinda weird ..hehe.... .These are just my opinions and u may argue if u like.

I also noticed that some boarding school students apparently have no future plans. Some of them that I know very smart but they dunno which course to take when at applying Uni..which is a vary dangerous situation coz they could make the wrong choice. My roomates at INTEC all complained which course to do...what kinda job they gonna get in the future. And their solution is finding which safe courses to take and they ended up taking the same courses aka amik course yang member and senior amik... ..and i believe if they do like this...they'll lost interest in their study coz they have no ambition and real interest in their course.

My 2 sen.



This post has been edited by forrestcat: Jun 4 2006, 01:54 AM

[yana19384]

seriously...there are even some of my seniors who have to stay back for 4 years instead of 2 and half years in india...and they are still under mara scholarship

[alphaz]

^4 years? peh.... there's something serious going on there.

to forrestcat:
ISAT stands for International Student Admissions Test. I dont know much about it moreover my batch in banting took the test only as part of a trial to see ISAT's applicability to Malaysian students. The test comrpise critical thinking and qualitative reasoning scores (not IQ test). it seems like it's compulsory for int students who wanna do medicine in Oz. More info from Google hehe...

i miss my boarding school...

[forrestcat]

^4 years? peh.... there's something serious going on there.

to forrestcat:
ISAT stands for International Student Admissions Test. I dont know much about it moreover my batch in banting took the test only as part of a trial to see ISAT's applicability to Malaysian students. The test comrpise critical thinking and qualitative reasoning scores (not IQ test). it seems like it's compulsory for int students who wanna do medicine in Oz. More info from Google hehe...

i miss my boarding school...

I am an engineering student.
But I believe the medic studenst had to take some IQ test or something, maybe that's ISAT.

[yana19384]

i believe that medic student need to be tested on their IQ,their entality,their quick response and also their responsibility wise...but it'l be very impossible to be done

but well...i hate the mentality nowadays that when the student scores straight As they deserve to be in medical school or they should be doing medicine and bla bla...cos that is not true...

u dont need a good brain to be a doctor...u need common sense and responsibility...but 90% of the time u need common sense....thats all

[alphaz]

^absolutely true.

[yana19384]

thanks for agreeing doc :P

adoi mengantuknye

[JeremicahRoy]

I never experienced going to a boarding school since we had no money for it. But I like the idea since as I've observed that students who go there spend more time studying, and that their studying hours are extended.

I know boarding schools is the U.S. and California. But then again,I'd like to send my first child to a boarding school for her to experience being independent and for her to focus more on her studies. We're currently looking for good boarding schools in Kuala Lumpur (any suggestions?)