Assalamualaikum
[Warning] - All pictures are blurry because they are pictures I stole from Ansara FB page and the one I managed to insta story (My phone die and reset itself)
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I grew up in MRSM and the PRS in me always knew that I'll be back to give back to the school in whatever way I can.
"Sirih Pulang ke Gagang" is an annual thing organised by my seniors. Basically, we need to give career talk to the current Form 4 students to somehow help them determine their future path. Back when I was still a university student, I joined similar program organised by our batch for the Form 5 students at the time...that experience was a bit disappointing that I stopped joining for the coming years. 1. We, the facilitators ourselves were still students at the time alahaaaai hingusan nya pastu ada hati nak bagi career talk and secondly, in 2011, most of the students at the time were into medic (ye lah, sekolah sains kan) almost 60% of them wanted to get into med schools and the remaining big percentage of them wanted to pursue engineering. So only 2 or 3 students were slightly interested in accounting, I use slightly because even them were on the fence of either accounting or engineering.
Fast forward to now, in 2019, I think I've got enough experience to brag about my current profession *flip hair* well, at least to a bunch of Form 4 students, still not experience enough to give talks to university students.
When I checked the speaker registration list, I saw like 5 names under Accounting and Finance so I was like phewh I don't need to talk much but on the actual day, for the first session, there was only me!!!! Syila came 20 minutes late, omg omg omg poor students had to hear me rambles for 20 minutes straight!
Here is my take on the whole experience:
1. Based on my 2011 experience, I came prepared with a mindset that I need to sell Accounting to the students, that I need to convince them that Accounting is a cool career path to pursue too. Knowing full well that each student had to attend two sessions, one career of their choice, another one was randomly picked by the organiser, I thought everyone in the room got accounting as their randomly allocated session. So when I asked "Who wants to be an accountant?" I didn't expect that everyone would raise their hand! (Including two biology girls I have in the session). I was flustered. This explain my initial 20 minutes ramble early on. I have nothing prepared for students who already love accounting! My reaction to their raised hands was "Really? semua nak jadi accountant?" followed by enthusiastic yes! oh my oh my accounting is popular!
The students were confused at my confused face so I had to explain my 2011 experience plus how my batch only had like 15 of us in the class. I couldn't blame them, at the end of the day, this is still a science school so everyone wanted to be a doctor. I guess it's different now. The students explained that they have 2 accounting full classes now with a lot more students wanted to take Accounting but since Cikgu Pauline retired, the school only has Cikgu Fadzilah so they have to put quota and screen the students through one test to see who's eligible to take accounting. I was shocked!
2. Now I understand why Kery kept insisting us to join him every year. Me and Syila were the only pure traditional accountant in the whole program. We took traditional path. Took accounting, professional paper, joined audit firm then move on to commercial company. Another senior were around for the afternoon session but she's not from accounting background. She's a business graduate and is currently self employed. I enjoyed listening to her talking about her hardship and how she fights for what she has now. However, the students were very interested in CAT, ACCA and the path to follow that if me and Syila weren't around, I feel so kesian to the students that they wouldn't be getting much information. After the session, me and Syila looked at each other and we were like, "Should we come every year from now on?"
3. I am happy that accounting finally gets the recognition it deserve among us bumiputera and never would I thought that I'll live to see the day when not many wants to pursue medical school. Don't get me wrong, we still need doctors God bless them for sacrificing their time and effort to keep us healthy, but I hate the brain washing science school always do to their student which is Doctor = Successful. I believe that everyone has their own role in this world. If a kid wanted to be a doctor, great, if a kid wanted to be an accountant, it's great too! Don't undermine one career over the other. I find it sad that a Pengetua of a SBP once said, "Jangan jadi macam senior korang tu....Dia pandai tau top student, tapi last last jadi Accountant," grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
P/S: If I am to be completely honest, the ideal career to pursue now is anything related to IT. With lots of automation and innovation coming on, that field of study has a lot more room to explore and career opportunity in the future.
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