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There are a few students who believe that early graduation is good. However, what I’ve experienced last time got me to reconsider that statement. Is graduating 6 mths earlier? really that good? Should you accept an offer to the Accelerated Bachelors Programme (ABP)? Below are a list of what I feel are the pros and cons.
Pros
You get to save $4000+ of school fees. Enough said for those families with tight finances.
You get to work 6 months earlier. Once again, good for those that need to feed their families.
Less graduates to compete with you for jobs. There are only like a few thousand graduates this semester, hence what I said. However, does less people mean less competition? This will be further covered in the “cons” section…
Priority in core/elective appeal. Not too sure about elective appeal success, but absolutely sure on cores. They will aid ABP students first in cores appeal.
Cons
Less graduates to compete with, even lesser job openings. Let us get real. 10,000+ graduates in Jan. 100,000+ graduates in May. What will you, as an employer do? In such a small country, most companies focus their recruitment for the May graduates. It makes business sense to do that as they need not spend two times – once in Jan, and another in May, to train fresh graduates for their jobscope. In my experience, for most of the companies that I apply to, they only start work in May/June. Which effectively means I will still be jobless for 5 months (if they accept me).
Of course, that can be mitigated by doing part time. But still, one can do part time even when studying.
Bank loan repayment commences no matter what. This means that if you really do not have a job by then, the bank doesn’t care. You have to repay a minimum of $100 per month. Though you save $3000, good luck on figuring out how to pay back the bank during 5 months of joblessness.
Hall can’t wait to kick you out. Upon my graduation, they gave me 3 working days to move out. I thought that was the norm, until I remembered that in the last semester break (YOG renovation period), I have a few seniors who could stay like almost 3-4 weeks after receiving their final results. Of course they appealed for that. I did that too, and was not successful. Well, I can understand that, because the school is desperate to clear the waiting list (at my time, still 13pts for males), and my moving out will free a space for someone else. Those who graduate in the normal way do not have to worry about that, as they graduate during the long semester break. Well, that’s the reality. Hall wants you out, for their waiting list.
Out of sync with your peers. Chances are, you are going to graduate alone. Very few, if not none, of your friends will actually be crazy to take ABP with you. As such, when you are doing FYP, they are doing Sem 1 stuffs, and when you are “freed”, they are chionging FYP. Grad trips? You can forget it. Most likely, your friends will forget about you and plan their own grad trips. After all, if you happen to start work earlier, how would you be able to take 12 days off? Same goes for graduation group photos.
Waiting 6 months for convocation. Even if you graduate early, you still have to wait 6 months for convocation. Coupled with the above point, by that time, you may have lost that “graduation feel” already.
So what is my advice to those that got ABP? Accept it first, for the cores and electives priority. However, when you are in it, do seriously consider whether you want to continue with it. You can drop any time you want, without any penalty. After all, even if you are ABP, that will not be reflected on your cert, nor transcript.
In my opinion, one should continue ABP, if and only if by one's year 3 semester 2, one has definitively secured a job offer from a company (whether formally or informally) to start work in Jan. Otherwise, one should really consider dropping it if there are no inkling of any job offers before course registration of year 4 sem 1.
Pros
You get to save $4000+ of school fees. Enough said for those families with tight finances.
You get to work 6 months earlier. Once again, good for those that need to feed their families.
Less graduates to compete with you for jobs. There are only like a few thousand graduates this semester, hence what I said. However, does less people mean less competition? This will be further covered in the “cons” section…
Priority in core/elective appeal. Not too sure about elective appeal success, but absolutely sure on cores. They will aid ABP students first in cores appeal.
Cons
Less graduates to compete with, even lesser job openings. Let us get real. 10,000+ graduates in Jan. 100,000+ graduates in May. What will you, as an employer do? In such a small country, most companies focus their recruitment for the May graduates. It makes business sense to do that as they need not spend two times – once in Jan, and another in May, to train fresh graduates for their jobscope. In my experience, for most of the companies that I apply to, they only start work in May/June. Which effectively means I will still be jobless for 5 months (if they accept me).
Of course, that can be mitigated by doing part time. But still, one can do part time even when studying.
Bank loan repayment commences no matter what. This means that if you really do not have a job by then, the bank doesn’t care. You have to repay a minimum of $100 per month. Though you save $3000, good luck on figuring out how to pay back the bank during 5 months of joblessness.
Hall can’t wait to kick you out. Upon my graduation, they gave me 3 working days to move out. I thought that was the norm, until I remembered that in the last semester break (YOG renovation period), I have a few seniors who could stay like almost 3-4 weeks after receiving their final results. Of course they appealed for that. I did that too, and was not successful. Well, I can understand that, because the school is desperate to clear the waiting list (at my time, still 13pts for males), and my moving out will free a space for someone else. Those who graduate in the normal way do not have to worry about that, as they graduate during the long semester break. Well, that’s the reality. Hall wants you out, for their waiting list.
Out of sync with your peers. Chances are, you are going to graduate alone. Very few, if not none, of your friends will actually be crazy to take ABP with you. As such, when you are doing FYP, they are doing Sem 1 stuffs, and when you are “freed”, they are chionging FYP. Grad trips? You can forget it. Most likely, your friends will forget about you and plan their own grad trips. After all, if you happen to start work earlier, how would you be able to take 12 days off? Same goes for graduation group photos.
Waiting 6 months for convocation. Even if you graduate early, you still have to wait 6 months for convocation. Coupled with the above point, by that time, you may have lost that “graduation feel” already.
So what is my advice to those that got ABP? Accept it first, for the cores and electives priority. However, when you are in it, do seriously consider whether you want to continue with it. You can drop any time you want, without any penalty. After all, even if you are ABP, that will not be reflected on your cert, nor transcript.
In my opinion, one should continue ABP, if and only if by one's year 3 semester 2, one has definitively secured a job offer from a company (whether formally or informally) to start work in Jan. Otherwise, one should really consider dropping it if there are no inkling of any job offers before course registration of year 4 sem 1.
