"If the government announced it to be a 5th uni, do you think it will have industry link in near future? Obviously those in the advisory board will be high management staff from different industry too. " ==> It already had industry links before government's announcement of its "nth university" status. Stronger in future, perhaps. If these "high management" have a preference to employ graduates from anywhere but UniSIM, despite sitting on board, it is of no use.
"Of course a lot of people's objective is to complete as soon as possible. But shorter time frame means learn lesser stuff, everybody knows that too, including the employer." ==> While I agree with you, on my own courses taken, that shorter time frame means learning less, you have to bear in mind that it may not be true for other courses.
Further, while one might not agree with some exemption arrangements signed between academic institutions for one reason or another, exemptions, in general, accredits one who have prior learning in a certain subject so that he/she would not need to "re-learn" the same, or similar, materials. In a sense, he/she "learns" less than others in terms of number of years studied, or credits taken. But it fulfilled the body of knowledge in a field of study as deemed required by the individual university granting the exemptions. Hence, I don't think it could be viewed as being "learning less than" with respect to fulfilling the degree requirement, or in terms of knowledge deemed required in a degree of a certain field of study. For example, NUS offers exemption who had taken H3 subjects, or to local polytechnics diploma holders who have taken similar subjects in their diploma courses. These students who have gained exemptions would usually have less academic credits read in the university than the other students who have not obtained any exemption. But it does not mean these students who have gained exemption learn less than their counterparts since these students already learned similar, or same, stuffs before. Of course, it is debatable whether these exemptions should be given, or whether those courses gaining exemptions are granted at an appropriate level, but the universities granting the exemptions viewed it as such, that is, there is no less of in terms knowledge in the relevant field of studies.
During my studies, I did not claim exemptions for some practical reasons (e.g., not recognised by certain professional qualifications), while some of which I have, or could have, gained exemptions, I replaced the modules with other relevant modules. In this respect, I shared your view of learning more. However, I can't say the same of threadstarter or others. So I'll try not to impose my values on their choices as much as possible.
Cheers!
