lOngbOWmeN

ERrr njc is like near the bot? should be from vjc

tuna retake your SATs, most ppl in my school apply with at least a 2200+, if you can hit 2300 and have good essays, most schools apart from CHYPSM are set

as for ECs, leave out all those NASA settlement, business contest, performance fluff....concentrate on your maths olympiad, cricket, dance and CIP, its much better to state a few solid commitments rather than giving a laundry list and risk having all of them brushed aside by the adcoms

as for the essays, the crux lies in differentiating yourself from the masses ("find" sth special bout yourself to write)....when they read it, if they can see the individual behind it, its done =)

btw do consider Liberal Arts Colleges (LACs) and other smaller universities, great education and aid, in addition to good placement at top grad schools

woebegone

verse: i probably can't provide a fair comparison here, since i haven't exactly been through the UK system (but i'll probably spend a semester abroad in UK next year!). but based on what i hear from my friends and from my own very subjective impression, UK universities seem to mirror our JC lecture system a lot more than the US LACs; that is, huge lectures, don't have to participate in class lectures, probably can skip the lectures altogether. more often than not, learning seems to take place independently outside of classroom (i.e. "i can't be bothered with lectures, just read the damn textbook" mentality) than through classroom teaching and discussion. of course, one may choose to do the same thing at an LAC, but the fact that you are one of the few noticeable 20 people in the class compared to being lost in the hundreds of people in a huge lecture hall meant you are less inclined to just let your mind wander off, i think. of coz, i'm not saying that one way of learning is better than the other. some people just study better by themselves.

and i'm not exactly saying the brits are less outspoken than the americans, it's just that under the UK system, there's less incentive or motivation for a brit to speak up in class compared to an american in a LAC setting. that's just my impression.

lOngbOWmeN

hmm woebegone perhaps you could elaborate more on which unis your frens were referring to, and wat courses in particular? i'm sure sciences would have a lot of lab-based/practical work that makes it hard to skip

i'm kinda interested to know since i'm an uk-bound student

woebegone

well, there are not very many UK unis that singaporeans go to. if you're doing science you go to cambridge, if you're doing engineering you go to imperial, if you're doing econ you go to oxford/LSE/UCL. oxbridge has a unique tutorial system (although supplement with lotsa effectively optional lectures), and most of my friends in UK are doing econ, so let's just say that i'm talking about LSE and UCL. as for science courses... yeah i guess you can't skip practicals... but surely you can skip lectures? heck, i lost count of the number of physics lectures i skipped back in jc... i went to chem only because the chem lecturers are marginally better...

lOngbOWmeN

yeah i skipped every single S-paper lecture i had ^^

but surely, there must be some merit in LSE's teaching methodologies for successfully educating so many heads of state/bankers/economics, a feat which none of the LACs achieved

YOU

There are quite a lot of successful persons who graduated from LACs.. take Hillary Clinton, Robert Zoellick for examples

And you can't compare for example Williams College with LSE one on one.. LSE will produce far more leaders, bankers because it has far more students than Williams

lOngbOWmeN

^ yeah not 1 on 1, but even if you put all the LACs together u wun get the number of heads of state/bankers produced by LSE

not saying LSE is essentially better, but that its teaching methodologies are indeed effective and on par with the LACs

serf-

obviously, there are many characteristics of LSE that help alumni succeed after graduation, off the top of my head i can think of: london, strong networks especially in the commonwealth, international reputation, etc. on the other hand, in comparison, LSE teaching quality just isn't up to par. being from RJC, and seeing as how its implied that you'll be matriculating there, i'm sure you've heard disgruntlement about this before.

there's been some documentation about this, i can't remember most of it, but (from a quick google search) this article seems to make the essential points, Times Higher Education - LSE set to refocus on teaching:

"The International Student Barometer survey this year placed the LSE 53rd out of 56 UK universities for teaching quality. The Barometer, an international survey by i-Graduate, the international student insight group, came after an internal report on teaching earlier this year by Janet Hartley, the LSE's pro-director for teaching and learning...

...expressed concerns about an over-reliance on graduate teaching assistants, who teach about 75 per cent of undergraduate classes...

...At a students union meeting last month, LSE director Howard Davies was forced to defend the institution's fees in light of the concerns about teaching quality.

Rajan Patel, who writes for the LSE student newspaper The Beaver , said students' main gripe was with the quality of academics' English and a lack of access to department "stars".

A recent Beaver article quoted an economics undergraduate as saying: "I have to write in a very simple way because if I write in a complex way I need to explain to my class teachers what it means."

Mr Patel said: "The lecturers lack confidence in front of the class." He added that interaction with academic leaders was patchy across the institution, with students on some courses having to wait until the second or third year before meeting senior figures..."

i recall a particular anecdote about a now-departed member of the teaching staff that claimed that students would get the same level of in-class experience as nearby london metropolitan university (whose predecessor institutions were 88th and 97th of 98 when last ranked in 2003).

now, i do think some of these claims are overblown. that is not to state that there are no grains of truth in them. LSE's focus is as a research university, consequently, certain aspects of teaching have to be compromised. making a personal judgement, i feel that when compared to top-tier LACs with a commitment to undergraduate teaching, there simply isn't any contest.

having said all of this, at the end of the day, teaching quality is but one factor in picking a university. LSE, and really most of the UK system sans oxbridge, does badly here, but possibly (depending on the individual) makes up for it in others. at the end of the day, where anyone chooses to matriculate is simply a matter of personal preference.

lOngbOWmeN

haha thx alot serf i wasnt defending LSE or anything, really wanted to know some of the problems plaguing UK unis

hope that in the future all students can say from this place we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge =)

YOU

I didn't want to say which is better too.. In my opinion, as long as you're in the environment that you love, you'll become a better person.. and be successful

lOngbOWmeN

^ yep me neither

screwitlah

the college usually doesn't play that big a part in shaping your character - you are who you are! that goes some way to explaining why LSE has "produced" so many great bankers. it's a target school for many aspiring bankers or financiers. it gives you the connections you need. it attracts the best - and the best will emerge the best no matter how lousy the teaching quality is. it's the biggest and most amateurish misconception to think that the number of prominent alumni produced is an indicator of teaching or curriculum quality. sending an unmotivated high school dropout to Harvard will not make him a Bill Gates. it's up to yourself. trust me, if Harvard were founded a century or two later, it''d never be able to catch up with the older and more established colleges in terms of attracting top students and faculty - the things that make it so good; the things that make Harvard Harvard. you wouldn't have even heard of Harvard.

100%Tuna

lOngbOWmeN and serf- :>> Thanks a ton for your replies. Ermm... the performance part was actually my main CCA: Drama! (So, you guys suggest I just mention "Drama" instead of mentioning like every performance I actually staged.
And as for the top league univs (cuz my parents, for some reason, totally refuse to pay a dime for anything lesser than the CHYMPS or maybe something like CGM or Berkeley or Cornell or something of that sort.), what exactly makes you have the "WOWEY, THIS GUY ABSOLUTELY ROCKS!" factor? As in what kind of CCAs ol?
And I actually designed a company product-pricing software; so do you think getting a patent for it will help? As in, i did hear that some top univs do ask for "patents" and such.
As for the NASA thingy, dang! I really thought it was one of my top achievement, being a global competition. So, do you think elaborating will help or is it just an oh-so-not-required thing?
Basically, to be quite frank, my parents have just given me 2 clear cut options (why, i personally don't know, but yeah), either get to a top notch univ in the States or UK, or stay on in NUS/ NTU (which I really don't want to!) So, what exactly is required to make my present portfolio something that can get the CHYMPS and the like give my application more than just a passing glance? WHAT KIND OF ECs AND OTHER STUFF WILL MAKE ME STAND OUT? (get the desperation! =) )
As for the SAT, retaking it this June; which leads me to another question- Do the univs need my June Common Test aka Mid-Year Scores? cuz as far as I can see, my grades will be affected due to SAT prep and other CCA stuff.

I know it's a question overload, but would be great if you guys could help me out with it, cuz at this stage, I need all the help I can get!
Thanks again! =)

PS: As for the college... hahaha! Keep guessing, you guys are close! =)

screwitlah

Forget it guys, no one with an Indian-sounding name has won a medal at the SMO for the past few years:

Singapore Mathematical Society - Competition Home Page

woebegone

"^ yeah not 1 on 1, but even if you put all the LACs together u wun get the number of heads of state/bankers produced by LSE. not saying LSE is essentially better, but that its teaching methodologies are indeed effective and on par with the LACs."

sorry if i sound rude, but it's beyond my understanding how a supposedly-bright kid like you can be so misguided. higher the number of heads of state/bankers produced => effective (or better) teaching methodologies?? that's perhaps one of the worst logical fallacies i've seen. the reason why these people choose to go to say, LSE, is not so much because of the teaching methodology as it is because of the school's reputation, the student body there (networking), and the fact that they probably didn't make it to oxbridge. your so-called future heads of states/bankers would have had what it takes to become what they will in ten years before they even stepped foot into LSE, going to LSE is really more like a stamp of approval than anything else. as screwitlah puts it, top unis attract the best, and the best will emerge the best regardless of how bad the teaching is. like, seriously, did you think RJ teachers are better than say NJ's or JJ's? during my time we had some of the worst physics teachers around, but did that stop us from snapping up >80% As in alvls, the physics olympiad medals, or virtually all of the institute of physics medals? nope.

btw, not only was your conclusion warped, your premise is just as unfounded. "if you put all the LACs together u wun get the number of heads of state/bankers produced by LSE"? there's obviously no way you can prove that, and if you would just look at the three US presidential candidates, two of them went to LACs (McCain went to naval academy): Clinton from Wellesley and Obama from Occidental (though, he did transfer to Columbia later), i'll say LACs do fine at producing leaders.