Undergraduate days at NUS Engineering Faculty

 

                                 At the Engineering Faculty Canteen Year 1 NUS. 

                                                 Yours Truly and Loh Shien Lee 

The time has flown by. Truly, flown by. 43 years since we were young undergraduates full of spunk and derring do sitting at the Engineering Canteen at the bottom of the bock, (43 I believe).

The 1st year course was unrelenting to say the least. 9 subjects and we had to clear them all at one go. No second chances. By my recall there was 800 first year undergraduates, and only 600 made it to the second year. 25% knock out rate.

The attrition and cut off for promotion to the second year was BRUTAL. 

          From Left, Andrew Lee, Yours Truly, Loh Shien Lee, Long Han Wee and Sydney Lim 

I recall I was rather handicapped, as I did only 1 maths subject at Pre U level, hence the University math, taught by a Dr Gupta was way over my head, and I was floundering.

I was very lucky that I managed to grasp some semblance of the subject and managed to pull out a weak pass (an 'E') without having to go and do a 're' exam which many of my cohort were wont to do.

There were some really good professors (like a Prof Mendis) and some who were borderline weird (a certain Assoc. Prof Leong) 

All in all the first year of engineering for me, after 2 and a half years in the military was like moving to Heaven when the last few years were some sort of Hell. (I jest of course !).

Fortunately I managed to meet some school friends like Andrew Lee and Sydney Lim from St Andrews and we then had to march through 4 tough years of undergraduate study.