At the very beginning, I was hesitating should I or should I NOT enroll into TAR College?
My first thought was, it's too crowded, secondly, how good is their Psychology course compared to other private institutions? After a long hesitation, I decided to give it a try due to two reasons;
- I might dropout halfway through my course, and enrolling into TARC which is subsidized by the government, I won't really be wasting THAT much of my parents money.
- My course has a special 2+1 twinning programme with UniSA.
My first semester itself was where I already started to enjoy myself. It took me sometime to get adjusted to new way of learning and coping with works. We were supposed to take 6 subjects including 2 language subjects(English and Bahasa) in our first semester, but I was exempted from both language papers due to my grade in SPM. The remaining 4 were Introduction to Psychology(Mr Phillip Chung), Introduction to Counselling(Miss Eva Li), Introduction to Information Technology(Mr Ng) and Tamadun Islam dan Asia(Sorry sir, I forgot your name, I hardly even attended your lecture after knowing that your taking of attendance to give us extra bonus marks for finals was bullshit).
Besides that, I joined First Aid Unit(FAU) and involved in organizing blood donation campaign in College, and during first semester itself I claimed my compulsory 2 credit hours for sport co-curriculum, Which I choose Gym-workout. Being a committee in FAU is not easy. I somehow quit after not being able to cope up with the amount of work I had.
1st semester, I passed all my papers except Tamadun Islam dan Asia, which I hardly attended lecture and did not even buy it's textbook(I photo stated instead).
During my second semester, I was hired by college's sports department as co-curriculum's Gym-workout programme Student-assistant/assistant instructor. I've already mentioned the nature of my job back in my welcoming post.
In our second semester, we covered Social Psychology, Sociology, Counselling Theory and Psychotherapy, Psychological Assessment, English for Communication and Bahasa Malaysia Kemahiran Berkomunikasi. No more exemption for language papers unless for former STPM students. We actually had to deal with 2 part-time lecturers. And it was one hell of headache during a first few weeks as part-time lecturers are not familiar with how we work things out(Note distribution, assignment group picking etc). We had to actually guide them with our college's system instead. Thankfully they were so down to earth and nice, very willing to learn from their mistakes although it was suppose to be the other way round. But yeah, we taught them how our college system works, they taught us academic stuffs. That's 1-1 .
Mr Yusoff, Miss Chew HY, Mr Phillip, Mr Hafiz and Mr Puspanathan were all very good lecturers with their own style sense of humor.
I managed to pass all my subjects in 2nd semester, including my resit paper of Tamadun Islam dan Asia from 1st semester.
3rd semester was one hell of a ride. Everything was done in a rushing manner. 3 subjects were covered, and all in 7 weeks. Sounds relaxing? Not really, it's actually the same thing as the 14 weeks long semester with 6 subjects. We need go attend 2 lecture, 2 tutorial, for every subject every week, and an additional of 2x2 hours of practical. The subjects were; English for Social Science, Counselling Methods and Techniques 1 and Malaysian Cultural and Religious Practices.
I have to say that Counselling was the subject I gained from the most in this semester. Thanks to a great lecturer,tutor and mentor, Miss Eva Li! I wish that she'll be teaching us every remaining semester in our Diploma year.
Cultural and Religious studies is the subject I've skipped lecture the most. Not because I'm not interested with the subject, but two reasons; it's a 8am lecture, and the lecturer deliver her lecture in monotone style. But, this was also partially the lecturer was too good to prepared us with her simplified version of notes, all geared up for us all the way for finals. By reading, It was enough for me I guess?
For the first time in my life, I experienced hell going through English classes. All thanks to a fat old lady teaching us. She's no other than Madam "CP". You don't need a rocket scientist to figure out who she is if she had taught you in TAR College. Not that I want to curse her, but...well, let me explain.
She adapts a teaching method like primary school, where she would call out students 1 by 1 to read passages. It's good for students who are weak in English(no offense), but students with higher grades in English would suffer to death due to boredom.
There was once she asked me to do a presentation, I decided not to get prepared and wanted an impromptu presentation. Halfway through my presentation, I ran out of ideas and decided to stop there. Of course I was being 'nagged' by the old bitch. After class I went to apologize and tried to ask for comment to improve myself, she just brush me off and said "too late to apologize". I "slapped" her back at her face saying "Nothing is too late, now it's all about giving chance" - I was referring that she did not give chance to her own students, and walk off.
I knew she was pissed. Other than that, I pointed at her mistakes in class when she spells a word wrongly. Her egoism level was so high that she did not bother to correct the word, she rubbed it off instead hoping to shake off the shame I brought to her. Once she threaten to confiscate my classmate's DVD for assignment, again, I asked her loudly " You think this is secondary school? and it's for assignment after all". She was pissed and said rules apply even in college.
But she got her payback during my presentation week. She gave me the lowest mark in class, which was so obvious to everyone that she had something against me. At least she didn't fail me, that was good enough. But I got the last laugh, during lecturer evaluation week, I did not save her face, I wrote every bad point about her, with valid reasons, things that really happened to me. You see, I'm a fair guy, I don't blame you if you are right, I only state facts if you are wrong.
The next thing we knew was, she started distributing chocolates and keep repeating statement trying to give herself credit to the next class of our's, right after our class submitted our evaluation form. I guess she was hoping for a better evaluation from the next class. Fat luck ! haha!
Conclusion; there's not much regret enrolling into TAR College. Facilities are good, lecturers are good, useful experience is what I gain the most. Especially working in the college gym. I'm hoping they will call me back again in 4th semester to work with them even if it's unpaid. Contacts and learning experience is what matters to me the most now.
However, I'm quite dissapointed to know the 2+1 twinning programme with UniSA is not safe for students who intend to pursue a Post graduate qualification. This is because 2+1 entitle us to a Degree without honours, and this lead to problem being accepted by Universities for their post graduate programme. And to pursue a Degree with Honours, you must achieve certain % of your results during your 1 year in UniSA to be entitled to a place for 2+2.
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