MCKK Scholarship Workshop 2009

The fourth installation of MCKK Scholarship Workshop 2009 took place on 2 August 2009. It was a much better arrangement because we managed to avoid the dreadful prospect of conducting one full day workshop without a break and non-stop talking and walking (and sometimes running) without a single drop of drink during Ramadhan, as was the case in 2007 and 2008.

Even more so, conducting it earlier will have a better impact on the students. When we designed the workshop back in 2006, it was never meant just to give a briefing on the paths available to MCKK boys once they leave the school. It was also meant to shock them of the magnitude of SPM, so that they buck up and put a side whatever that distracts them from focussing on SPM.

My batch did a big mistake with our SPM. We went into SPM with one of the best trial results in MCKK (if not SBP) history – a few of us actually got 9A1s and Fadli got 10A1s (so he was the best candidate to obtain 11A1s together with English 1119). In those days, it was unheard of that a school can produce 4 – 5 straight A1s, at most usually it’s about two. Nationally there were less than 30 people each year getting straight A1s – so you can imagine the euphoria of going into SPM with 4 – 5 candidates who were poised to get straight A1s.

But there’s a thin line between confidence and over-confidence – as a batch who had had a good academic records throughout our years in MCKK, the teachers pretty much left it to our own to manage, because we had managed before. As SPM approached in November 1994, in retrospect we shifted gears – unfortunately we shifted downwards. We slowed down because we began to think SPM was not that dreadful after all – and the time left (about 2 months) was better spent making the best out of our MCKK experience.

So we did enjoy to the maximum. Everyone and anyone tried everything (Note 1) that we slowly descended away and away from SPM.

Throughout all this, there was only one teacher who made a remark about the way we were behaving that I remember forever. On one occasion, Mr Anand (who was and is very close to our batch) said to me that “we (Class of 94) under estimated the magnitude of SPM”. Four months later, when SPM was announced, I then began to understand in entirety the magnitude of the word “magnitude” that Mr Anand had said six months before.

Against everyone’s expectation, we did not get a 100% pass for SPM because one student failed. It was even more mind boggling because he was a new Form 4 intake with a good SRP results before that.

But perhaps what was more damaging to our ego and brought us crashing down to Earth (and earned us the realisation of what it means to be an under achieving batch forever ha ha), was the fact that none of us got straight A1s; when many people from other schools that year managed to get.

It was a lesson in humility at its best – and I somehow vowed that someday, we should never allow those after us repeat the same mistake that we did.

So half of the content of the workshop each year is always meant to shock them, so that they understand the magnitude of SPM (unlike us).

If the boys buck up a few months before SPM, being born clever as they are, at least there’s some hope for salvation.

On another note, I am getting a bit concerned on the succession planning for this – as I don’t think I can afford the time and efforts to do this forever. Originally the idea was for the first few batches to continue once they graduate.

The first experimental batch is Class of 2005 when we selected their best of the best and provided assistance in scholarship and university applications as a foundation for continuing this in the future. By my calculation, 3 or 4 of them should be back by 2010 and they can tag along for one or two years until 2012 before they can take over. Eventually, each batch post 2005 should come back to reinforce the team and by 2014 the tradition would have acquired its inertia to have its own life when all of us are gone doing other things.

We can then take assurance that never again MCKK boys leave the gates without being prepared to face the competition outside.

That was the planning on paper, what actually happens is a different thing. I realised that it takes maturity to appreciate and understand why we are doing this.

On the part of the old boys going back, it is important to understand the bigger picture that with each breath that shortens our tenure on this earth each day, there is an obligation to serve beyond our immediate selfish interest - and serve consistently. We were brought up to serve and if we cannot change the world, we can at least influence the worldview of those younglings after us so that they can do what we could not.

On the part of MCKK present boys who benefit from this each year, they need to understand that it is not their automatic right to be assisted lest it becomes crutches and counter productive in the long run. The attention poured on them today is in return for an obligation in the future to come back and continue; but that deferred payment in the future will remain their debt to the school and society until they pay them off.

While some of them from the Class of 2005 onwards understood the concept of “deferred obligation” vis-à-vis this, most from all the graduating batches did not understand that it takes time to be able to acquire the skills, acumen, respect and confidence to conduct such a workshop effectively each year, so that it would have the required effect on the boys.

After a while, I get the impression that many actually thought it’s an ego trip back to MCKK to boast which overseas universities they are in now – similar to the frequent occurrences of batches who had not even graduated from universities going back to the school to advise the SPM candidates on what to do with their life!

With this thought, many would not want to commit to the arduous process of learning, following, observing and emulating what the generation before them painstakingly put for them to carry on.

With this lesson learnt, I understood now that in all probability, there is a certain age requirement for people who want to conduct this type of program – you are looking at people who have been working for quite a while and have had experience managing people to have the right mix of youth, maturity and energy. As we go back to the drawing board, I guess the plan should seriously consider those of the Class 96 to Class of 99 generations (to last for the period 2012 to 2014 at least).

To Class of 2009, with the rugby team loss to Vajiravudh yerterday, it should push you guys to the wall to do your best for SPM and salvage whatever is left of the year 2009. I have been close to MCKK since 2004 to know most of the big things happening there and 2009 is the only year that we have not won a single thing in anything. All that is left is SPM for you boys to leave some marks.

I wish you all the best.


Note 1:

With the benefit of hindsight, despite the humiliation of SPM (which later on we converted to become a domestic joke among us), I am actually grateful that most of us did take time to understand and appreciate MCKK and what it means to be a part of it and of each other. If we had not had the semi-hedonistic experience leading to SPM weeks in 1994, we wouldn’t have been the close knit under achieving batch that we are today.

POST SCRIPT

1) I come across some blog posting by Class of 2009 on SPM, careers etc. I like to think that we did achieve some of the objectives, especially on the part to shock them of the magnitude of SPM and to orientate their focus towards the life outside MCKK. Read here and here.

2) In retrospect, despite the panic all the time that we are falling behind, to a certain extent we are quite advanced in this area. Read here about a plea by an ex-Head Boy of a neighbouring old SBP for old boys to help present boys on matters of post SPM paths.

3) Thank you to Sdr Affendy Hasni (JPA, Law – UK bound), Sdr Zulikhwan Ayob (Bank Negara, Medicine – UK bound) and Sdr Ahmad Firdaus Arul Hisham (PETRONAS, Accounting – Australia bound) from the Class of 2008 who had assisted throughout the workshop.

Photos here.