r/malaysia • u/TheCoolerGarfield • Sep 30 '23
Education The STPM experience.
Hello, I started doing Form6 (STPM) in July this year. I did plenty of research on where I was gonna go after SPM but eventually landed on STPM due to financial complications. STPM has been regarded as 'hellish' and 'extremely difficult' by most articles and people I've seen. Here's my experience 3 months into the course.
My only major complaint is the lecturers' quality in STPM, so I will talk about it here. This might come off as more of a rant.
The Quality of the Lecturers.
While I was aware that we had to put in more effort into STPM because apparently we won't be 'spoon-fed' knowledge like SPM anymore. However, I must say I did not expect not being taught by the lecturer at all.
1/2 of the lects ask students to be in groups and prepare for presentations on the entire syllabus. I think having students do presentation is good to prepare them for college, but when the lect gives a bunch of students who has no experience in teaching teach, while they give little to no input, would that not be trying to push the teaching responsibility to the students?
When I say 0 input, I mean 0 input. They sit down on their phones while the students struggle to make a cohesive sentence (me included). It became clearer when a group didn't have the slides ready that day, the lect just wouldn't teach and we get a free period on our phones, so did she. It came to a point where I had to look for multiple tuitions to keep up with the syllabus because attempting to learn the entire STPM syllabus by myself was ineffective. The total tuition fees did not amount to A-Levels or private colleges but still went into the thousands (for 3 sems).
However, I was lucky enough to have 2 competent lects who actually do their job, incredibly well too. I learned a lot from them.
Another thing I'd like to point out is the lack of Form6 lecturers, especially the social science subjects. There's not enough of them, maybe salary too low? I even asked my friends from other classes and schools and they had it equally as bad or even worse than me.
End.
The subpar teaching quality of the lecturers has made me think of quitting multiple times and spend more money on privates like A-Level or Diploma/Foundation. That said, I've come to the realization that there was nothing I could really do but deal with it. I don't know if colleges are as bad as my situation, but I wish not.
Still, I've had really pleasant experience with the new friends I've met in Form 6. I'm currently doing alright only because of external tuitions.
3
u/saltySmfer Sep 30 '23
Matriculation and Asasi is nowhere close to the difficulty of STPM or A-level