If you ask an average student from my college on what is his definition of education, chances are he/she will tell you or imply that education is simply a matter of chalking up A's and ensuring that you ace every subject. If you were to probe further and ask him why he chose the university track, there are likely to be a few possible answers. An university education is sought after and important in landing a well-paying, decent job. University education is chosen as it betters your chances of employment compared to being a junior college or polytechnic graduate.

I hate to be a doomsday prophet or the person to bring the bad news but the university education in the country or at least in my college is not bringing out the best in students. The education system sure is lauded as one of the best and people do send their kids to Singapore to study but it is not the best for various reasons.

The lecturers play a huge part in the education system and if they are unable to stimulate the interest of the students or not able to effectively communicate well with the students, the system in place is almost a failure. The accent of lecturers can be forgiven as long as they can be understood and if they are going to bore the hell out of the students by not stirring up their interest and talking in a monotonous tone or reading from the slides, the university education will be a total disaster.

Most students in my college have a myopic view of the world and their world revolves around Singapore, studies and television which preaches bullshit. It's hard to have a stimulating and engaging conversation with an average NTU student as they are most likely going to provide childish and immature answers or they will try to engage you in a meaningless gossip talk.

It's no wonder that most exchange students get appalled when they come to our beautiful campus expecting intellectual and interesting people and end up getting disappointed having to communicate with boring and not so engaging locals who come across as immature.

One of the reasons in my opinion in the short-fall of the students' intellect is our lack of exposure to a variety of programmes like music, theater, movies, books and people as we tend to keep to our studying and over worship the mass media which is unable to expose us to the different aspects of culture.

Education should be wholesome and not limited to only reading the theories from your coursework. It involves engaging and discussing with people on any issue from studies to politics and exploring the unknown to gain a deeper insight and perspective and not limiting ourselves to what we know because education should never be limited in anyway.

There has to be a change and the change has to come now. Something is terribly wrong with the world. We have given too much value to money than it deserves. Our lives are shaped by money and the decisions that we make usually involve money. Why do we attach so much importance to money? Does money have to be a motivation for us to strive? Does money have to be the deciding factor when we choose our job? Does money have to be the factor in chasing our dreams?

Gone are the days when people used to attach importance to integrity, honesty and sincerity. People now feel that money is the only attribute which decides your 'status' In fact, some high society people lack the basic human skills and behave like barbarians.

Many people have told me that money can buy everything but it can never buy love,friendship,trust and honesty. Money attracts people but it is unable to buy the love of your life and the friendship of your comrades because these qualities are priceless. If they are bought off, then these qualities are either fake or cease to exist.I can't imagine using money to buy off my friends and the love of my life because when the money dries up, they will cease to exist in my life.

We have to change now and act now and not dedicate our lives to chasing dollars and cents and making it our sole aim in life.I'm not disputing the fact that money is important but there should be a limit to how much importance we place on the 'paper'. It is not going to follow us to our grave when we reach the ultimate stage of life.

One of my addictions is books as I can't resist buying a book which is awesome and yet cheap and one such book which I bought on impulse was A Thousand Splendid Suns written by Khaled Hosseni, the same author who wrote Kite Runner. A Thousand Splendid Suns follow 2 female characters and their troubles and worries and it interwines fiction with real events.

The book in my opinion makes the average reader sympathethic to the Afghan women during the Taliban regime who controlled every aspect of a woman. The Taliban rulers were a bunch of wankers for misuing the Qu'ran to their advantage and making women suffer as a result and giving men the upper hand in every issue even when they are in the wrong.

I guess the only foolish thing the Taliban regime did was not to hand Osama over to America as demanded after the 9-11 incident and that launched America into a war against Terrorism. Although the war is debatable and might be considered unethical, the Taliban regime was defeated and the women were finally free from oppression.

The book in my opinion is not as good as the Kite Runner as the Kite runner makes the average reader think about himself and the issues of courage, morality and values which the Thousand spelendid suns is not able to do so but the book is still a must read nonetheless.

I find myself behaving like a steel member: buckling under compressive load. Just like both the flange and web, my mind or body is either going to buckle under the weight of the FYP. There is no shortcuts to this subject where I can throw smoke bomb and still score a decent grade. It requires painful reading and understanding of steel design and research papers before I can even start on Uncle Chiew's research paper. Just like the steel member, I have to toughen up and increase my compressive strength to withstand the compression load.