I refer to 7 in 10 NTU Students Secured Jobs Ahead of Graduation. Click on http://www.straitstimes.com/breaking-news/singapore/story/7-10-ntu-students-secured-jobs-ahead-graduation-20130725
How I wish the SPH reporter Linette Lai could do more investigation work but instead, she chose to rubber stamp and publish what NTU President tells her.
Last year around Nov, SPH also published an article that says a taxi driver can earn more than $5000 a month without going through their brains.
Ironically, SPH singled out TRS as having low credibility. If SPH were to be sincere, they should investigate this "7 in 10 NTU Students Secured Jobs Before Graduation" claim.
Common sense will tell you it is just not possible.
While it might be true for graduates in pharmacy, law, medicine and architect, the reverse cannot be said for the students of the other disciplines.
I was once a temporary admin assistant in charge of job applicants in an govt sector. Each time, my HR director orders me to advertise, I would dread it as my mailbox will be flooded with more than 100 applications in a weeks' time, and some are even foreigners.
Sometimes, I also try to help the job applicants by giving them tips and asking them to go read up on a few topics. This is because if the applicants are unsuitable, my boss can re-advertise for the same position again and the dreaded cycle goes on and on.
Take a look at NTU Career Fair, which was held earlier this year.
Even when I visited some booths, common sense will tell me that there aren't enough jobs to absorb all the job applicants. Even the Ministry of Law had the audacity to pay for a booth but when I went there to enquire, the HR personnel said they only had 2 positions available. It's like setting up a booth but selling 2 grains of peanuts.
Coupled with the fact that many people are changing jobs, this is just not possible.
In addition, gainfully employed graduates will be more than happy to fill up the survey findings and might inflate their salary to boost their ego. While the unemployed fresh graduates would usually be not in the mood to fill up these surveys. I remember when I was unemployed, I threw the survey away as I was busy job hunting. Therefore there is a possibility that this painted picture is skewed and inaccurate.
I believe that many unemployed PMETs have registered themselves in WDA’s CDC, e2i and Caliberlink and their sheer numbers will question these statistics.
I would like to propose that these graduates need to declare their place of employment for record purposes.
In addition, most universities have a vested interest to inflate their figures to improve their image. I would therefore like to propose that an independent audit firm to audit these survey findings to provide a more balanced and neutral result from the surveys.
I plead the NTU President to stop putting up a brave front and stop deceiving the public that 7 in 10 NTU students can secure jobs before graduation.
CJ
TRS Contributor