NOVEMBER 8 — So, the SPM exam just started about a week ago and will end in December. 

Here’s a quick idea before parents and students go hunting for the first Diploma or Foundation or A-Levels program which opens in February or March:

How about taking a year off?

The student has spent the better part of the previous 11 years (and sometimes 12) in school. Why rush into another education semester? Why not consider the benefits of doing a gap year before pre-university? 

One of the most important reasons why an extended breather may be needed before embarking on a university degree is the value from getting some space. 

Usually by the time a Malaysian student has finished SPM or STPM or A-Levels, he or she would’ve finished about one and a half decades of formal schooling. 

And let’s be honest, how often are students — especially Asian students — given the opportunity to reflect and “think for themselves” in any substantial manner?

Does my child know what she wants? Has he been given sufficient time to “look around”, examine his options, think deeply and carefully about his vocation, etc.? 

Is she even allowed to chart her future autonomously and independently, especially in a very ‘top-down’ authoritarian society like many in Asia?

A one- (or two-) year break in studies could be akin to a race-car going for an overhaul; maybe take a year off from racing. We’re not talking about the in-race pit-stop here (those are akin to school holidays). We’re talking full-blown strip-to-the-chassis “servicing”. 

Often it’s necessary simply to get off the grid of Normal in order to rethink one’s understanding of or desire for Normal in the first place. 

From seven years old to 18 years old, it’s been nothing but a factory conveyor belt of lessons and examinations; perhaps going back into “garden” mode where letting Nature do its slow and patient nurturing could help.

It is entirely possible that a young person may discover more meaning and passion in her studies precisely by spending more time doing something other than (gasp!) study. 

This could involve spending, oh I don’t know, six months in Hong Kong or Bangkok to help out in an NGO? Or it could involve staying for a year in Egypt or India or Chile simply experiencing a very different culture? 

Or it could mean diving into the world of art or music or photography, being involved in projects, earning a bit of money and generally living a life outside of academia before going back in? 

Or, well, it could just mean spending eight or nine months working in a Coffee Bean to earn some pocket money while making new friends? 

What’s the rush, seriously? What huge difference does it make that you graduate one (or two or three) years later than your friends? (see note 1)

Another value of gap-year activities is the greater maturity it develops in young people. 

By not having to worry about non-stop assignments and final exams or projects, a person is able to plunge fully into, well, something else (!). Again, a Malaysian post-teen would have had almost nothing but school assignments and classes full-time for more than a decade — why not expose him or her to another “sector” in a serious way? 

Think about the positive effects on that person’s psychology of, say, helping out the Orang Asli for a few months or acting in some B-grade movie in Hong Kong or living in a monastery in South Korea or ministering to drug addicts and so on.

Such an individual would hopefully have greater levels of social exposure, resilience towards adversity, perception of truths and so on with which to navigate their university syllabi. One could, in fact, “view” one’s Bachelor degree differently because of prior life-experience.

Finally, if we need yet another reason to do a gap-year, I suppose the most practical one is you get to help your folks save a bit of money (because we all know university degrees aren’t cheap) and who knows you may earn a bit to contribute to your own education.

Think about it?

Note 1: Malcolm Gladwell, in his best-selling book on success, even makes the straight-forward case that some professional athletes succeed because of their (slightly) older age. He even recommends that schools should group students born in the first quarter of the year away from those born in later quarters so the maturity levels could be better equalised. For Gladwell, the age difference in question was a few months. Assuming he’s got a point, imagine what a difference one or two years could make for university success? See Gladwell, M. Outliers: The Story of Success, chapter 1. 

* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.