Page 5 - Personal Portfolio

A.3 Post - Secondary

As I’ve said before in my second reflection (refer to Appendix B), most people are under
the impression that the career you choose determines the course of your life, but before that, the

focus is on the institution for their post-secondary education. This is because when enrolled in a
post-secondary school, a student is bound to a specific program which allows for only so many
career paths, however the different strengths and weaknesses of the institution often ends up
dictating which line one ends up going down. As that may be, this unit has helped me come to
the conclusion that my future occupation lies not only in my interests, but different attributing
factors which determine the university/college that one would go to. This is why I realized it was
important to fully research about different aspects such as the location, size, and smaller details

for each school and campus. Originally, due to my burning passion for mathematics, I wished to
enroll in the University of Waterloo ever since I was a fifth grader because of the amazing
competitions they held each year and all the great anecdotes that I had heard about the place.
However, as I grew older, my perception changed and I realized that although it may be a
prestigious school, what works for someone else, may not necessarily be the appropriate idea for

me. An example of how my understanding of the finer details changed how I thought, would be
when I was about to fully commit and align my courses to match Waterloo’s Engineering
Programme. After looking into their co-op program, I learnt that I would be forced to move quite
frequently to take on different jobs, which goes against one of my most imperative work-values
(refer to Appendix B), which discouraged me from joining such a program. Moreover, when
looking at other options such as the University of British Columbia, I realized that a bigger
university would be a more feasible idea as it would provide me with a variety of different
options in terms of what I would want to do with my education. This provides a new appeal as it

means that not only do I have a multitude of options, but that I can combine a variety of subjects
to find my true passion. Generally speaking, looking into universities may seem like the natural
thing to do, but this course allowed me to fully understand the concepts behind such actions, thus
informing me of the importance of finding an appropriate post-secondary institution that suits
me.

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