For my case:

After spm I applied so many loans but not a single one sticked ( mara, jpa, private companies),

Did my major in engineering at UM..first 2 years was with ptptn, the allowance was ok but had to be frugal and work part time during sem breaks.

I applied for jpa pidn, but got rejected twice. But did get it in my 3rd year after an appeal.

Ptptn - approx 8k - waived due to good academic results

Jpa pidn - approx 20k but hopefully can get it down to 10k (working in a private company in malaysia)


Overall, I think It turned out quite well for me. I got a job that I really enjoy. Compare to my peers, some got scholarship from private companies and have to serve their bonds ( they don't like their career path, some of them willing to negate their bond and pay the full amount, to pursue a career that they like)...I know from one view, it's not ok to cut your bond since those companies invested in those scholars to eventually work for them. On the other hand, these private scholarships ( ie from glc) are up for grabs even before those students start their degree life. 4 years is a long time to change our career interests.

In my opinion,

1.it is better to pick scholarships or loans that don't limit our choice industries unless you really know what you wanna do from the getgo. Pidn is quite good imo, I don't see a lot of bias ( ie due to race...a lot of my malay, indian and chinese colleagues are able to get that loan), and you can work in a private company and get half the discounts. ptptn as well, they don't give you much but if you can get 1st class, hey that's free money

2.Competition is stiff, after my spm years, it was hard to get a scholarship even with good results. I can only imagine the competition gets more difficult nowadays

3. Imo, it's a double edge sword to study overseas with huge loans ( unless you can reduce the amount with good grades etc). Sure you get probably better education and international exposure, but I don't think our local unis are that bad. When you apply for grad jobs there are other factors as well like communication, soft skills, attitude, extra uni activities, etc which can be gained at local uni as well...Taking my company for example ( this might be an isolated case), when I applied for it there were so many oversea grads, even with a masters degree. The majority that got it was from local unis. Same starting salary and when i talked to the hiring managers / hr.....the above skills and good grades mattered more than where they graduated. The oversea grads have to pay more for their loan compared to the local grads. I know this might not apply throughout the whole market but deemed it quite consistent along my colleagues and juniors in engineering.

A bit of deviation from the main topic but just my 2 cents hehe.

This post has been edited by aizatvader32: Mar 17 2024, 11:03 PM