Over half of recent SUTD graduates have secured jobs
Just a week before her A-level examinations began, Ms Faith See lost a close church friend to a medical complication.
He had undergone surgery for a pre-existing condition, and while the operation went well, complications arose days later.
"I was telling myself that I had to study... I couldn't focus, but I had no choice..." said the former Anglo-Chinese Junior College student.
Her eventual results were "not that bad", she said, and she managed to secure a place in the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD), where she pursued information systems technology and design.
Ms See, 22, is one of 475 students who graduated from the university this month.
They are the sixth batch of graduates, and 53 per cent of them have either secured jobs or will be working on their own start-ups, SUTD said. Another 20 per cent plan to pursue graduate studies. It added that the top hiring sectors include information and communication, business and management consultancy, finance and insurance, and research and development.
Ms See has joined DBS Bank's graduate associate programme, known as the Skill Enhancement Education and Development (Seed) programme.
She secured the position in October last year.
She is currently a cyber-security engineer, although she can explore other roles in rotation.
"Cyber hygiene is something that many people don't seem to have a concept of. It could be simple things but they get overlooked easily so I wanted to figure out a way to make this more accessible to the community," she said
Another graduate, Mr Safafisalam Bohari Jaon, studied engineering systems and design, and got a place in March in a graduate programme with insurance provider FWD, where he will have a hand in its digital strategy.
"I was lucky to secure the position right before the circuit breaker period in April, so the pandemic didn't affect my job search," said the 24-year-old, adding that many of his friends, both from SUTD and other universities, are still looking for jobs and traineeship options.
Mr Safafisalam, who studied in Raffles Institution, has signed up for a youth mentorship programme with self-help group Yayasan Mendaki to give a listening ear and be a role model to two students from the Institute of Technical Education.
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