I just wanted to NOT disappoint my parents, and myself
It was the winter of 2017, I was in year 8
I just received a letter for the selective school entrance test (for Melbourne High) which everyone in my friendship group is talking about
Like typical asian parents, my parents sent me to this tutoring school to prepare for this big exam that everyone said would define my future
4+ hours each weekend in some random classroom - I absolutely hated it
It was just week after week of doing practice exams that I didn't care about, in an overly toxic environment that compares you based on grades
(We literally had our names ranked based on grades on an excel spreadsheet that was posted in front of the main office so everyone could see)
Finally after years of tutoring, finishing the grueling exam, waiting anxiously for the results to arrive in the mail
The letter was here, crisp white envelope, containing the words that would define my future
It was finally in my hands
My hands were shaking as I made a messy tear in the envelope
Still shaking, I took out the piece of paper inside in front of my parents
And the letter began with "unfortunately..."
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Tell me if you can relate
I wanted to get a high of an ATAR as possible, I wanted to get into my dream course at the time which was medicine (basic I know)
Issue was I was getting average grades, I had just failed getting into my dream school, so things were not looking great
So like every other student I started looking around for tutors
And this is when I saw so many overpriced tutors charging $150+/hr which honestly pissed me off
There was no guarantee to the teaching quality
It felt like it was just some random kid trying to scam me out of my life savings which at the time was a grand total of $217 + a coles gift voucher
So I obviously couldn’t afford to have 1-1 tutoring for the entire year (which equates to over $6000+)
I felt I was at a disadvantage
And this genuinely pissed me off enough when I thought that VCE was a pay-to-win game
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That's When I Discovered The Answer...
It pissed me off so much that it sparked me to go into monk-mode in high school (year 9 - year 12)
I spent this time engaging in hundreds of hours of research, watching Ali Abdaal back when he wasn't a gym shark athlete, learning about different productivity techniques, and biohacking to gain every edge possible
I ended up sacrificing a lot of time I could have spent with friends and family
But in the end I proved that even an average student dropkick like me could graduate with a 99.95 ATAR
Without having to pay unrealistic prices
Without the torment of having to rock up at some random tutoring classroom on the weekend
I was able to achieve my dream ATAR and get into medicine at unimelb which is where I am studying as I am writing this right now
However I have one main regret
I sacrificed many relationships and my health to get my ATAR
There was this girl I completely ignored
My health was so bad I would always get sick
I was so skinny that you could literally see my ribs
So I want you to achieve what I did but in a FRACTION of the time