IJSO - Onward to Korea!

So the International Junior Science Olympiad phase 1 training has concluded, and it appears that we have managed to maintain the status quo of having 4 ri guys in the Singapore team! I guess its a bit obvious who the other 3 guys are, so I shall neglect to mention their names. =)

Well the trainings were pretty fun after all, although I suspect that not a lot of emphasis was placed on these sessions, for otherwise, I would expect a certain NUSHS guy to be the team too, but ah well, it was still fun on the whole.

Actually, I guess it is really an interesting story how I came to be in the IJSO team, NSC team, and all. I admit that when I came RI, I liked science, but that was it. Science did not have any particular attraction for me, and it was just something at which I was rather good at.

However, I had the privilege of being taught by Mr. Liu Hongwan (who is currently studying in the states) last year, and it was his engaging teaching style, thought-provoking questions, as well as patience to answer our own multitude of questions, which really sparked off my interest for science. I must really thank him for inspiring and sparking off my interest in science, without which I would never have been where I am today.

Yet even at the start of this year, I was basically just a nobody in terms of competition science, for I mean, getting a 'top in lower sec science' award doesn't really mean much in terms of how much knowledge about science you have, just whether you are capable of acing the projects and tests. As such, I didn't really expect to get anywhere when the school announced that it was holding a selection test to access our ability in science (note my request to go for Bio RA extra class instead of the selection test), yet amazingly, I actually got into the NSC team (and with that of course the ri IJSO selection test team).

Although I am still not really sure how I managed to pull off this feat, being in the science team has really seen a great improvement in my scientific skill and knowledge, for the trainings really required us to read up on all topics and stretched us to our limits (sometimes we cant really cope with the info overload...).

Still I really enjoyed this experience, and whats more, there is more to come in the next few months, as phase 2 training begins. Korea, here we come! XD