Ed Ed and EdDy!!

Tuesday, December 27, 2005

man...mr tan jux scold me for all e stuff...i'll quote. "To Cassandra, Nathaniel and Nicolette,

I have taken a few days to reflect on the National Schools Newspaper of the Year Competition and would like you to do the same.
First of all, I must confess that I was thoroughly disappointed with your lack of enthusiasm for the competition right from the beginning. The team could not come together for a group meeting at all. At the very first meeting that we had, Nathaniel did not turn up and he came up with some excuses. I tried to believe his difficulties but after hearing a lot of sweet words from Nathaniel about how interested he was and not seeing any action from him, I soon lost faith in his enthusiasm for the competition. When I suggested that all of you practise writing some reports for me, Nathaniel even said that it was a good idea and that he would do it - eventually, I only received one article from Nicolette. When I told Nathaniel to meet on the Friday before the competition, his reply that came in after many hours was to meet on Monday instead (the day of the competition) - from this, I saw that he obviously didn't care much about the competition. It was only then that I decided to drop Nathaniel from the competition.
Nathaniel wasn't the only one who wasn't enthusiastic about the competition. Some time after our first meeting, Cassandra expressed her wish to be taken out of the team. I told her that she couldn't withdraw. I had two reasons for not allowing Cassandra to withdraw from the competition. I had been very unfair in my treatment of Cassandra. I had given her more opportunities than anyone else in the School. The reason for this unfairness was because I got to know Cassandra since Sec 1 and I know that if Cassandra could achieve good CCA grades to go along with her Academic results, she would probably be able to attain a Scholarship Award for her University Education (this is not about the money that comes along with the Award, but the bright future that is assured for a Scholar). I tried to give her all the opportunities possible. The second reason why I didn't allow Cassandra to drop out of the team was that I was trying to teach all of you some sense of responsibility. I have obviously failed here.
Nicolette also showed some signs of a lack of enthusiasm for the competition. I understand that she was on a long Church Camp and as a result was quite tired to meet me on the Saturday before the competition. I met her on Sunday instead. When she arrived, she still showed signs of fatigue. But, that was not a good excuse for her remembering the wrong starting date of the competition - was the competiton important to her? I tried to suppress the doubts I had in her - she arrived one hour late on the day of the competition (my original plan was to meet the complete team half an hour before the competition to give some final instruction and that couldn't be done because of this). She lost her authority over the team because of this - I wouldn't blame the team because I would have lost my faith in her too if I were in their shoes.
When I saw the final product after the competition ended, I was thoroughly disappointed with it. Everything that could go wrong, went wrong. No single person should be spared the blame (including myself), but the two persons who were supposed to be leaders (Nicolette and Cassandra) in the team definitely cannot escape the blame. There was no cohesion in the product and this can be attributed to lack of leadership and cooperation. Even the articles were badly written.
I was told about how Peicai was the only team that played computer games through the night. Have you all been deprived of computer games for so long that you must play computer games then? Was the team so confident of yourselves that you became complacent? Was it a lack of motivation? And then there was the quarrel that everyone at the competition got to know about. If the intention was to draw attention to yourself, rest assured that the RI, VS and ACS boys will forever remember not to date girls from Peicai. Whatever was the case, what the five of you had achieved that day was to completely embarrass the school and, worst of all, give yourself a bad name. In 24 hours, you succeeded in wiping out the good name that we had built up over the last two years.
You have failed to treasure the opportunity given to you. The opportunities given to you did not come easy. They were the rewards for the hardwork that my previous two editorial teams put in. If you do not care about such opportunities, I will not try to convince you otherwise anymore. This is the ultimatum.
I will wish you all the best for your future if you decide not to continue to be part of the Catalyst's Editorial team. If you regret your actions and would like to continue to be part of the team, you will have to make some changes to yourself. I am not going to compromise my standard for any one of you anymore.

Mr Tan Aik Fong
Teacher In-Charge
The Catalyst"
i'm like feeling so shit...felt like i really let down peicai...but come on...the quarrel was'nt even my fault lorhz...nicolette blamed me for deleting her work(which i din),wat i was suppose to do?let her blame me?it was lucky i din shout at her infront of so many pp...i already REN liaoz lorhz....dammit....!oh well...thx mr tan anyway...those bloody in-crowders are so cocky...did i tell u?they pretended that they dunno me...big deal,they're such a bunch of losers anyway...

hard-boil-egg @ 1:02 PM