A student really tested my patience last weekend with a really shitty attitude. Whinging why does she have to come in to school on a Saturday to attend a animation masterclass and why must she have so much work to do.
My 1st reaction was "How ungrateful is that? We arranged for a senior animator from a huge
animation studio to come in and give a master class in animation. Do you know how impossible it was during my time for that to happen?"
She sulked through the whole masterclass falling asleep dozen of time before taking her bag and walked off deliberating showing us that she is going off. She is not the only one, some other students sneaked off or didn't even bother showing up. I even have students not showing up the while semester and not even producing any work at all. I even caught them torrenting on school comps.
I love students like this. I really do.
I will not have any remorse about failing them at the end of the semester if they cannot produce the required work. Just another one in many students that chose animation as course because they think its a hip or easy course to pass and is stuck when they realised its more then they bargained for just to get the piece of paper qualification. I actually suspect some of them just need the student visa so that they can stay in Singapore and work part time.
I will focus my effort and energy on the students who actually want to be here.
You might say its a bit harsh. That she just does not see the value of hard work and perseverance until she actually matures or grows up. A lot of these students pick animation not knowing what kinda of hours and sacrifice it takes to actually hopefully get to a certain level.
Maybe my expectation is too high. Some people are just trying this out to see if this is something they can do. And I understand that at that age, they have many other distractions like relationships, crushes, growing up etc....
I agree to a certain extent but we can push and encourage them but if we have to drag you all the way to the finish line while spoon feeding you all the time because they are too unmotivated to lift a finger. Well tough. This is life, you are competing against your peers for a job in the industry. Not only your peers but also students from around the region.
It is a weird experience coming from the industry where people are so hungry to get a job or a break by starting as runners or receptionist and working in the nights to learn stuff.
Some may succeed other might not, but they gave their all. And can look back with no regrets and hopefully take something from it. These guys even if they do not get it but try and stick at it, I will give as much time as I could to help them.
For these students, if they want to cruise through life. No skin off my bone. Life is really too short to push and urge students that do not care or worse still can't be bothered to care.
So I will change to a " good luck and good riddance aka live long and prosper" mentality with a big fucking smile on my face. So much fun. So you see I do love these students.
