“I was preparing for IIT JEE when I decided to apply for Universities abroad and selected HKUST over all the other universities is because of the following reasons:
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a) Affordable tuition fee,
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b) High global ranking,
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c) Less time difference in comparison to India,
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d) Familiarity with the place due to our family business,
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e) Hong Kong is a global city.
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Hi, I am Aditya Jain. I pursued my bachelors from HKUST with majors in Industrial Engineering and minors in Business Studies. So, Industrial engineering is a bridge between technology and business. It is defined as the optimization of complex systems or processes that reduces the cost and produces better outcomes. The curriculum at HKUST helped us study everything from Engineering to Business in sizable bits. It also involves a lot of statistics and mathematics. We study technological designs and decision making in-depth to understand and improve the performance of a product or project. So, if you ask me to code, I might not be able to do it. However, I can understand the problems faced by coders.
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Having scored an aggregate 90% in class 12th, I got into HKUST in the academic year 2012 based on my grades, Extra-Curricular activities, Application presentation and Interview.
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The education system here is different from India. The Bachelor’s at HKUST is for four years, but if one is from an International Board, they are eligible to skip the first year (depending from case to case). The environment at the University is very accommodating, along with the relationship shared by the students and professors. However, language can be a barrier if you have Chinese professors. Also, there is no compulsory attendance requirement for most courses, but it is essential to attend the classes in order to understand the concepts and to keep up the pace of assignment submissions. Furthermore, there is a clear shift from textbook-based education to practical project-based education.
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Being one of the oldest and most prominent financial hubs of Asia, its job market primarily focuses on Finance and Insurance sectors. While jobs are available in other sectors as well, one might have to compromise on the profile or salary. In recent years, Hong Kong has seen a rapid expansion in the IT sector as well, with lots of technology startups finding their home in Hong Kong. Civil Engineering is another program which could land you a very juicy paycheque. However, language can be a significant barrier to get into that market.
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As far as accommodation is concerned, the rent is excruciatingly high even for the tiniest rooms with limited walking space. At the University, I stayed at the best hall of residence, which was exclusive for people involved in performing arts. I play the guitar and almost everyone there is good at least one form of the performing arts. Imagine, coming back to your accommodation after an exhausting day and being a part of a live jamming session. You instantly feel uplifted, light and detoxed. Over three years, I was paired with different kinds of musicians as roommates. Also, we had this little musical community complete with music rooms, activities, jams, cultural nights, dinners etc. This little community helped us grow as musicians as well as social beings. The atmosphere was very relaxed, and one could easily knock on any door if you were craving for a jam session. Also, every accommodation had a hall master (referred to as ‘Hall mom’ in my case). A hall master is a professor residing at the accommodation, who maintained the decorum of the hall and helped students with their problems related to residing in the hall. Also, the hall would frequently invite musicians and other artists to interact with us. In my opinion, these facilities added a lot to my tenure at HKUST.
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Being a vegetarian initially, I had many problems with food at the beginning. The campus did not have a lot of vegetarians options initially. However, later, along with some friends, we found an Indian lady who agreed to cook for us in exchange for money. We raised several requests to the management about this, and later, they even added a decent amount of options in the menu at various cafes.
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During my time at HKUST, we initiated a lot of new things like HKUST’s first charity fashion show, and its first society for South Asia Culture promotion. We also founded the first chapter of ‘Alpha Kappa Psi – Chi Phi Chapter’, the first business fraternity in Asia.
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While Hong Kong is a fantastic place to live in, I felt that India has a lot more opportunity as compared to anywhere in the world. So, I came back to India after seven years of staying in Hong Kong and have started my fintech in the space of microlending and gateway services working towards creating a better, financially inclusive society.
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In a nutshell, Hong Kong would always be my second home. I am grateful that I got this opportunity and would cherish my time there always.
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One piece of advice for all the fresh aspirants, before planning to study abroad; it is essential to do extensive research about the Courses, University, job and culture of a country before investing your early crucial grooming years”.
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