Educational autobiography part 1 Ariff Abdullah [email protected] edu I was born in Malaysia where I have spent most of my childhood life. I grew up in a multi-racial environment where neither of my parents graduated high school. Most people think that education comes from school, but school is not the only place you learn.
For example, way before I started school I was already being educated by my parents, they taught me how to eat, behave, and a lot of other things that help out in life. I started my school days with preschool. It was really interesting as I learned to make new friends and interact with others. It was a kind of a religious kindergarten school and the teachers always told me the same thing as sharing with others.
I learned to be nice to everybody. I also learned the basics. In Malaysia it is different in the education system compared to United States. I remembered after kindergarten I went to primary school. That was a learning experience because I had to basically be on my own for a couple of days since I was the new kid in class. There were not a lot of things happen because I did not portrays that education is important at that time and I just enjoyed my years as a pure learner for the sake of knowing new things and etc.
Then I went to secondary school which is I guess equivalent with entering a junior high school in US. I was selected to represent our school to participate in the young scientist program organized by Pharmacy Department of International Islamic Universities Malaysia collaboration with Ministry of Education of Malaysia. We were given different families of herbs and did some research about the chemical contents in the plant that can be further used in medicine and what not . We were given the leguminocae group or we called it legumes plants as specimen and it somehow trigger myself that I want to be a scientist in the future. That is the point when I decided to consider science as my favorite subject and later on I have been offered by the Malaysian government to further my study in biotechnology.
I choose Penn State as it can ensure me a better education program in order for me to pursue my dream in becoming a researcher one day.
