some thoughts and advice from an aspiring writer

Thursday 22nd July, 2021

It’s been said many a time before - "bagging out arts & humanities students is getting old". But what if I’m not even a student? What if I’ve let these politicians and humanities nay-sayers push me out of universities, just as they wanted? Maybe I want to show them what I'm capable of without higher education.

Perhaps that’s why I’m writing this article right now, sitting at my desk, listening to What Once Was by the late band Her’s on-repeat rather than on a Zoom listening to a lecturer being spoken-over by a kid that’s left his microphone on.

In the year 2020, I was in my final year of high school with a variety of humanities subjects before me – I was completing three major works, all of which I put so much of my time and energy towards. I was proud of my PIP, I was proud of my performances, and I was proud of my art. I completed these alongside a sprinkle of Modern History and a mind-numbing splattering of Advanced English. I really had a lot on my plate, and I was terrified of what could go wrong in a HSC full of writing-based subjects. In the end, I picked up some high-to-average scoring marks – it didn’t go as bad as I thought it would have, and I genuinely thought that I was going to get the ATAR that I was aiming for, if anything.

Then two hours later, I get a message. It’s not it. It’s not even close. How did this happen? I got a damn band six, NESA - did your controlling grip over my future mean nothing to you? This is when I heard about other students in my cohort that had completed various STEM subjects and achieved average marks all heading off to their dream universities with their high ATARs. I can either be mad at the system or try to make the best out of this.

So, I did – I received a good amount of offers from various universities and colleges across NSW and even in Victoria, however I deferred these offers eager to gain as much practical experience as possible rather than paying a $58,000 HECS debt. You read that right, by the way.

This whopper of a fee to pay for an education is a result of the 113% fee increase for Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Communications students put forth in July of 2020 – right after what I decided what to do with my life. Unfortunately, I, like many other aspiring journalists, politicians and writers must “dream a little cheaper,”, as Senator Jacqui Lambie said in October 2020 while defending regional and rural students.

Why does this continue to happen? I understand the importance of STEM, but in a world where COVID currently rules, we are publicly provided updates and insight into the work of scientists and engineers by politicians and journalists – majority of which have an education in humanities degrees, such as Arts or Communications – even Law. We need STEM to progress into the future and attempt to fix the mistakes that we’ve made in the past, but we also need humanities to educate these findings and breakthroughs to the public so that we can function as a society. Ignorance is simply not an option anymore.

To put things into perspective – if you’re a student interested in humanities and are terrified about what lies ahead of you, be passionate about what you love. Write about it – make something creative about it. University is an option for many, but not all. If you’re determined to show the world what you’ve got, let your passion carry you.

(this article was originally written as a submission for Year13)