Personal Statement
My competence set of initiative, creativity, passion and leadership rests firmly upon my experience in the Chunhui Association, a student organization attached to the Alumni Association of our school. The Chunhui Association was founded at the 90th school anniversary in 2007; one year later, right after I became a freshman, I joined this newly-built union, wishing to develop my all-around abilities through extracurricular activities. At the orientation for newcomers, I found that this juvenile organization was facing a tough situation: we had neither regular activities nor remarkable influence within or outside campus. Yet measures could and must be taken. Junior as I was, I boldly put forward my idea and suggested taking some changes. Fortunately, my fellow members recognized my opinion, including the founder -- Belinda Mao. We then had a heated discussion aiming to propose possible solutions, during which I actively participated in by consulting current senior members and exchanging notions with my fellow companions. My passion and ambition impressed everyone present and Belinda offered me to take charge of coming up with a proposal.
Realizing that enhancing interaction between alumni and current students is the key to this task, I labeled it as important and emergent. Yet how to boost contacts? Apparently our current way of sending out newspapers to alumni is insufficient. In order to scoop versatile opinions, I called on a focus group to brainstorm possible ways. Most of us thought it best to hold lectures and invite some renowned alumni to be the distinguished guests; I agreed with this as well. However, we should come up with some shining points so that we could distinguish our activities from other common or tedious ones. To this end, I sought the Student Vocational Counsel Centre for help. Through talking with a job tutor there and analyzing past employment data, I noticed an intriguing phenomenon -- nearly 80% graduates from our school have entered into specific industries, such as banking, securities, insurance, the Big Four accounting firms. Wouldn't it be great if we hold some sharing sessions classified by industries? This idea struck me. Still, I did not hurry to present my immature thought; instead, before I put forward a plan, I took into account other essential details: types and number of guests, frequency of holding such sessions, proper time and place, etc. The proposal was lauded by my teammates and they contributed their views to perfect it as well. After continuous betterment and delicate organization, we finally initiate a path-breaking session to see how it works. In our first Industry Sharing Session, we invited six alumni from foreign banks, China's state-owned banks and joint-stock commercial banks respectively, to be our distinguished guests. I am proud to say that this trial gained a complete victory: the auditorium was filled to full capacity and there was much interaction between the speakers and audiences. Nevertheless, this is never the end for such an aggressive team as us. We also asked the audiences to fill in our self-designed questionnaires and chatted with all lecturers so that we could continuously improve in the future.
Later we registered the "Industry Sharing Sessions" at the Federation of Associations to ensure exclusive right to hold it, which means this activity has been a patent and regular activity of our association ever since. My contributions all through this process have been more than incremental changes -- I have up-shifted my association to get on the right track. Happily, my endeavor has been recognized by my fellow members; after my promotion to the Minister in 2010, I was nominated to be the President. However, this desirable news caught me in a dilemma, because the International Exchange Office of my university was selecting outstanding students to study abroad at that time and I stood a good chance to be one of the 2010/2011 Exchange Students. On the one hand, I yearn to study overseas, especially in Hong Kong. On the other hand, I love our Chunhui Association so much that I would like to lead it leap further forward. If I choose to go exchanging, I would be away from my home school for one semester so that I have to give up the position of President. Facing this difficult choice, I was at a loss for some time. Yet after searching my heart for answer, I found that I myself appreciate a breathtaking exchange experience more than a title. I could still take remote charge of certain affairs by keeping close contact with my nice fellows, but I saw no reason for missing the rare opportunity. Finally I managed to reach a perfect balance: being the Vice President of my association and an Exchange Student to the Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
What the one-semester rewarding exchange life in HK gave me is far beyond what once ran wild in my mind. During my study at the Faculty of Business of PolyU, I enjoyed intellectual interactions with learned teachers and the state-of-the-art study mode. For instance, Professor Louis Cheng provided us the valuable opportunity to do mock trading via Stock-Trak, the global leading provider of educational financial trading simulations. Apart from that, I have fallen in love with the unique Hong Kong culture, assimilating both Eastern and Western values, outlooks and elites. Now I have been in close contact with many local and international friends whom I met there. Most importantly, it is this experience that helped to shape my career path plan. I aspire to hone my comprehensive abilities through the MSc in Economics in the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology first and then advance my career in the business world. I believe that my excellent quantitative and financial background enables me well suited to handle this program. I majored in Statistics in my freshman year and performed excellently in courses such as Mathematical Analysis, Probability Theory and Computer Programming. It is the love for Finance and Economics that motivated me to transfer major from Statistics to Finance. Ever since that, I have been working even harder to equip myself both theoretically and practically by accumulating in-class knowledge and on-job internship experience. Yet I fully realize that I have only scratched the surface. I also feel a pressing need to get solid economics and analytical training. With a curriculum taught by leading economics professors and designed to develop students' academic and applied abilities, HKUST is the ideal forum for me to pursue deeper knowledge and international perspectives.
In closing, I believe that attaining this MSc in Economics degree offered by HKUST is the footstone to achieving my career goals, and I would appreciate it a great deal to be one of your students.
