Missed the mark? It's okay

In 2008, Mr Mohammad Abdillah Mohamad Sam entered NorthLight School after he failed the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) for the second time.

- Jane Ng

In July 2024, Mr Abdillah, now 30, came full circle when he went back to the school to teach info-comm technology (ICT) for three months.

He was in between jobs and wanted to give back to the school that gave him a second shot at his dream of becoming a graphic designer.

He had struggled with studies in primary school, particularly in English and mathematics.

"I would mix up 'b' and 'd', and could not spell my name correctly for the whole of Primary 1," he says.

He did poorly in mathematics at PSLE, getting a score of "U" or "ungraded" at both attempts.

Even though he loved drawing and dreamt of becoming a graphic artist, he thought that ambition was out of his reach.

When he went to NorthLight School, the different way lessons were taught worked and he began to see improvement.

He attributes a large part of his progress to his NorthLight teachers.

"They didn't judge the way I studied and gave me encouragement to do well. They told me to go for it, no matter how slowly," says Mr Abdillah, who is now a motion graphics artist.

"I'm proud to say I'm from NorthLight because I had my second chance there. I felt emotional when I graduated from the school," adds Mr Abdillah, who went on to study digital animation at the Institute of Technical Education.

He later did well enough to enter polytechnic and graduated from Nanyang Polytechnic with a diploma in motion graphics in 2016. Keen to explore options in the industry, he took on various jobs in graphic design until he took a break in early 2024.

When the opportunity came up to do a relief teaching stint from July to September, he asked his mother, housewife Asiah Idris, 67, what she thought.

She told him: "No matter the journey you went through, it is time for you to give back. It is good to share your story and knowledge. Maybe the children will learn something from it."