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HKDSE - Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education
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Students queue up with their DSE results at the Haking Wong campus of the Institute of Vocational Education, in Cheung Sha Wan in July 2015. Sub-degree programmes are an option for students who do not manage to secure a place at a UGC-funded university. Photo: Sam Tsang

Hong Kong students should know that DSE heartbreak is not the end of the world

Very soon, most Form Six graduates in Hong Kong will receive their Diploma of Secondary Education exam result slips, marking the end of their six years of secondary school and the start of a new journey into adulthood. As a university student who also took the examination, I would like to share some hints about how to deal with failures at this time, because no one, including top DSE achievers, can claim to have never failed in their lives.
The first line of defence is to face our failures bravely. Getting a poor grade can make us feel depressed about the future. However, we must remain positive and remember that this is just a temporary setback. A pessimistic attitude kills our passion to fight on.

Next, we have to learn from our mistakes. As the lyrics of the Aerosmith track Dream On go: “you got to lose to know how to win.” However, this can come true only when we discover the reason for our failure and make the necessary changes so that we can succeed the next time around. If we refuse to learn from our mistakes, history will only repeat itself. Therefore, we have to be self-reflective to reach our goals.

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Failure comes to everyone at some point, the key is not to give in. I watched my classmate abandon himself to despair after failing a subject in the exam. But I also saw another friend who didn’t get a good result in the DSE exam work hard at a sub-degree programme, which helped him to get into his favoured degree programme later. What really matters is your attitude towards the outcome, not the outcome itself. If we have a good attitude, we can at least stand up and fight back, regardless of what fate throws at us.

Henry Wong, Kennedy Town

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