My iACADEMY Experience!

Hi! I'm Moira!

I'm a college student in my third year, taking up Web Development at Information and Communications Technology Academy, better known as iACADEMY! I'll be talking about my experience as a student of iAC in this little website of mine. A lot can happen in three years, but that's to much, so I'll talk about the highlights of my stay at iACADEMY. 

I guess a good way to start talking about my experience is why I went for iACADEMY in the first place. It's quite simple, honestly. My dad used to play badminton at The Zone and told me that he saw a school open up nearby. He looked into it and told me that it was a school that offered Web Development, one of my choices for a college course. So when the time came for me to apply to different colleges, we checked it out. I got a glimpse of the school and was told that everyone was like family and that being part of the iACADEMY community would grant me a lot of opportunities. 

I'm getting ahead of myself, let me tell you a little bit about my school, in case you don't know about it. 

About iACADEMY

So what exactly is iACADEMY? Well, it's a college that offers courses for three different schools: Web Development, Software Engineering, and Game Development for the School of Computing; Fashion Design, Multimedia Arts, and Animation for the School of Design; and Financial Management and Marketing for the School of Business. The school also offers Senior High School strands at their Yakal Campus. 

If there was something you could associate with iACADEMY, other than a hexagon, it would be the phrase Game Changers. iACADEMY encourages its students to change the game, stir things up, and do things differently. Students are taught to face challenges with innovation and efficiency in mind. The school is quite unique, starting from the way they welcome their new students to the way they celebrate their graduations. 

Fun fact: They make sure every student decorates their graduation cap any way they like. The graduation ceremonies are always colorful and fun to watch for that reason alone since iAC students can get pretty creative. 

The Experience

Let's get to the point, shall we? 

The iACADEMY experience starts when you first go to the school to apply. Normally, you'd just get some papers, get told about requirements and whatnot, but iACADEMY surprised me. On the day we went to the school to apply, we were asked to sit down on one of the couches and was talked to by one of the professors. She asked me about what course I wanted to go for, why, how my current school experience was, etc. It was just a normal, pleasing conversation. Then she took us for a tour of the school. That was the highlight of the visit. 

And so I enrolled into iACADEMY. I was really excited for my first day. We had a general assembly about a week before classes started and that was also kind of the welcoming ceremony for the new students. It wasn't like any regular general assembly. We were grouped together and we got to know a bunch of new people, as well as some of the higher batch students. After that, some faculty and admin members presented some things that any student would need to know. There was free food too but that wasn't the best part. 

I mentioned that iACADEMY does things differently, starting from how they welcome their students. The school's signature way of doing this is by making students go through an "initiation" and it's different every year. They welcomed our batch by doing an rave-type party by the drop off. Color powder was thrown everywhere, loud music boomed, Ms. Tanco was spraying us down with water, and everyone was having fun. It was definitely a memorable way to be welcomed to a school and I'm pretty sure everyone bragged about it to their friends outside of iACADEMY. 

The Classes

It's pretty much expected that in any school, some classes are fun and some classes make you want to go to sleep for a million years and wake up hoping you could just graduate immediately. Stress isn't nice but sleep and lots of free time is. 

Surprisingly enough, I enjoyed more classes in iACADEMY than hated some. The school wants to make sure that its students graduate with a variety of skills in their skillset, and so I got the opportunity to learn things I never thought I'd learn or take up. I've always had an interest in photography and I got the chance to learn that through our photography class. I also learned animation and video editing, and those are usually things that students would self-learn. 

What I love about the school is that most, if not all, the professors let you eat in class (unless your class is held in a computer laboratory). We also get enough time for breaks so we get to buy some snacks for us to munch on while we study. We also don't have to buy any books. Professors either give us the material online or we can just take notes during class. It's pretty practical for us since we don't have to bring any heavy books. 

Oh, and of course, there's free wifi. 

Essentials, people. 

The Community

There's more to school that classes and whatnot though. They say college is the where you discover more about yourself and figure out what kind of people you'd prefer to surround yourself with. I agree with that a lot. Any person would agree when you say that high school is filled with superficiality. College is a little bit more stripped down. 

In the middle of the rush to write papers, do projects, hand in requirements, students need to surround themselves with people they're comfortable with. All that work and stress often gets to a person usually brings their walls down and makes them a little bit more vulnerable than usual. That's where the charm of iACADEMY's homey feeling comes in. 

There's a variety of kinds of students in iACADEMY. There's almost a group for anyone to belong to - people who like anime, games, kpop, rock, films,fashion, art, and so much other stuff. These people get together and everyone has a place in the community 

The school also holds a bunch of events for everyone to destress a little bit and have some time to enjoy. There were events where bouncy houses were involved, arcade games, playing with dogs, cosplay competitions, and many other stuff. A lot of the community experience also depends on the student organizations. It's actually quite amazing to see how much control the students get when it comes to their orgs, so everyone can have a say in what events students might be able to enjoy! 

Overall

Three years is a lot of time for a lot of things to happen. People came and people left, but the people who stuck around with me throughout the three years that I've been studying at iACADEMY are now the people that matter to me the most at the moment. I found a friend who could ride along with my jokes. We could make stressful study sessions turn into chill and productive ones. I found a friend who knew the right things to say at the right moments and could cheer me up with just a small box of Chuckie or a small pack of M&Ms. I found ways to handle stress and emotions that I couldn't handle before. 

Studying at iACADEMY has been an amazing experience so far. There were a lot of ups and downs, but the professors, my friends, and the feel of the school in general helped me through it. Even the friendly competition among people in the school really inspired me to do better and I think that's the best thing you can get out of a school.