Various challenges have to be faced by a visually impaired student in pursuing education, but his hard work all paid off when he was announced as one of the top students of STPM 2022 after achieving a Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA) of 3.92 with four A’s.
As the fourth child out of five siblings, Muhammad Amir Faris Mohd Firdaus is also a student at St John’s Institution Kuala Lumpur. He was diagnosed with visual impairment at the age of six due to a tumour in his nose.
According to him, throughout his education, he refused to give up despite facing challenges, including difficulty in movement and accessing information.
“So, being visually impaired is not easy, especially when it comes to accessing information, especially visual information. For some of it, I have to ask for help from friends and teachers to describe the visual information to me.
“Every day, I am also led by other friends from the hostel to get on the bus to school,” he said.
“My way of facing challenges as a visually impaired student is by daring to step forward and try anything that is around me or explore life,” he said when he was interviewed by Berita Harian after the STPM 2022 Best Student Award Ceremony at the Malaysian Examinations Council (MPM) today.
A total of 17 top STPM 2022 students received the awards, presented by Minister of Education Fadhlina Sidek.
Also present were the Secretary-General of the Ministry of Education Datuk Nik Nasarudin Mohd Zawawi and the Chairman of MPM Prof Datuk Dr Mohd Ekhwan Toriman.
5As Scorer with CGPA 4.00
Meanwhile, Nur Atikah Zailan, 21, from Kota Klias National Secondary School (SMK), Beaufort, Sabah, who achieved a CGPA of 4.00 with five A’s, dedicated her success to her father, who is also a General Assistant at the Sabah Rubber Industry Board, and her late mother.
“My father and late mother have been an inspiration for me to study hard. They often reminded us that we are not well-off, and education is our hope to change our lives.
“I can describe the hardships we faced when we were only given RM3 for daily expenses to go to school, but I would wake up as early as 4 am to cook food for myself and my siblings to bring to school,” she said.
She further mentioned that there is no secret recipe for her success. In fact, she would use weekends to study subjects starting after the Isyak prayer until 1 am every day.
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