[COMPARE AND CONTRAST ESSAY] BIU2042

BIU 2042

ENGLISH PROFICIENCY 4

COMPARE AND CONTRAST ESSAY

Name Zur’Amanda Tirkah binti Rizaliman

Matric number D20182085824

Group AM

Lecturer’s name Mdm. Khursiah Binti Mohd Sauffi

Date of submission 13th November 2020

 [COMPARE AND CONTRAST ESSAY] BIU2042

Essentially, if we asked people over the globe, they will certainly agree that education is
crucial to every person and the key to a successful life. Even though each person has their clarity
of success, education; on the order hand is the mold for every step in our life. This is because
education is a never-ending learning process that shapes our personality and way of behavior. As
pointed out by Kirk Douglas, “The learning process continues until the day you die.” Thus, the
importance of education can never be undermined. For the most part, many considered that
choosing study either abroad or locally plays a significant role in our life choice. Nonetheless,
both of these have their pros and cons. They can be determined by the term of cost, personal
skills, and culture.

Firstly, the obvious contra of study local and abroad is the cost required. This is owing to
the undeniable fact that study abroad will triple the cost to afford the same education that had
been offered at local universities. This is due to the currency rate for other countries that
commonly bigger than ours. Apart from the staggering high universities fee, we also need more
expenditure to adapt to the living cost which includes the demand to buy winter cloth for
students that study in seasonal countries as we have a different climate. Subsequently, the prices
of the flight ticket also need to be considered since basically the ticket price is based on how far
the distance of the countries from our countries. For instance, the ticket flight from Malaysia to
Indonesia more economical compared to France. Moreover, most airlines likely to mark up the
tickets prices on a peak season which lead to expensive tickets price. On the contrary, study
locally definitely does not require that much money. This is due to the tuition fees which part of
it has been subsidized by the government, hence the expenses lower. Students also need not
worry about the demand for tickets as there are various transports that they can choose from. So,
students may choose the cheaper option. In short, lower expenses are required when you choose
to study locally.

On the other hand, studying abroad is proven to improve one’s personal skills. For
reasons, when students are away from their parents, they need to be fully responsible for their
actions. Hence, it wills catalyst the maturity and self-independence process. Moreover, by
studying abroad, they need to adapt to the new environment and face problems on their own such
as the language barrier. Without family, they require to stand on their own two feet. Eventually,
the students will be tougher in overcoming challenges and develop greater self-reliance.

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 [COMPARE AND CONTRAST ESSAY] BIU2042

However, it is different from study locally whereas the student’s personality improvement will
remain almost no differences. This is because the students are in their comfort zone as they need
not change much with the environment that they have been immersed in since born. We took
examples from language and culture, which locally students will never face. Furthermore, they
always can depend on their parents for minor obstacles as they only a few feet away. By dint of
these, their personal skills will remain the same.

Lastly, studying abroad also allows exploring the other culture and experience a brand-
new country with different insights. By exposing to diverse culture, it can help students to
educate more and provides students with global perspectives. However, studying abroad also can
lead to culture shock. There are high possibilities they will be influenced by western culture and
lose certain local cultural values by studying abroad. Conversely enrolling in local, familiar
surroundings and the cultures that have been immersed will certainly stick to students. The
students will easily blend in despite the new environment which is college life. Thereby, the
identity of our cultures will remain embedded.

In short, both studying local and abroad have various strengths based on cost, personal
skills, and culture. By and large, the local university still can produce the same product as abroad
university at a much lower expenditure. Despite the benefits from study overseas, the local
institute gives the students the same opportunity as them to further the study, albeit some
unavoidable weaknesses which this weakness can be overcome by practice. Thus, these
differences need to be taken into account by students to afford the best education.