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What does it take to overcome adversities and achieve success? In this article, we will share the inspiring story of Hussain Natchapol, a 26-year-old alumnus (Class of 2020) from the Diploma in Chemical Engineering (DCHE) at Singapore Polytechnic (SP).

With an interest to pursue a diploma course in a chemical related discipline, Natchapol enrolled into SP’s DCHE course in 2016 under the influence of his secondary school’s chemistry teacher. Raised in an orphaned, single parent family as an only child, Natchapol hoped to graduate from DCHE, find a good job in the chemical industry, and earn money to support his family as soon as he could.

However, Natchapol had to cope with multiple adversities in his journey to obtaining his diploma. Due to family circumstances which resulted in the loss of family income and having to face with the financial pressures to cope with his family’s living expenses and his grandfather’s cancer treatments, he became the breadwinner of his family by working part-time as a waiter in a restaurant. He worked long hours of up to 12 hours on weekends and on weekday evenings whenever his schedule allows, leaving him little time and energy to study. As a result, he had trouble concentrating in class and catching up with his studies. Being a quiet and introverted student by nature, he did not confide much about his challenges with his course mates. The challenges to juggle between his personal challenges and as a new student adjusting to polytechnic life proved too much for him at that point in time. He failed a core module in his first year of studies, leaving him depressed and demotivated.

Fortunately, he met three lecturers who changed his life, "I am very grateful to all my DCHE lecturers, especially to Ms Oh Ai Ye, Dr Wong Yunyi and Mr Koh Hong Wee. Although I tend to sit quietly at the back of the classroom during most lessons, they noticed and kept a lookout for me. They never gave up on me and motivated me to do better. In addition to giving me extra coaching, guidance, and encouragement to persevere, they have also showed me the relevance and importance of what I was learning. They made me realise that chemical engineering is not just about equations and formulas, but also lots of hands-on work, innovation, sustainability, problem-solving, and more importantly, there are numerous career and growth opportunities in the chemical industry" Natchapol said.

With the guidance and encouragement received from his lecturers, Natchapol regained his motivation and got inspired to work towards starting off his career as a process technician in a chemical plant. Finding his sense of purpose and motivation to complete the course, he strived to juggle between his daily part time work and studies, which eventually led to him starting to score “A”s from his second year of studies and close to perfect GPA in his final year. He also excelled in his internship in a global leading oil movement and storage company, which eventually led him to secure a full time job offer from the company as a process technician after graduation, where he worked for more than two years before switching to his current job to fulfil his learning aspirations to work as a process technician in a manufacturing plant in a global leading oil and gas company. While he doesn’t totally rule out the possibility that he might pursue a degree in the future, he currently plans to continue to focus on learning on the job and building his career in the chemical industry, with aspirations to take on supervisory roles in the future.

Natchapol said, “Process technician is often being misunderstood as a sunset job that is low skilled, low paid, unsafe, and unhealthy with limited career progression. I beg to differ. Instead, it takes a lot of knowledge and skills to understand how each unique process unit runs. You must be highly knowledgeable about the process you operate, and we need to work under pressure because we play important roles in ensuring safe plant operations and to troubleshoot the plant to prevent simple upsets from escalating into a disaster. The chemical industry will continue to be important to support our everyday life, as it’s impossible for us to live in a world without chemicals, from a water bottle to the watch and spectacles you wear, all of which are made from chemicals. The chemical industry is transforming to become more sustainable to become safer, produce less waste, emit less harmful byproducts, and produce products using more environmentally sustainable techniques. The chemical industry is a very safe industry due to stringent rules and regulations to be complied with. There are robust control measures to ensure that workers are protected from exposure to the hazardous chemicals, and there is regulated health screening every year to closely monitor workers’ health. Although I work on 12-hour shifts, I report to work for only 14 to 15 days a month as opposed to about 22 days for people working on typical day jobs. There are sufficient off and rest days to ensure that workers can be recharged and rejuvenated. As for pay and career progression, I am grateful for the constant learning opportunities given to me by my employers, and to be earning a decent salary to be able to support my family, comfortably pay for my accommodation, vehicle, meet my personal living needs, and to save up for rainy days.”