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I’ve always been a government-basher, always talking about how screwed up Singapore is with their systems and everything else well let’s talk about the one of the most government fueled aspect- Education standing at S$6.966 Billion much more than millitary defences. Clearly Singapore has placed education as an important aspect of society development.
Let’s take a look at the levels of education in singapore- Primary(PSLE), Secondary(O levels), Pre-univerisity(A levels), Diploma and vocational (various diplomas), technical education( National ITE cert) of which students are required by the government to complete secondary school, and has a choice whether to move on to further education or not.
Singapore adopted the streaming system althoug it has been said to be abolished, the streaming system still stands till this very day however unspoken and unwritten. Students are still being put into classes according to their so-called “ability to learn” so that it suits their “learning paces”. This might be true for some students are slower learnings than others but heck? Since they said streaming system was abolished to prevent branding and labeling why is it so that it is still happening? Are they trying to fool themselves or the idiots who fail to see it? So yeah, nice going Singapore, labeling and branding are still going on right in my backyard and i can just see thousands of potential talents being filtered out as the otherwise. During my era, we were filtered when we were 10, 12, 14, 16(or17) in primary and secondary education; i can just imagine the number of actually-smart-but-playful students labeled as “stupid” at a young age. These students will then be unable to realise their full potential and will be conformed to the system to whatever the system thinks they belong but infact, the system is probabbly wrong all the time. This is the result of the national examinations, being wholly relied on grades and acadamic results. Its a world of alphaberts and numericals.
So what do they test you during the examinations? Well for all i can remember it could be like: “what is the squareroot of 9?” where the questions are usually to test the rememberence of the fomula and their right application; like-wise every examination tests the application of the fomula and if you have remembered their fomula. Wait wait wait, hang on a second, arn’t the aims of exams to test students on their understanding and application? So Singapore has made it so where students just simply come with a full stomach of facts and spot-the-similarities-to-apply-facts system then vomit them out on the examination papers; so what does that mean? It has turned into a memorising facts session; students these days are made to write facts over and over again until they have it at the back of their heads and ever ready to throw at the test papers. Where is the understanding and all that bullcrap? Has examinations lost their aim and their desired results?
Okay so its so technical and stuff lets talk about where the money of the tax payers are going. Singapore education system offers bursaries and monetary rewards to the top 95-percentile of a cohort. Ok bursaries first, it is a grant of up to 80% of tuition fees; looking at polytechnic education where tuition fees hit sky high at S$13k per semestar, 80% is indeed a heavy load off the our parent’s pockets but should’nt they not revise their percentile to suit every family’s needs? 80% off S$13k is still S$2k plus does it weigh evenly between 2 family with annual income of S$20k and S$400k ? You don’t need to be a mathamatician to figure out the maths there; Has taxes lost it’s purpose as to devide the country’s wealth among its people? Same thing goes for monetary rewards for good results, it should have been revised to meet family’s needs, why make someone whose already rich, richer? and how will, by giving more money to someone who has abundance, motivate him or her to study more? Does’nt it entirely defeats the purpose and create more discords among the social classes?
I’ll keep this short and sweet, Singapore’s education system is really a waste of tax payer’s money and has caused the ‘death” of dreams and talents of many capable people personally i graduated from a dropout school and i had personally witness this myself; think again when you go to work the next time, how does memorising facts and vomiting them out help your boss solve their problems? The work force needs problem solvers not some nerd who is able to memorise the entire wikipedia. Nuff said.
Comments please :)
