UNSW related article

This article looks interesting. It's a letter written by a reader regarding the inflexible education system of Singapore.

Source: http://www.straitstimes.com

I READ with dismay about UNSW pulling out, but I knew that this is something that could happen any time to many foreign organisations which test their toes in Singapore waters.
One of the major reasons is the unforgiving inflexibility of the system and the way we Singaporeans have been groomed to accept that trying is not good enough, a failure is a failure and that we have to take full brunt of the consequences of failure, no exceptions.

The many unknowns and possibilities these days are ironically coupled with technological achievements that can have indicated abilities to predict some certainties giving rise to set regulations, guidelines and norms, benchmarks and deliverables being foisted on every engagement and contract, particularly at governmental level.

The weakness in the system shows up most when, firstly, the predictions/calculated risks don't match up to benchmarks despite the utmost efforts of both parties, secondly when there are more variations, changes, scenarios that are covered by these initial guidelines and deliverables and, thirdly, when the party with clout - which is usually the governmental body or GLC - is in a position to flex its muscles which it inevitably does without conceding an inch.

I have encountered many instances and accepted them because deep down, I do take the view that guidelines and deliverables are what differentiate us from being a cowboy country and which are required to set minimum standards and achieve accountability.

However, the latest personal episode set me thinking about how flawed the system can be.

My son, who is seven, attended a premier kindergarten and now attends a premier primary school - none of the educationists in these institutions alerted me to his learning disabilities which could have been rectified at an earlier stage.

Being very apprehensive at their comments that he was not trying hard enough, I arranged for an assessment at the Dyslexia Association of Singapore.

They were an excellent team who carried out tests showing that while he was not dyslexic, he had visio spatial and motor issues that caused him to scrawl instead of write, and rendering him unable to cope with the galloping curriculum, including being expected to spell 'community service' and 'amenities' (among a list of 200 phonetically unrelated words).

I wrote to the Compulsory Education Unit to request an exemption as home schooling may be an option to help him catch up at this juncture in order that he could achieve mainstream acceptance at a later point.

I received an ultimatum to reply within 21 days with a long list of requirements which included full details of how I expected to find alternatives to fit within the national education curriculum and system failing which I would be exposed to the full penalties of the breach including a fine and jail term.

Currently, my family and I are in turmoil. It is obvious that the child needs help through occupational therapists, education specialists and also sports and music related activities. The reason why we wanted to take him out of the system is that after a full day of school, he is unable to fully reap the benefits of these specialists particularly as one-to-one support is recommended.

Instead of the system being supportive of what is a very challenging move, we get an implied threat.

In fact, it was the difficulties of challenging the system at the onset that may have exacerbated the current position.

Our request to delay his admission to Primary One as he was a premature child born in December had resulted in a whole array of requirements which so dumbfounded us that we decided to take the path of least resistance, that is, enrol him in Primary One within the requisite dates.

My elder son, who is now completing his Master's Degree in Canada, was luckier.

In the early primary years, he was also branded as being subnormal. We, as parents, knew that this was not the case. He was a great personality and very bright - but he did not always do what was demanded of him. Fortunately, intelligence tests proved that our instincts were correct. He was put in the gifted education system which did much for him.

In my case, as a child of a diplomat, I returned to Singapore in Secondary 3. I failed every subject including English despite being on the top honour roll in my high school.

I was also fortunate to have great friends and tuition teachers who pointed out that that the system then only required regurgitation - nothing more - and I became a top scorer and attained undergraduate and graduate degrees in NUS.

Perhaps the system has caused our educationists to be fully aware that their primary role is one of accountability - and there are set norms, rules and codes of behaviour and conduct which are cast in stone.

When there is any deviation to the set answers or mode, no matter how superior such deviations are - they have to be marked to be wrong.

Let me give you three instances.

Even when my son was in the gifted education programme, he was asked to give as many words for the letter Z as possible.

He included 'zeppelin' and 'zinnia' in his list. He was marked wrong. I questioned the teacher because a zeppelin is an airship and zinnia is a flower. She said they were proper nouns. I further challenged her for the differences between zinnia and rose - she dismissed me with a shrug and a frown - and my son tugged me and begged me to give in, in case he was reprimanded further.

Another instance was when he was asked to give an answer based on a graph - he put 75.2 per cent (trying to be as accurate as possible) but the teacher said the answer was 75 per cent - no negotiation.

The only reason why I wanted to raise these points was that I wanted my child to be able to look at situations from as many angles as possible - and when he is not supported for pushing boundaries, then there is something wrong because neither he nor I could find any real basis for such dismissal.

The third instance was composition-set words. One of my educationist friends in the international school system remarked how her student in the Singapore school system, whom she was helping, was thumbed down by his teacher for an essay which used more suitably nuanced words than the givens and was given a fail mark.

I myself looked at a 'model' composition which my young son was asked to follow and found not just grammatical errors, but also cliches that did not actually happen in real life - only standard Singapore textbooks and exam guides.

Relating all this to the UNSW scenario, I can see how all this harks to the inflexibility of our unforgiving system and our well-trained bureaucrats.

The guidelines are always clear and until the guidelines are changed top down, the bureaucrats must follow it to a T - that is the safest route and the route that ensures that benchmarks are met and the line is toed - so the bureaucrats have passed the test of accountability and there will be no possibility of any slap on the wrist or what my son calls 'chicken egg' - a big fat zero.

Jasmine Tan Chin Chwee (Ms)