Tag: Education

Random Discourse – Hair Cut and Police Report

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One of the latest brouhaha has got to be the case whereby a mother made a police report over the matter of a teacher taking her son to a haircut.

I had many discussions with separate friends on the matter of education and discipline in school. One of the things we all agreed on: if we were to let our parents know we have been punished / disciplined in school, we will be given a perhaps even more unpleasant “2nd helping” at home. It doesn’t matter whether we are in the right or wrong, because in our parents opinion, such things simply shouldn’t happen. If the school / teacher chooses to punish us – we must have done something in the wrong. In other words, our parents defer to the decision of the school. Perhaps they believed that above teaching us about how to read and write, and on science and humanities, a school also teaches us on how to be proper human beings. Respecting order and authority was the rule of the day back then, even though as youngsters we often resent that. Yet, as we grew older, we understand the necessity of that even though it maybe fraught with abuse. While abuse must be stopped, it is not by means of ‘throwing out the baby with the bath water’.

At the present, society has downgraded the role of teachers from being a mentor and a moral example to nothing more than an instructor or a trainer. Granted, teachers are definitely no paragon of virtue, but I can bet those of us who remember their teachers fondly would recall how some of the sterner ones left a mark on our values and our world views to shape us into what we have become. These days teachers are no longer accorded a lot of respect because parents with equal or better education no longer think highly of them. Teachers and the school have lost the parents’ backing on disciplinary actions. With that, the meaning of education has been completely redefined to mean nothing more than instructing a person the knowledge to work in society, instead of teaching them what it meant to be a person and to live in harmony with one another and the environment. If we take away the religious aspect of some teachings, like those of Buddha and Jesus, we can see their basic objective was simply to ensure that all human beings follow certain guidelines and recognise what is good and evil. Even the Age of Philosophy which sprouted in China during the Spring and Autumn period of the Eastern Zhou dynasty, was a response to the collapse of order and traditions in that period whereby learned people and scholars (such as Confucius) present their ideas on how order can be restored (either through education, philosophical enlightenment or harsh laws) where man can live in mutual respect of one another and with civility. That is why Confucius is lauded as an educator – because education is not only about understanding the science (e.g. the natural order of the world around us), but also about proper behavior and social order. My point is simply, we have long lost our understanding of what education really should be.

The teaching of values and building character has long been completely displaced in schools. That is why these days we even hear arguments that students are ‘customers’, complete with a sleep inducing narrative on that matter. Thus, the modern day school has generally stopped doing so to avoid unnecessary confrontation with parents. After all, some parents argued that the mentoring of a child, teaching them manners and what is good and evil, and discipline is the department of parenting. In their opinion, the school and / or the teachers should have nothing to do with it. Just teach children the ABCs, the mathematics and the science and ensure they get the straight As and be done with it. In extension, the government has also retreated from that arena as any attempt to do so will be followed by accusation of fascism, and it will be decried for imposing its values on the next generation or attempting to indoctrinate the young.

That maybe partially true, considering how some of us born in the formative years of Singapore are raised and how we have been taught in school. Unfortunately, a lot of parents are unaware of the role they have to play and has thus failed dismally. What follows is that the young and impressionable has no one at home or in school to look up to, and whatever that awes and inspires them – in most cases idols of popular culture, which are some of the worst examples – moved in to fill that vacuum. Worst yet, parents try to make up for the lack of presence in their children’s lives, and to demonstrate their love, by showering their children with material wants. It is of no surprise that some children even refused to sit still to consume their meals without a tablet computer playing their favorite cartoon placed before them.

A sense of entitlement thus take hold, and as children grow older and become bolder in expressing their views, parents find it even harder to punish what is wrong. They believed that the best way to love their children is to make them fell good. Even though I am not a parent, I see that as a kind of dereliction of duty. In my opinion that parents should never shirk from the responsibility of teaching a child what is right apart from what is wrong. In many cases, not only is the wrong not punished but rewarded – for e.g. a father trying to make peace with his son by buying him the latest gadget – which thus renders the purpose of rewarding success and doing right entirely meaningless. Just what incentive is there to make the effort to do the different thing when the current method of getting their way simply works? Even when parents may be rewarding a child for his success, the offer to reward is given before hand to entice the child to do so which thus gives them the impression that there is no reason to do better unless there is a reward. It has become quite a norm for children to demand for a reward when asked to do something. Isn’t it sad, that we need to entice people to do what should be done with rewards, and thus made doing what is right or good the exception other than the norm?

To avoid punishing a child for fear of hurting the child momentarily is not love, it is giving them the false impression that the world which is harsh in nature is a warm and fuzzy place. In effect, parents have denied their children the true joy of learning and growing up. Parents failed to see that they are only setting their children up for greater failures in the future – whereby one simple setback would be good enough to cause them to despair and never to pick themselves up again. For e.g. Eagles pushed their chicks off their nests on high cliffs, and then pick them up at the last moment, to teach them how to fly. If eagles feared that their chicks will fall to their deaths, then the chicks will never grow up to soar the skies.

This is how I see it when I read that the child in this case locked himself up for days after that haircut (a standard 4×2 according to some), which in my opinion was really not so bad at all from the few photos shown on the papers. The mother seems to have simply just allowed the child to throw his tantrums for days without giving him guidance on how to handle the matter or to smoothen things out. While I agree it is within the mother’s right to express her concern for her child and even to protest what she perceived to be the high-handedness of the teacher in handling the matter, a police report was an over-reaction and completely unnecessary. Furthermore, I felt there was no need for the teacher to apologise, since the child was not singled out to be discriminated or punished. To force the teacher to do so would simply immobilise the other teachers, depriving them of the power to act when necessary. While the letter to inform the parent did not effectively reach her, that was a matter of communication failure and not so much the fault of the school or the teacher. In fact, this poor teacher had the very unpleasant task of enforcing the school rules only to be hang out to dry by the school and the Ministry of Education, which clearly has not only failed to provide the guidelines to back the teacher, but also to show them where the line is.

An old classmate who has been in the teaching profession for many years mentioned this, “Why is everyone focussing on the hair? It is just a snip. Did it occur to you that the teacher didn’t want to see the student get kicked out of the exam hall and bit the bullet?”. He has a good point. After all, the teacher has taken an action which is in the best interest of the child. In Article 3 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, it is stated that: “In all actions concerning children, whether undertaken by public or private social welfare institutions, courts of law, administrative authorities or legislative bodies, the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration.”.

It is of no wonder that my friends who has previously been teachers or police constables have such low morale. Other than the teacher, the police constable who had to record the complaints of the parent probably felt he has better things to do in service of the public. From a certain point of view, I felt even getting caught for sleeping in a patrol car in a deserted corner of a multi-storey carpark would have been better for morale than to handle the mother’s police report.

It is of no surprise why more people seems unable to act, or simply refused to do the right thing. After all, if doing something comes with the risks of taking the rap when it goes wrong, then it is best to just do nothing. It reminds me of Pigsy in the “Journey to the West” story, which often did nothing and is the fastest to take credit. Meanwhile, Wukong (the monkey god) often gets the rap and punishment from the Monk Tripitaka (Xuanzang) for doing what is right and necessary, and in the best interest of the party. But that will be for another post, when I get my thoughts more organised to put that down in writing.

Commentary – Sweta Agarwal

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I would have written something about this letter when my friend sent it to me earlier had I not been bothered by work and some personal matters. Here’s the letter in question:

Thanks, being a PR is good enough
August 20, 2009 Thursday

IN RESPONSE to letters by Mr Jimmy Loke (‘The PR difference’, last Saturday) and Mr Chia Kok Leong (‘No school, no Singapore’, last Saturday), I would only ask them to refer to Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew’s speech reported last Friday (‘MM: Foreign talent is vital’), where he gave an idea of the benefits citizens have over permanent residents (PRs).

I am happy to be a PR and although we do not get equal benefits in housing and other respects, that is understandable. We understand the difference between a citizen and a PR.

But where our children are concerned, we just want them to have the best education possible and I think we are not asking much. Citizens have the upper hand in buying homes and other respects, which is justified, but where schooling is concerned, ‘every child has the right to get the best education possible’.

About living here for six years and not taking citizenship, I think this is a very personal choice. I would just like to end this topic by saying we are not here to compete with citizens but there are certain things on which one cannot compromise and children’s education is one of them. I think we are not asking much and we are grateful to the Government for understanding that for every parent, his child’s welfare comes first.

I would like to thank Mr Loke and Mr Chia for inviting us to become citizens but for now, I am proud to be a citizen of my country and have PR status in Singapore.

Sweta Agarwal (Mrs)

It appears to me that PRs from this one particular country always have this unusual and unacceptable ‘mentality of entitlement’. We have far less issues with other PRs, apparently. I recalled having written another blog post before, after another PR (apparently of the same nationality) shamelessly wrote in asking why he can only get HDB flats off the open market and not the ‘subsidised’ ones which are offered only to Singapore Citizens who are first time owners.

When I first read it, my response to the friend who sent the article to me was simply this: “This is like a customer, whom after being served a cup of plain water, asks for a cup of chai latte – for free, and also to be served first.”

Frankly, I don’t understand where her argument of “compromising her children’s education” is coming from. Giving priority to the children of citizens in getting a place in schools would hardly compromise her children’s education. She either have to send them further away to study if she can’t get her children a place, or to a private school. After all, we citizens expect her to pay the full fees for her child’s education for taking up a place which would otherwise have been given to a Singaporean child!

According to this article, Mrs Sweta Agarwal had also issued a veiled threat that PRs may consider leaving Singapore if their children cannot get into the schools of their choice, and had justified the equal chance given to PRs because they ‘pay taxes and abide by Singapore’s laws’.

That’s preposterous! Everyone is expected to abide by the law of the land, wherever he / she is, and this PR should not forget that Singapore provided her the job opportunities in the first place and thus paying taxes to our State is a duty and in my personal opinion, an institutionalised method for people who has benefited from the society to give some of it back. It doesn’t matter whether the government gahmen uses that money to build infrastructure or invest (and lose) it in investments. Ultimately, that money is spent with the intention to benefit everyone staying here. Before Mrs Sweta Agarwal issued her threat, she should first ask herself why she has chosen to come to Singapore, if not for the fact that Singapore offers the best deal? Unless she is really exceptional, Singapore losses nothing in a win-win deal like this since someone else either more capable or equally capable would have quickly filled the positions she vacated.

As my friend Modeus put it: These people probably think Singaporean men do our national service and get allowances and enjoy free meals paid by them. Personally, I am not surprised if these people think we citizens enjoy our lives on their hard work and money or that Singapore cannot do without them. After all, whenever the Singapore gahmen defend the Foreign Fallen Talent policies, they have repeatedly make it clear that while Singapore can fill some of these jobs, we do not necessarily have the critical mass to fill all of them. As such, the gahmen opened up the labor market to attract investors to set up shop here, so that the investors won’t take it elsewhere. To put it in a simple analogy: We’ll let some outsiders come and eat the pie, because we can’t finish it all. That is better than losing the entire pie to someone else entirely.

Either way, this is not the first time a PR issued such a threat when PRs in general faces a backlash from citizens. However, PRs would do well to remember that when Singapore’s economy change, they might find themselves obsolete just like many of our own graduates trained in the wrong trade. While they may currently be in demand, they shouldn’t think that Singapore owe them a living. After all, they may come a day when their currently valued ‘talent’ become obsolete and available at a cheaper cost at some newly industrialised economies elsewhere.

We Chinese have a saying: 山水有相逢. It literally translates as: Even the mountains will meet the water. To elaborate, the mountain maybe high, but even then one day the water once flowing at its foot will be on its peaks. What it really means is that a person shouldn’t feel so high and mighty, because conditions can change so drastically that it takes others on top of you.

When the day comes where Singapore’s economy no longer needs the likes of Mrs Sweta Agarwal, I hope the ICA officer at the customs putting the chop on her passport will say:

Good riddance, to bad rubbish.

Commentary: Career Guidance

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While browsing the articles on The Singapore Daily I come across an article titled ‘Lack of Career Guidance in the Singapore Education System’. The blogger basically lamented about the lack of guidance given to young students as far as their career path is concerned after they complete their secondary school education – which generally means obtaining a good enough pass in their GCE ‘O’ Level exams to either proceed to Junior College or to enter the specialisation stage of their education in the Polytechnics. She pointed out the usual factors driving a student’s choice and what are some of the outcome on making the wrong choice. She then claim that those who end up hating their course is proof that students lacks career and education guidance.

I too have my gripes about the education system. Basically, they are mostly about the lack of choices. I felt it concentrates too much on the science and technical fields, with too little on the humanities and the arts. As a result, we have a well-trained and possibly well-qualified workforce, without anyone particularly outstanding. To put it in an analogy, Singapore’s Education System is like a PC manufacturer, which will ensure that its products are competitive. That means it will attempt to produce hardware with the latest CPUs, the best RAM etc. Unfortunately, Singapore’s Education System does not ‘preload’ these computers with software, and you are left to ‘install’ them on your own.

The other thing I am also unhappy about is with the streaming system. While I can understand resource constraint means putting all the ‘bright sparks’ at one place would be a more effective use of resources, the streaming system makes our Education System very unforgiving to late boomers. And that is the very reason why a brother of a good friend of mine has remained in the U.S. to this day, even after a close shave with the collapsing WTC in New York City back in 2001.

However, while I resent the system, I could not find fault with it. A well-trained and qualified workforce is what I considered a pillar of Singapore’s economy. The government gahmen ensures there will be a ready pool of trained manpower for companies encouraged to set up shop here and also fulfill their promise of creating job opportunities for the citizens. Otherwise, the jobs will end up going to foreigners like the very blogger who wrote I am talking about. Thus, it is natural the gahmen actively promotes certain courses from time to time (e.g. Mechatronics in the 80s, IT in the 90s and Life Sciences in the early 21st Century).

Anyway, one must always remember that ultimately, no one is forced into taking up the course they have chosen. If they end up disliking their choice, is it really a lack of career guidance? It would be rather natural that one would pick up course which enhances their chance of future employment. Just who would want to be left out of where the gahmen is taking the nation’s economy? And which agencies are to take up the effort to give advice to the teenager, and be responsible for the advice which might affect their lives forever? No matter how neutral such an agency, I would find it unlikely it would be giving an advice different from what their parents or peers are giving. In fact, at the tender age of 16 or 17 (depending on whether you are ‘Express’ or ‘Normal’ stream), it would take a partial genius to take the risk in going down a path less trodden.

On top of that the economy is never static, and changes happens pretty rapidly once it pushes past a certain point. Back in mid-1988 when I was entered the Polytechnic, the choice of that time was Mechatronics – which generally deals with automated production. I repeated one semester and by the end of 1994 when I entered the workforce, certain companies have started to move their production lines to Johor, Batam and by the start of 1997 to Suzhou in China. In short, it has become a sunset industry in Singapore, production facilities are moving out of Singapore and unless you are in the management or R&D level, a particularly sought out individual, or you are willing to work overseas, there’s basically not much of a prospect left in this line.

Now, this change didn’t happen rapidly and it took almost a decade. By then everyone I knew have either shifted to doing sales of products for the company they already worked for, or they have changed line entirely. I changed line in 1998 to work for my friend who is dealing primarily with network and computer setup. None of us would have expected this, and I doubt anyone who happens to be giving career guidance would have expected this back then either.

Either way, it is not entirely true that there is no career guidance given. My mei xinyun did a quick search and came up with the following links:

NJC Career Guidance
MoE Guidance Branch: Career and Educational Guidance

Do also note that it wasn’t so long that IT, and then Life Sciences was the in-thing. But with the coming IR, it is now all about Entertainment and Services!

So I must ask, was it ever the responsibility of the Education System to ensure everyone have a successful career? In fact, is it even relevant or necessary to offer career guidance when the nature of Singapore economy changes ever so rapidly? Or are we just finding it convenient to blame someone or some perceived lack when conditions in life don’t go the way we want? How are we to expect our very own Bill Gates or Steve Jobs when we expect everything to be spoon-fed?

Sure, I would really like to blame my current employer too. The wise guys with coats and ties in the Head Office making the decisions thought it would be better to sell the entire firm to a competitor. Ya right… and no one advised me this was coming.

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