I rather agree that scholarships can't buy loyalty, but i don't
think loyalty's the objective here, i believe familiarity is what
they hope to accomplish.
By offering the scholarships, the well performing foreign
students come here to study and if they really are good they
can get a job here. By getting them to study here, they might grow
to be familar with the lifestyle and chose to stay. After all, as
human beings we tend to prefer to stick with the familar once we've
grown used to it.
What they offer, is their minds that would entice the
higher end corporations to stay.
If such scholarships are not offered, these foreign students
wouldn't even come here in the first place. I don't think it would
be possible we can expect all our talents to be homegrown.
I'm not advocating my view is the correct one, but merely
presenting my analysis of the other side of the coin.
that is very naive. there is this springboard culture among the
young immigrants.
once they got established enough, they will try to seek
immigration to a even better paying country.
its the same when singaporean go overseas for work and studies.
if they can leave everything behind in singapore, they can do it
again anywhere, and be literally global citizens, where citizenship
is just a meaningless piece of paper.
you think gong li really want to become a singaporean because
singapore is an attractive country to her? in fact, how often
did you see her around in singapore. most of the time, she's living
in china or at LA, hollywood.
she pick up singapore citizenship cos its cheap and convenient.
as long as you don't stay in singapore, you don't have to pay tax,
and a singapore passport is more convenient when travelling
compared to a chinese or american passport.
likewise, how many scholars want to really stay and contribute
to singapore, by becoming a loyal singaporean? too few.
the ministers speak of them creating employment. but i only see
they taking employment from locals, instead of creating jobs for
locals. if you want to create employment, it would be better to
invite entrepreneurs and investors over to singapore, than to offer
jobs and scholarships to foreigners. The gahmen's immigration logic
is warped.
we don't need to offer scholarships to attract foreign
talents.
if they are truly talented, they would have seek out
singapore as a place of business opportunities, and come to
singapore on their own. look at china and india now, people
are fighting to enter these markets, and the government plays
only a minimal role in attracting investment. by
not trying intentionally to bring in foreign talent, only
the truly capable and commited will come knocking on the doors
of singapores.
we do not need to lower ourselves to the role of
beggars, prostrating and begging these so-called
"talents" to come to singapore, enticing them with our hard
earned cash.
even if we r to offer scholarship to foreigners, it would be
better for the universities and educational institutions themselves
to award the scholarships, not the government.
have you seen any singaporean on a british or american
government scholarship? no. even the smartest singaporean scholar
can only hope of getting a university scholarship (excluding
corporate scholarships), i don't see why our government should be
so "special" to award scholarships to foreigners.