Originally posted by linchiling:
Got this article from http://singaporemind.blogspot.com/
Anybody knows whether the info in bold is true?
Explaining a discrepancy.....
Mr Gan said 28,000 Singapore students applied to
the universities this year and half of them were offered places. In
contrast, 23,000 foreign students applied and only 987 or 4.3
percent were given places -
Channel News Asia, 18 Jul 2007
international students now make up about 20% of NTUs
undergraduate population and about 33% of its graduate
population
the National University of Singapore (NUS) said about
20% of its 23,900 undergraduates and about 50% of its 9,100
postgraduate students are from overseas
the number of permanent
residencies (PRs) awarded last year rose to 57,300 a 9.6%
increase from 2005 and a 55.3% increase from 2004- Business Times
of 26 May 2007.
The people I spoke to who graduated from NUS & NTU, stared at
me in disbelief when I mentioned these numbers - only 4.3% of the
foreigners who applied got into our universities. They were sure
there are lot more foreign students than the 987 our esteemed
minister said were successful with their applications.
Of course our Minister of State for Eduction Mr. Gan did not lie
when he say only 4.3% of foreign students who applied to our
universities got a place. One plausible explanation is the rest got
into our unversities because they were offered scholarship and
hence did not need to apply for a place in our universities.
As Singapore aspires to be an education hub, we cannot expect top
foreign students to apply to our universities like locals - they
have to be invite to our universities through offers of
scholarship.
I met a lecturer from one of our universities the other day. [b]He
said many foreign students take advantage of a loophole in their
scholarship requiring them to work 3 years in Singapore before
leaving for other countries. They simply claim that they are unable
to find jobs for 6 months and they are allowed to leave - thus
getting a free education at the expense of Singaporeans!!
Wah so smart...no wonder our beloved govt like them so much to give
them free scholarship while Singaporeans like myself struggled
through my university giving tuition on weekends and make ends meet
by taking up bank loans for my fees. I took 5 years to clear my
education debt after I got my 1st class honours from NUS. I guess
my govt was afraid that I wasn't challenged enough.....to this day
I'm still thankful for the challenges they gave me. I guess they
are kind enough to reserve such challenges for Singaporeans while
foreign students are given scholarships and denied the benefit of
shouldering the financial burdens that Singaporeans received.
[/b]
Nice watching all these number crunching from the opposite side
of the fence...
Just a little piece of advise....all official stats and figures
given should not be taken at face value and should be taken with a
little salt...this is what most gahmens do anyway...part and parcel
of politics...massaging numbers so that it reflects favorably the
gahmen....
The sooner you accept this the better it is....we business folks
have a better feel of the real situation on the ground...I always
the the actual figure and multiply it by 2...eg unemployment
rate.
I have always accepted the fact that there are more foreigners in
Sillypore just like how I have been accepted in another
country...its a fact of life and its their policy to increase the
population...whether the locals like it or not...