Not Another Brick in the Wall
Based on unconfirmed sources, the recent O'levels and A'levels
results again throw no surprises, the top performers are all from
the pedigree schools, the Raffles, the Chinese Highs, the Nanayangs
etc etc. Amidst all these top peforming students, there was one
lone stand-out, a girl from Bukit Panjang Sec Sch who aced all her
O'level subjects; no mean feat at all.
I have no problems with top schools in Singapore, they have a
certain type of students, they churn out one faceless student after
another with the consent of their parents. They can choke the
talent in their hands and mould them into the technocratic clones
which will get a PSC scholarship and end up in a GLC, stat board or
the civil service. Those elite students that eventually break down
and become disillusioned with this deterministic process, end up
flying the coop, migrating to other more fashionable capitals of
the world like London, NYC or SF, and live a bohemian lifestyle.
Who cares? This process is replicated throughout the world, there
will be always be schools which are the mirrors of the ruling
ideological regime, co-opting the talented and the privileged into
the process of maintaining the existing power structure in
society.
Its the other side of the spectrum that begs the attention. Whereas
there are schools in other countries which are specifically
tailor-made to turn a wayward child's life into something
meaningful, in Sg this is a most sparing commodity. The closest I
can think of are the polytechnics which take in the underachievers
from O'levels and turn them into the dynamic businessmen or
entrepreneurs which our gahment is so desperately craving for. In
the US, there is an academy known as El Puente which takes in the
most dire of students from the inner city of NYC and cultivates a
learning programme for each student which works on their strengths
rather than forcing them into an educational straitjacket. Such a
school relies on a dedicated bunch of Real teachers and Real
educators. Many such examples can be found, except in Sg. The
problem of our "elite" students is that when they are
disillusioned, they just migrate their talent (which has been
drummed into their psyche by our top schools) into another society,
another economy. For under-achieving students who are disillusioned
every day as their futures are pigeon-holed into our rigid
education system, a route out of this bleakness creates a fierce
sense of loyalty tempered by a much needed understanding of the
reality of the world. These latter types are the ones who can lead
Sg in the new world. They were never in the box in the first place
so there is no need for them to think out of the box. They have a
natural talent for this.
Where is this route out for the under-achievers in Singapore? Who
can lead an institutional breakthrough for the
under-achievers?
Lau Ah Pek
15.3.2004
