TR EMERITUS

MOE Singapore’s education system is a joke. It only looks good on paper. Many of us who are or were in the system know better than those international panelists. When I was still a teacher, I was often too busy with my CCA, swimming, to effectively help my academically weaker students. Even if I wanted to, I was really too busy with all my non-teaching duties. As a former CCA teacher, I would have 8 hours of free time to coach students in swimming, to give them pep talk and motivate them for competition. But when it came to helping my weaker students pass their exams, I didn’t even have more than 1 hour free each week. Anything more than that 1 hour, the time would be given most grudgingly, that it took me away from my other official duties. So, an academically weak swimmer would be given 8 hours a week, sometimes a lot more time closer to competitions, to train to help the school win glory. But if the same swimmer needed help with his Chemistry or Additional Math, the school has little time to help him. He has to ‘manage’ his time better and solve his own problem. Many students today need tuition because the subjects are poorly taught in school. The teacher has too many non-teaching duties. Class sizes are too big, and often in neighourhood schools, teachers have to waste time on classroom management issues. School priorities are also wrong. Schools often force students to spend 6 hours a week on CCA, often double that time closer to sports competition and concert. On the other hand, schools spend far less time helping academically weaker students, and often take the easy way out by pressuring the student to drop the subject instead. I now tutor students in Math and English, many of whom are academically weak. I usually need no more than 1 hour to get students to understand core concepts in key exam chapters. What amazes me every time is that if their own school teacher had been willing to sit down 1 hour with that same student, that student wouldn’t be needing tuition. But I understand the teacher’s difficulties because I was once in such a position. But I always make it clear to the students; they are seeking tuition because the subject is poorly taught in school. Some of my friends are worried for me that I keep telling people schools are teaching badly. They fear that the schools will get the message and buck up, and tutors will lose their jobs. But I tell my friends I am not worried. The schools will continue to teach students poorly because their priority now is no longer on good quality teaching. School leaders and teachers have too much vested interests to steer the education system back to good teaching. I have seen it in the 4 different schools I taught at when I was still with MOE, and judging from my tuition students, nothing much has changed. Schools have plenty of time for training and rehearsals to win competitions, but have little time to spare to coach weak students to ensure they don’t drop the subject. Ex-teacher * Comment appeared in: Singapore’s education conundrum  Read More →

Let us look at the meaning of mercenary: Source: @exiledsurfer A mercenary is a person who takes part in an armed conflict, who is not a national or a party to the conflict and is "motivated to take part in the hostilities by the desire for private gain." or to be precised “Soldier  of Fortune”. Governments employ mercenaries as they begin to lose the support of their own people. During Gadhafi's last days, he hired former soldiers from Yugoslavia, Mali and other African nations to shore up his support to fight against his own citizens but in the end he lost the battle. Every good thing must one day come to an end. The PAP know they are facing a losing battle: people have lost faith in them, people are just fed up with ever higher cost of living and the government just could not care less, instead paying themselves the world's highest salaries. In every election their support dwindles. Their only recourse, as with any other government losing control, is bringing in “soldiers of fortune”. Of course they do not use guns, they use different tactics; opening the floodgates to impoverished nations, giving easy access to our universities even with their schools' questionable standards. Questionable and fake degrees are given easy access to our job market. They speed up the citizenship of these new EPs and SPs in the hope they will vote for the PAP. Community centers encourage the new citizens to join the RC - WAH LAH!!!, they too have their mercenaries. Readers, this is done with a purpose, nothing but to shore up support for the ruling party. My former Burmese tenant with questionable qualifications was allowed to have easy access to Singapore universities, after 5 years, he is now a Singapore citizen; he is also now an RC member. The government sponsors foreign students with our taxpayers' money, this being one way of getting their support when the election is held. In the last Punggol by-election, we saw many Filipino RC members in full force supporting the PAP but at the end of the day, they lost; not enough new citizens to shore up the winning numbers. This time around they are battle-ready, with half a million new citizens, they are confident of winning this time around. They are in government not to serve the people but to serve themselves and their closest supporters. Will it backfire one day? Without our taxpayers' money would Singtel be what it is today? Yet we pay the highest World Cup fees; is this how they repay us? Not only SingTel, for transport and housing they use our taxpayers' money yet we pay premium prices. It is our money that funds all these corporations. We have seen old folks cleaning tables and collecting old boxes and cardboard. There are people who have no food on their table and yet our politicians are being paid the most. Readers, they are not here to serve us, they are at war with us - they treat us as their enemies. There are already casualties of this war, practically every day we hear of our fellow Singaporeans being displaced by these mercenaries. We have seen civil wars in Syria and how the government used mercenaries for their war efforts. We do not need to go there to observe, the war is here now, the government is battling its own citizens, that is why there is practically negligible social salvation by the government; they do not care as they treat us as their enemies. We have mercenaries in sports who are paid vast sums to win trophies in major competitions. They have practically no shame. Our government is becoming the world's laughing stock. Every second, every minute, every hour, they are plotting against us. Their tools of war - community centers, National Service - where one is being molded, taught to be subjugated like an obedience school for dogs- local media, playing propaganda messages and last but not least, now the MERCENARIES. They are not interested in Singaporeans' benefit but only in their own benefits - their families' and their close supporters. They do not know the meaning of being a true government. aziz kassim * Submitted by TRE reader.  Read More →

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong was spot-on in saying that our small country cannot ease up on its curbs on foreign worker inflow, as that would put a strain on our limited infrastructure in critical areas such as housing, transport, health care and security ("S'pore can't ease up on foreign worker limits, says PM Lee"; last Thursday). However, this message must permeate all the planning and development policies across ministries and government agencies, to ensure congruency with the desired goal - to reduce dependency on foreign manpower. Currently, it seems that government bodies are still set on pursuing growth and expansion, despite the limits on foreign manpower and the acute shortage of local talent, while businesses are expected to face these realities. Given that organisations have to continually review their business models and processes to stay relevant in this high-tech era, government bodies should work with other agencies and tripartite partners to ensure that economic growth is achieved in tandem with the availability of talent, both local and foreign. We cannot expect to build more homes, hospitals, hotels, shopping malls and other amenities, or attract foreign investments in the manufacturing or service sectors, without a comprehensive analysis of the manpower necessary to provide and sustain such services or investments. There are already signs that the manpower crunch is having an undesirable effect on employees' health, safety and morale, and on the lives of people who require their services. Can we afford to wait for a major labour crisis before measures are taken? Brenton Ong * Letter first appeared in ST Forum (13 May).  Read More →