The Greatest Love of All

I believe that children are our future
Teach them well and let them lead the way
Show them all the beauty they possess inside
Give them a sense of pride to make it easier
Let the children's laughter remind us all how we used to be
- opening lyrics from "Greatest Love of All", Masser/Creed

Hardly anyone disputes the importance of education as a force for economic, social and cultural development. Education is also a driver of social equity by providing opportunities to youths from underprivileged backgrounds. In this one respect, perception and reality are probably aligned. The political cost of spending more on education is likely to be minimal, and as long as marginal utility from such spending is positive, probably easier to justify than ministerial salaries.

But what are the policy objectives underlying education in Singapore? I would like to suggest my three of my own policy objectives, not necessarily in order of importance. First, the educational system should maximise the potential of every child. Second, the system should be capable of assessing that potential, and be able to differentiate on that basis. Third, that the system produces citizens capable of functioning in the real world.

Maximising Potential
This is a truly multidimensional subject. The system must cater to students which are academically strong as well as those who are weak. Streaming is probably a neccessary evil, in some form or another. However, I would argue that the way streaming has been implemented is probably flawed and needs to be improved. (more on this later) Another major flaw in our system is the focus on traditional academic skills, to the detriment with those with potential in alternatives like art or music. (to be fair, this could be a criticism of Singapore society as a whole rather than of the education system, though one begets the other in a vicious cycle)

Assessment and Differentiation
Without a means to measure their levels of achievement, the educational system is doing a vast disservice both to its students, and to itself. This is also important where there is competition for limited spots in the next stage of the ladder. One could argue that the A and O level examinations are increasingly poor differentiators at the top end as getting distinctions become easier (what an oxymoron!). It is also necessary to spot weak students who may require more help and attention, as well as spotting weaknesses in the educational system in general.

I would like to note that examinations, which are the traditional way of accomplishing this in Singapore, are continually being replaced by components with greater "continual assessment" and non-academic indicators. However, this introduces subjectivity into the equation.

Real World Relevance
I remember taking two years of Technical Studies as a secondary school student (which pretty much dates me). Is that more useful than learning about soil erosion and how oxbow lakes form? It is easier to engage a student when something is interesting and hands on. However, many things that seem boring in school are actually very useful in real life. Or may be necessary as a foundation so one can get to the interesting stuff. So, I'm not sure how curriculum reform should proceed. Fortunately, I think that this has little impact on the key subject of this post, which is:

Streaming
One way to achieve all three objectives is to segregate students on the basis of ability. In theory, this allows students to find their own level, where the weaker students can get more help without holding the fast ones back. It also allows the curriculum to be tailored to each segment rather than forcing a million different feet into the same size shoe.

But I think streaming, at least in practice, has become more of a burden and stigma. Can late bloomers flourish under this system? Do students in a "weaker" stream suffer from second-order effects that stunt their future growth (i.e. does streaming have a causal effect on rather than correlation with performance)? I believe that within most people, there is a potential to find something that they are good at, and with the right amount of self-pride and determination, this can be developed to both the individual and society's benefit. What the current system does may be to erode that self-pride (granted, part of the blame lies with society)

How do we know streaming is necessary? As an extreme case, let's examine college math. In many of the very good colleges, two introductory courses in multivariate calculus are available. One is usually meant for "general consumption" which means that it provides working knowledge for economics or engineering majors. The other, honours calculus, is meant for math or physics majors who actually need to understand the subject. Of course, honours calculus is more difficult.

What happens is that at the first lecture, a lot of people attend the honours calculus class. By the end of two weeks, only a few remain. This is voluntary streaming in its purest form. This frees the professor from having to explain each equation to the village idiot, and allows the econ major who only wants to learn Lagrange coefficients to avoid matrix algebra. Voila! now take this principle and extend it to primary school kids. Not so simple, is it now? In schools, unlike in a top college, the wastage of resources probably makes such a Darwinistic approach infeasible.

I Have No Answers
I've noted multiple times that many of the problems with the system may actually stem from societal pressures, parental expectations et al and can't be resolved independently from within the educational system. However, I have a couple of suggestions.

For one, I think that schools should instil a greater sense of self-pride in students. When you believe, the results are far greater. I remember that I got 35/50 for my first math test in Primary Four (which is quite a poor score, don't you think?) My teacher told me that I could (and should) do better. (And I did) We should find ways to give students this self-belief and instil in them a sense of purpose. Part of it is convincing people that opportunities are still available for them to succeed no matter where they are on the totem pole.

Second, should the resources allow it, we should provide for more scope for students to fail. Schools have little spare capacity, making it difficult to recreate the "try it out for a few weeks to see if you can tahan" scenario I have above. The requirement to follow a national curriculum make such experiments costly. But if I was a policy-maker, I would love to think about how to introduce this into the system without pissing the parents off. (parents usually think that their kids are above average, though 50% of them are wrong in that regard)

Does that sound paradoxical? You want pride, but you also want failure? Time for my Chinese saying of the day: 真金不怕火炼 (loosely translated as the true metal is not afraid of the fire). The secret is to achieve the right blend. I find our current system too unforgiving of academic weakness (esp at a young age). Perhaps if students had greater opportunity to find their own level rather than it being foisted upon them by their parents or the system, Singaporean society would be better off for it.