Excerpts from The Kent Ridge Common:
SINGAPORE - When Fareed Zakaria of Newsweek interviewed our then education minister Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam, the latter made a tacit admission that the Singapore system has not been effective in producing world-beaters.
One puzzling fact was that Singapore churns out only few truly top-ranked scientists, entrepreneurs, inventors, business executives or academics despite being number 1 in the global math and science rankings for school children. It doesn’t come as a surprise that our students perform well in standardized tests since we have always been known to produce exam-smart students. It wouldn’t be that difficult for the latter to score top marks in their math and science exams.
Thus, Mr Shanmugaratnam had to concede that the Singapore system is an exam meritocracy, whilst the American one is a talent meritocracy, which saw the latter producing world-beaters in abundance. During the PAP Policy Forum at the beginning of 2006, he suggested a revamp of our education system that will see it move from an exam meritocracy towards a talent meritocracy.
Yet, this so-called exam meritocracy still remains the platform for the segregation of future “elites”, the wheat, from the chaff, us ordinary joes.
Read the rest of the article in The Kent Ridge Common.
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Singapore’s educational system works under the chinese philosophy that it is nature that determines how good you are.
All of us have a certain CEP, or career ending point, and it is the objective of the education system to discover who are the ones with the highest CEP.
Thus, once we identify them, we give them scholarships. By definition, these people will have the highest CEP, and will succeed in whatever they do later.
This is similar to the wuxia theme, that everyone has a certain level of internal strength and, the hero of each novel, regardless on whether they are Guojing, Yang Guo or Zhang Wuji, must, by definition, have the highest level of internal strength, and hence will be the most successful.
elite : “a group or class of persons enjoying superior intellectual or social or economic status”
From the above, I do not see that to be an elite, you have to be kind, compassionate, caring, fair, unbiased, transparent, selflessness (opposite of greedy).
correct me if i the long. pardon me singlish.
“Thus, Mr Shanmugaratnam had to concede that the Singapore system is an exam meritocracy, whilst the American one is a talent meritocracy, which saw the latter producing world-beaters in abundance.”
And what is the difference between our country and America ?
And what is the difference between exam meritocracy and talent meritocracy.
It makes me think of ten-year series. No wonder we need foreign talents.
“Singapore system is an exam meritocracy, whilst the American one is a talent meritocracy”
What is the difference between Singapore & America.
What is the difference between exam meritocracy & talent meritocracy.
It makes me think of ten-year series.
The performance and behaviour of our Ministers and MPs viewed as elites, reveals the PAP system is a failure despite claims of stringent selection.
The idea of CEP is a sound strategy but the execution is way off the mark.
Just looking at the nitwits who can slip through and actually rise to the apex
says it all ! The system gets better because now we have nitwits at the apex selecting more nitwits to join the system.
It does not take much imagination to see that the country’s problems discussed and debated on TOC and other websites have been self-inflicted.
I think both exam meritocracy and talent meritocracy have their pluses and minuses. Neither works all the time. But my main misgiving about any form of meritocracy is that it neglects the “moral” dimension. Without the moral dimension, exam or talent meritocrats will exploit the situation greatly and immorally in favour of themselves, as seen in the cases of US banks and some of our local elites. LKY talks about the character and integrity of the people PAP have chosen, but I see little evidence to support his assertion.
Singapore’s exam meritocracy has produced someone who can lose billions of dollars and need not pay back a single cent. You should know who.
In a nutshell, the PAP system selects scholastic nitwits. That is why Singapore can never be as great America. Even our brightest of scholars want to remain in America and die-die break their bonds. LKY and his underlings’ sycophantic behaviour towards America is an obvious indication that Singapore is just tiny red dot with no bite!
I just want to point out that being an elite and practising elitism are 2 completely different issues. Just as there is a difference between a pragmatist and practising pragmatism. They are not the same thing. Elite and pragmatist are merely classification to describe a group of people whereas elitism and pragmatism are political philosophies that people may subscribe to.
Just to point out too that CEP in Civil Service-speak stands for “Current Estimated Potential”, not career end point.
One’s CEP can change over the course of your career. For good performers, it should usually go up. Of course, for scholars and Admin Service officers, it is often artificially high.
Gerald is such a talent, he should apply to serve in gov.
Let’s put it this way, if we really had an elite, would they need to call themselves elite? I refer you to the little girl who told the world to, “Get out of my uncaring ELITE face.”