Essay (Draft1)

Essay Draft

Singapore is an open and small economy with a Gini coefficient higher than neighboring countries (0.478 as of 2012)*. The issue about income inequality is that it brings much unhappiness and tension towards society and would affect any country politically, economically and socially if not handled well. Also, as reference to the TED video that Godwin mentioned, with globalization, wealth is starting to concentrate on a minority few making the disparity between the high income earners and the low income earners bigger than ever before. Thus, with an increasing income gap between the top income earners and low income earners, social impacts on educational opportunities and social mobility within the society is greater than ever before. The government should not only focus solely on financial aid, more attention should be given to equalizing educational opportunities to keep social mobility up.

However, in Singapore, educational opportunities are not equalized and would benefit the rich who have more connections affecting a child’s chances of being accepted into a school and the child’s performance due to the environment.* For example, in the admission criteria of students into primary schools mostly comes with the efforts of the parent’s contribution to the school. This includes alumni involvement, regular parent volunteering and recommendation from an active community service leader or church organization directly linked from the school. This clearly give the rich more advantage to get their children into better or more popular schools giving them a better head-start into their education journey.

Eligibility	Primary One Registration Phase	Registration Dates
For children who are Singapore Citizens or Singapore Permanent Residents	Phase 1 For a child who has a sibling studying in the primary school of choice	Thursday, 4 July 2013 Friday, 5 July 2013
	Phase 2A(1) (a) For a child whose parent is a former student of the primary school and who has joined the alumni association as a member not later than 30 June 2012. (b) For a child whose parent is a member of the School Advisory / Management Committee Announcement of Results: Thursday, 11 July 2013	Tuesday, 9 July 2013
	Phase 2A(2) (a) For a child whose parent or sibling has studied in the primary school of choice (b) For a child whose parent is a staff member of the primary school of choice Announcement of Results: Thursday, 18 July 2013	Monday, 15 July 2013 Tuesday, 16 July 2013
	Phase 2B (a) For a child whose parent has joined the primary school as a parent volunteer not later than 1 July 2012 and has given at least 40 hours of voluntary service to the school by 30 June 2013 (b) For a child whose parent is a member endorsed by the church/clan directly connected with the primary school (c) For a child whose parent is endorsed as an active community leader Announcement of Results: Friday, 26 July 2013	Monday, 22 July 2013 Tuesday, 23 July 2013
	Phase 2C For all children who are eligible for Primary One in the following year and are not yet registered in a primary school Announcement of Results: Tuesday, 6 August 2013	Tuesday, 30 July 2013 Wednesday, 31 July 2013 Thursday, 1 August 2013
	Phase 2C Supplementary For a child who is not yet registered in a school after Phase 2C Announcement of Results: Tuesday, 20 August 2013	Tuesday, 13 August 2013 Wednesday, 14 August 2013
For children who are not Singapore Citizens or Singapore Permanent Residents1	Phase 3 For a child who is neither a Singapore Citizen nor a Singapore Permanent Resident Announcement of Results: Friday, 30 August 2013	Thursday, 29 August 2013

(Taken from http://www.moe.gov.sg/education/admissions/primary-one-registration/phases/) 

As seen in 2B, the parent has to rely on volunteering their service to the school, religious contacts and connections with community service leaders. Even though this may encourage parents to take part in the child’s education journey and play a more active role in serving the community, this would generally motivate the parents who can afford to spend their time on these activities. Singapore, being one of the most expensive cities in Asia, naturally has a high cost of living. Most low-income families would have both parents working in order to cope with the high cost of living. Thus, the time spent at work will reduce the amount of time to participate such activities.

As we are moving towards a fair society where all schools are good schools, we need to improve on the currents system in place, and give all students a fair and more equal chance regardless of their parents’ socio-economic status.

As of 2014, the government has decided to make the system fairer by reserving 40 seats (split fairly between phase 2B and 2C) for students with no prior connections through the alumni or without a sibling being in the same school. With no criteria attached to these reserved places, this allows a random selection of students with no background limitations. This is a slight improvement from the previous system where no concession was given, and would definitely ensure that there would be 20 places available for balloting giving more opportunities for those who has no connections of such kind. This helps to ensure those popular primary schools with good performance records in the “Primary School Leaving Examination” (PSLE) are not kept within the elites or the rich who is able to secure places through alumni involvement or regular volunteering with the school.

Even though the 40 places may be reserved and prove to be good in assuring a more just way of selection, the rich would still be able to use the balloting criteria or put more commitment into the alumni in order to gain priority to get their children through the system in phase 2B. Also, Phase 2B requires a religion organization endorsement, if the school is connected to a church or clan, puts priority of some religions over others, this goes against Singapore’s main values of equality regardless of race and religion. This should not be the case especially when primary school education is compulsory under Singapore’s laws.*

Hence, I would like to suggest of removing phase 2B completely, doing away with alumni connections or parent volunteering. There are always other measures in order to get parents involved in a child’s education journey, without having to place them as an admission advantage. This would help ensure that all schools will receive a random distribution of students with differing abilities and capabilities helping all schools to increase its dynamics and enriching the school’s culture.

Although this may be tough to implement in the short-run, this should be the goal of Singapore’s education system in the long-run. Giving all students an equal starting point is crucial to ensure that social mobility is up and equally accessed by anyone regardless of their background. Only with fair opportunities, will there be healthy competition in the economy striving for improvement.

[809 words]

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