Pros of Education in Singapore

I want to follow up on Tony's post regarding educational opportunities in Singapore by listing some pros and cons, based on my own experience studying there. I'll be speaking on education at the O and A levels (equivalent to our SPM and STPM) since that's the extent of my exposure to the Singapore education system. I studied in Raffles Institution for my O levels and in Raffles Junior College for my A levels under the ASEAN scholarship program. Tony was my senior by 4 years under the same scholarship program but unfortunately, our paths didn't cross.

I'll start with the pros in this posting and then move on to the cons in my next posting.

Pro 1: Education system entirely in English

Except for your second language (Chinese, Malay, Tamil or if you're daring enough, French, German or Spanish), the education system in Singapore is entirely in English. This provides an excellent opportunity to prepare oneself for an overseas undergraduate education. I thought that my English was pretty decent (by Malaysian standards) before I went to Singapore. But I soon discovered that my writing and reading skills left much to be desired. I found that the standard of English at the secondary school level was surprisingly high. I guess that a large part of this was because of the substandard level of English being taught in Malaysian schools. Many of my ASEAN scholar friends from Chinese schools in Malaysia struggled mightily especially for English and English Literature. I would like to think that my English improved substantially after my Singapore stint although I'm still prone to errors (like 'irregardless'). I don't want to think about how bad it would be if I hadn't go to Singapore.

It wasn't just having to learn the entire syllabus in English but also being forced to read novels such as 'To Kill A Mockingbird' or Shakespeare. I would never have picked up such books had I stayed in Malaysia. My Singapore experience evoked an interest in reading literature beyond Enid Blyton, Sidney Sheldon and Jeffrey Archer.

I was also inspired to order a subscription to the Economist when I was taking an 'S' paper in Economics during my A levels. I've been an avid reader of the Economist for the past 15 years. Again, I don't think that I would have had that kind of motivation had I stayed on in Malaysia.

Pro 2: Excellent facilities

When I first entered Raffles Institution, I thought that I had mistakenly gone to a country club. I studied in La Salle PJ, supposedly one of the better schools in PJ in terms of infrastructure, but RI and LSPJ were worlds apart. RI had just moved to new grounds which included a synthetic track, air-conditioned lecture theatres and clean toilets! Since my departure from RI some 13 years ago, they've added a new hostel, a synthetic hockey pitch, a swimming pool, a second library, 2 basketball courts and they've recently announced a $36 million (Sing dollar) facelift.

The other thing that I found amazing was the level of maintenance in RI. Toilets in Malaysian schools are notorious for being dirty, wet and smelly. Toilets in RI were fantastically clean and seemed never to run out of toilet paper. And it wasn't as if there were an army of cleaners maintaining the place. Perhaps, the propensity to destroy school property wasn't at the same level as that found in Malaysia.

The excellent facilities and amenities can be found in all of the top schools in Singapore (and there are quite a few). Almost all the top schools in Singapore have moved into new buildings in the past 5 to 15 years. ACS, SCGS, RGS, CHS, TKGS are some of the secondary schools which have new buildings. Raffles Junior College recently moved to Bishan, to be located alongside RI. NJC and Hwa Chong Junior College had new buildings in my final years in Singapore. There are literally hundreds of secondary schools which have facilities and amenities that few schools in Malaysia can aspire to. The only schools in Malaysia which have comparable facilities are private schools - Garden International or ISKL.

Pro 3: High level of competition

I went from being a top 10 student in my whole form in LSPJ to the middle of the pack in my class in RI. My class was half Malaysian, half Singaporean. All the Malaysians were ASEAN scholars, supposedly the best brains picked from Malaysia. And because classes were streamed, the Singaporeans in my class were supposed to be among the best students (in the Express stream) in that cohort.

It was a bit of a culture shock to go from being one of the top dogs (academically speaking) to being one of the chasers in the pack. It was a humbling experience indeed but one that was necessary. I have never been as intimidated as I was in that class in RI and I have never since been as intimated in subsequent academic settings including at LSE, Cambridge and now at Duke.

The level of competition continued to be high in Raffles Junior College, where I did my A levels. To put things in perspective, I took 4 A level subjects and 1 S level subject and got A's in all of them plus another A in GP (General Paper) giving me a total of 6As. I was placed at around 100 out of a class of approximately 800 students. The top scorer in my cohort had 9 As - 4 A level papers, 3 S level papers and GP and 2nd language. 50% of my cohort had 3As or more. By comparison, most students in Malaysian A level institutions would be content with taking 3 A level papers. I probably would have placed in the top 5 or 10 in an A level program like Sunway or Taylors.

In a competitive setting like the one in Singapore, you really have to work your butt off to even be on sparring terms with the best. In Malaysia, one would be pretty happy to end up in Cambridge or Oxford but in RJ, you stood out only if you got into the top schools in the US - Harvard, MIT, Caltech, Princeton, Yale, Stanford (By comparison, Duke is relatively easy to get into). I have said before and I will continue to say, if you can make it through the competitive pressures in a top school in Singapore, you will be able to excel in any of the top universities in the world. I'm not sure if I can say the same about Malaysian schools.

I'm not 'dissing' those who have excelled within the context of Malaysian schools. I think that there are many, many students who have gone through SPM and STPM who are world class brains and have gone on to some of the top universities in the world and done well there. But personally, I think I would have gotten less out of the system had I stayed on in Malaysia instead of going to Singapore. There are, of course, shortcomings in the Singapore system, which I will discuss in my next posting, but given a choice on whether to repeat the experience or not, I would choose to go to RI for my O levels and RJ for my A levels, in a heartbeat.

(I've left out, for the sake of brevity, other pros such as better trained teachers, a more flexible and expansive curriculum, a better support system to apply for top universities overseas, just to name a few)