Template : Tuesday, March 6, 2012 ? 0 Atashinchi ?
Long time no post haha. I'm afraid I've been rather lazy ever since I came back from China. There were many things that I wanted to post about but I never really got round to doing it. :/This morning when I was going to work I was reflecting about getting back As results. I've been thinking about it quite a bit - not regarding my own results, which met my expectations very nicely - but rather about the direction that our education in Raffles has taken us.
Over the weekend I read in the news that many Chinese schools are interested in learning from the Raffles experience. And for good reason. Our school has many accolades to its name: Top School in A levels (i think), Best Sports School, Top Feeder School to Ivy Leagues/Cambridge/Oxford, Highest representation in PSC scholarships/NUS medicine/law courses, etc. Countless dazzling titles continuously push up our self-esteem. Indeed, pride is at the core of the Rafflesian Spirit.
But surely, it is not possible for everyone to stand at the pinnacle, not even in RJ. Last friday I felt it especially keenly. The slides flashed in the MPH boasted impressive statistics - record A rates, monopoly over the titles of top student - there was an air of pride and festivity despite all that tension. Yet no matter how high the percentages went, there was bound to be a minority who didn't do as well as the rest of the school. And while those who received the grades that they wanted celebrated in glee, who was there to comfort and support those who didn't?
I half expected the principal to end her speech with a word of encouragement for those who might not have scored as well as the others, but no. The only message sent across was one of excellence and perfection. Then I recalled my many years of education in Raffles, what featured prominently was the celebration of merit and victory; I only had vague memories of lessons on failure. I still remember the story of the RI student who jumped off the top floor of the school building after receiving A levels results many years ago. And then I feel afraid. We've been so little exposed to failure, that I really don't know how we will fare in the event of a crisis.
Sometimes I wonder, is Singapore like that too? Always striving too be first; obsessed with the Gold Standard. But no one can stay at the top forever. What do we do if one day we fall? This is inevitable in a meritocratic society, some may say, but shouldn't the pursuit of excellence be accompanied with a lesson on mindset? In Chinese there is a phrase: "胜不骄 败不馁", meaning not to become arrogant because of success, as well as not to be discouraged by failure. Raffles students are often accused of elitism. I wonder how far that is true. Although I try very hard to keep an open and objective mindset, I realised that whenever I meet new people I will subconsciously compare myself to them. It was an appalling discovery, and I can only hope that the spirit of competition will aid me and not hinder me in life.
I've been fortunate so far, as I have yet to experience any significant failure. While I know that having (ok-ly) good grades and a smattering of random achievements does not make me a better person than anyone else, I cannot help but feel that the tendency to judge people based on such criteria has already become intrinsic in me. And then I wonder how many others feel the same way as I do, or worse, do not even realise that they have such a mindset.
It may sound comical that I am mourning a lack of failure in my life, but as I venture further and further into the real world, I am becoming increasingly aware of the importance of resilience. I read in the papers about the Minister of Education's meeting with some Committee of Supply (whatever that is), one of the issues to be discussed being the reformation of the Character and Leadership Programme. I really hope that these discussions will lead to real policies being implemented, and that future CLE lessons will actually contribute to building students' characters, rather than forcing them to write mundane reflections (just to fulfil the RD requirement), or worse, be absorbed into English/Math/Science classes just like half of the fun classes in primary school were.
[insert a wholly irrelevant song]
