The metaphor of the market and its impact on education
Past decades have seen increasing attempts in various parts of the world to restructure and deregulate state schooling. Central to these are initiatives to dismantle centralized educational bureaucracies and create in their place devolved systems of education entailing significant degrees of institutional autonomy. Such policies often introduce a “market” element into the provision of educational services even though educational institutions have continued to be paid largely out of taxes. Market metaphors in important speeches of Singapore’s leaders reveal that they, too, adhere to theses policies- that to survive and prosper, Singapore institutions, including education, must make themselves relevant to the world, producing goods and services which are in demand by the international community. 

The metaphor of the marketplace is evident in the use of words, such as  “competition”, “choice”, “adversity”, “accountability” and “consumer responsiveness”, which have crept into the discourse of education in the last decade, In Singapore, marketization came in the 1990’s with schools being given more autonomy, e.g., for the first time, government school principals were allowed to appoint staff, devise school curricula and choose textbooks, as a means of making each school more “distinctive”. At the National Day Rally of 1992, PM Goh reiterated that competition among schools was a good thing because it would provide parents and students with a wider range of “choice”. It would also improve “accountability” by forcing schools to improve their programmes (Goh, 1993, p. 31).  “Products” of these schools would become the leaders of tomorrow.  Subsequently, in the hunt for new members of parliament, PM Goh announced that:  

   The new candidates CEP (current estimated potential) should be based on High IQ and EQ, an understanding of economic imperatives, the ability to sell and get the ground to buy into policies.26

In a commentary on political renewal on the same occasion, a newspaper editorial bemoans, without any apparent tongue-in- cheek, the lack of a “product champion for Singapore Incorporated.”27 The real aim of education according to Viswa Sadasivan, Chairman of the Feedback Unit on Political Matters, is for the citizenry to go into “productionist roles” and when they grow up, they should “Go global, mint money and attract foreign investment.”28

Since then, the market metaphor has become widespread especially where the education “industry” is concerned. Education is now expected to service the national and international market economy. In his speech at the 1998 World Economic Forum, Rear-Admiral Teo Chee Hean (Radm Teo), Minister for Education and 2nd Minister for Defence spoke of the necessity to “exploit talents” for “the creation of wealth”.  Quoting from the World Bank, he reminded his audience that “human capital accounted for an average 64% of the productive wealth of a country - substantially more than the physical capital and natural resources combined.” Knowledge is to be regarded as an investment which “pays off” for individuals in a job, for industry in a trained labor force, and for the nation in economic growth.29 In another talk on education and the “new economy”, Rear Adm. Teo welcomed suggestions to organize “corporate internship” and “overseas attachment”. He indicated his desire to see more “interdisciplinary projects”, to learn “problem solving”, “communication skills” and “how to work in teams.”30

Currently, there is a nation-wide drive to introduce the competitive edge of commercialism into education. This is perceived as a good way of insuring the relevancy of the education system to the job market. After all, a commercial firm which failed to satisfy its customers would lose them to its competitors. By putting the competitive pressure on the state educational organization, there would hopefully be increased efficiency, more choice and diversity, improved standards and quality, accountability and responsiveness.

Streaming and ranking are also important “tools” in a  “talent search”.31  Radm Teo’s speech during the fiscal year 2001 Supply Debate shows a facile use of business terminology such as “customisation”,  “wastage” and “partnership”: 

As a system, streaming is better than requiring every student to fit into only one prescribed programme of study.  Indeed, the more customised education becomes, the more streams will emerge. Through streaming and giving those who need it, a lighter curriculum or more time, we have reduced educational wastage …The facilitation of partnership between schools, parent and the wider community is essential in helping children grow.32

On the issue of ranking, the Minister of Education often speaks from the viewpoint of a manager focussed on achieving results:

This (ranking) is something which is useful as a management tool for the school themselves, and for the education system as a whole. People need to know how they are performing, where they stand, otherwise it is very difficult to make improvements.  One very useful aspect of ranking is the value-added component, which tracks how much a student has improved since he joined that school.  It has forced schools to give much more emphasis in trying to do their best for even weaker students to make sure everyone improves.33

Similarly, a typical dialogue between a Parliamentary Secretary and school principal might include the following references to the market metaphor. In this particular case, the Parliamentary Secretary commented that a certain school had “slipped in the annual ranking of schools and become second-rate.”  In the subsequent interview with the press, the aforesaid principal reassured the public: “We are here to do our job and that means being accountable to our pupils…adding value to every subject and instilling a sense of pride in the students.”34

Schools are now encouraged to partner with private companies and are increasingly conscious of seeing themselves as “brands”, and an increasing number are undertaking marketing and promotional activities “to woo pupils”, something which they have never used to do.35 Several schools have used promotional strategies, such as advertising on the Internet, distributing brochures and making promotional visits overseas. The following headlines from the leading English daily, the Straits Times, show how schools have courted the media to create a “brand” for themselves:

            RI sets up X Labs on nascent technologies (Straits Times, 23. 4. 2000:34)36
            Silicon Valley spotlight for Chinese High boys (Straits Times, 2. 5. 2000: 37)
            Crescent Girls moves at Web Speed (Straits Times, 3. 5. 2000:10)
            River Valley aims for the Sciences (Straits Times, 14. 2. 2000: 58)
            Every staff counts in Xinmin (Straits Times, 1.2. 2000: 35)
            RICE staple IT diet for Rosyth School (Straits Times, 26. 2.2000: 48)37
            Outram Secondary’s link up with IBM (Straits Times, 23.3.2000:43)

   In newspapers, one also finds articles for the general public entitled “How to Market Your School” with subheadings such as “Smash Your Opponent”, “Act like a Salesman”, “Be like Robinson’s” (a successful departmental store in Singapore).38 In the past decade, therefore, education has been increasingly perceived as a marketable commodity in Singapore, with pupils as “clients”, teachers as “workers”, and accountability measured in terms of the ranking of schools.    

Language education in Singapore
While the metaphors of statehood have underscored the importance of preparing students to survive (especially in times of crisis), to find gainful employment and contribute to economic prosperity, the Ministry of Education in Singapore, similar to many other Ministries in the world,  has always affirmed that the mission of the school is “to engage a child’s curiosity so that he or she develops a love for learning.”39 Indeed, according to PM Goh:

Fundamentally, education is about nurturing the whole person, his moral, cognitive, physical, social and aesthetic development.40

similarly, Rear Admiral Teo, Minister of Education, has asserted that the objective of education is “to develop in them (the students) the desired values and instincts that will make them responsible citizens.41As a result, the education curriculum places a strong emphasis on the learning of social and moral values. Its overall goal is education for social harmony and cooperative living. It stresses Asian values e.g. hard work, thrift, honesty; self-discipline, family stability, respect and courtesy towards elders.

Approved by the Ministry of Education for use in both primary and secondary schools, textbooks issued under the new Singapore English language syllabus 2001are illustrative. A review of these texts, currently used by all students in Singapore, indicates that they contribute to education for social harmony and cooperative living by promoting the acquisition of moral values and collaboration skills. Highlights of the review follow with examples selected from the various textbooks. For ease of reference I shall refer to them through their codes i.e., PT1, PT2, PT3, PT4 (for primary language textbooks) and ST1, ST2, ST3, ST4 (for secondary language textbooks).42

   I chose to review the textbooks used in the language curriculum since language learning (English and the mother tongue) has been a significant and important component of the school curriculum since 1988 and takes up more than a third of curriculum time in the primary schools and a quarter of the curriculum time in the secondary schools. Moreover, of all subjects taught in the educational system, language teaching can be said to stand out because the subject-matter content of language classes is not fixed – any subject can be the medium through which language is learned. Because of this rather unique feature, the language classroom becomes an important arena for communicating and conveying values, attitudes, and standards in an indirect and very effective fashion and, therefore, holds immense promise for socializing students for cooperation and social harmony (Jacobs and Cates, 1999). The review is also based on the premise that textbooks are not neutral. Rather, they are often radically selective. As a result, they, too, provide ideological spectacles through which we see the world and so can influence the way learners come to perceive and interact with their social context.

Moral values
Moral values are taught through themes which organize the content of the language texts. There are approximately twelve themes for each year of language teaching and each theme usually takes up about fifteen hours of instructional time. “Respect for Animals”, “Courtesy and Kindness”, “People of other Cultures” and “Religious Festivals” are examples. Values are usually illustrated through stories with a moral. In PT2 and PT4, for example, fables and fairy tales teach kindness, generosity and loyalty. Stories and poems in secondary textbooks, i.e. ST1, ST3 and ST4, enable the authors to focus on the importance of compassion, tolerance, and sympathy. Comprehension questions based on individual readings may also be used to highlight what is salient, such as the ill effects of greed, jealousy and ruthless ambition (ST3).

The family as a theme for teaching values predominates in both sets of textbooks.  The model of the state, after all, is said to be the “happy family”, and there is a widespread belief that no efforts should be spared to preserve the family unit and to keep it strong, cohesive and supportive of its members (CDIS, 1985). Therefore on both levels, the texts (PT1, PT2, ST3, ST4) include legends and allegories involving the extended family so as to teach values of respect and gratitude to people in authority as well as the aged. PT3’s unit on “Animal Families” begins: “Animal families are just like our families. There is always someone who takes care of the children…” (1B pp. 20-28). Language learning activities included in PT 1 ask students to write about “How my grandmother takes care of me” (2A, 54-55) or to write a “Thank you note to mothers” (2a p. 70-1), thus stressing the importance of caring.

According to the Constitution of the State Advisory Council on the Aged (1988), “Filial piety is the cornerstone of the family. It is also the foundation on which a nation is built.” The textbooks reflect this view, and filial piety is cultivated by a careful inclusion of the contributions of the aged to the society. Reading passages, such as “The Story of the Magic Pot” (PT2, 2A, 42-3), gives dominant roles to the aged. Grandparents play the role of storytellers. In PT2 (2A, 44-45), for instance, the grandfather tells the story of the mean old ogre. In addition, the aged are able to tell their stories of how Singapore was like in the past (usually much poorer and less orderly), how they always helped their parents and their siblings, and how people (including themselves) worked and played. PT2 also contains listening, writing, and speaking activities which have students imagine what it was like in their grandfather’s time (2A p. 85). As noted above, the figures of grandparents are used to teach caring, obedience, respect and other values which promotes unity in the family and society. Thus, through the promotion of these Asian family values, cohesiveness and support among family members is encouraged, and social harmony can be maintained.

Stories of Singapore (especially its history, and some of its folk tales) provide the thematic context for promoting loyalty to and pride in one’s country. These are carefully included in all of the primary and secondary textbooks, e.g. “How did Singapore get its name?” (PT3), encouraging students to help their country (PT 2) . Additionally, included in the secondary textbooks are stories on nationhood which emphasize Singapore’s past history as a colonized and occupied area. Thus, the textbooks complement the daily ritual in schools where students are required to stand before the national flag and repeat the following words: “We the citizens of Singapore, pledge ourselves as one united people, regardless of race, language, or religion, to build a democratic society based on justice and equality so as to achieve happiness, prosperity, and progress for our nation.” Implicit in the pledge “we….one united people”, which is informed by a sense of carefully nurtured loyalty, is a promise to work in social harmony.

Collaboration and negotiation skills   
The 2001 language syllabus is based on communicative and functional methodological approaches which promote cooperation and collaboration in learning. According to this methodology, fluency in language use is emphasized over accuracy, and the communicative function of language over form. Therefore, drama, role-play, story telling, the reciting of poetry, songs, and games are classroom activities used to provide opportunities for students to express themselves (cf. Freire, 1972, p.29). Such language activities necessarily involve negotiation, collaboration and cooperation. They emphasize the importance of group work and encourage students to work together to achieve common goals (Ministry of Education, 2000). 

The methodology is reflected in the textbooks. On the secondary level, collaboration and negotiation skills are developed through the inclusion of tasks and mini-projects, which require students to work together while developing competency in English. For instance, ST2 has designed all of its language learning exercises through projects which require collaborative work. Two popular examples are “Reader’s Theatre” and “Choral Reading”. The former requires students to work together to write and act out a play and the latter that they select pieces of poetry and team together to present them. Another textbook, ST3, directly teaches the values of group work by asking students to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of collaborative sharing 43 The four primary textbooks also provide ample opportunities for group work.  PT3, for example, includes ‘information gap’ activities. These are structured so that one partner assigned to a task has a piece of the information needed by the other to complete it. That is, one student must share this information with “his friend” in order for the task-at-hand to be completed. They must cooperate. Moreover, the textbooks generate a sense of partnership and common endeavor by using pronouns such as  “We”, “our team”,  “our group”,” our country”.  The teaching of  ‘process writing’ i.e. writing taken through the stages of drafting, conferencing, revising and editing, is also advocated in the 2001 language syllabus. Students are encouraged to work in pairs to share their drafts with one another in order to obtain feedback in the various stages of the process - to negotiate and to collaborate.

Besides promoting the development and use of collaborative skills, these group activities also have the potential to lead to the formation of friendships across racial, ethnic, social and economic lines. Students can learn to appreciate the common humanity that the peoples of different nationalities, religions, socioeconomic classes, cultures and even sexes share. Thus as Jacobs (2002) has noted, cooperative learning can be an effective tool for preventing violence and, it may be inferred, for promoting social harmony.

Competition or Cooperation?
To summarize, Singapore’s language curriculum uses a set of textbooks designed to promote cooperative living and social harmony by incorporating values education and the teaching of collaborative skills with language learning (Ministry of Education, 2004). However, textbook itineraries often differ from real-life practices. In the case of Singapore’s language curriculum, the metaphors that dominate the state discourse are sometimes obstacles to the achievement of these curricular goals. While cooperation is openly valued in the educational system and the language classrooms, competition communicated through the metaphors of sports, war and the market appear to be the preferred ideology.

As a result, while the textbooks promote collaboration and negotiation skills, these are not working as well as they should be in the classroom. A preoccupation with the concept of schools as markets has inevitably encouraged the ranking of schools according to performance so as to encourage pupils to compete and excel (Aware, 2001). All secondary schools and Junior Colleges have been publicly ranked on an annual basis since 1992 and the results have been published in local newspapers 44. The ranking exerts considerable pressure among principals to compete with each other in such areas as student recruitment and in developing strategies that ensure success in the examination 45. This means that inevitably, for Singaporeans, what is really important is the marks in the examination (Lee, 1999, p. 227). In fact, there is a nation-wide obsession with excelling in examinations46, which, then, become the training ground for competition, perseverance and endurance, all characteristics indirectly promoted by the sports metaphor of statehood (Khong, 2004).

Consequently, students often tend to concentrate exclusively on what they perceive to be strategies that lead to better marks in the examination, and collaborative activities suggested by the syllabus, which do not maximize their chances to achieve, are ignored. Moreover, to ensure that students have ample time for examination preparation, teachers attempt to complete the syllabus several months before the date of the examinations. To do this effectively, they prepare structured questions (rather than stories, poetry and reader’s theatre) that require short responses from students. Once the teacher feels that the majority has understood the content, he/she will assign textbook-based or teacher-designed exercises followed by school-designed worksheets which students complete on their own. Tan’s (2001) research found that experienced teachers strongly endorsed such learning activities, which require memorization, rather than methods advocated by the communicative and functional syllabuses. Student-directed small group discussions and other teaching strategies that empower learners and encourage collaborative learning are rarely used since teachers prefer recitation and seatwork to student-directed small group activities (Tan, p. 2001).

Similarly, while the textbook emphasizes values which promote social harmony and cooperative living, school children are metaphorically and subconsciously urged through the discourses of its key leaders to remember the “struggles” of nationhood – that is, the “turbulent” history of how one “progresses” from a dependent colony to becoming a tough, competitive and hungry nation. While familial themes in language textbooks aim to have students learn “filial piety”, the aging are often referred to as a “dark clouds” in the media. 47 Old age is seen as a barrier to winning the race. Apparently, there is some conflict between the promotion of a harmonious and cooperative society and the need to develop qualities deemed essential for competition in a “big bad world”.

Conclusion
Our choice of language and its metaphors reveal our innermost thoughts and plan our actions. While the 2001 language syllabus aims to develop moral values such as peace and cooperation, and skills for social harmony and cooperative living, the state ideology communicated through its favorite metaphors does appear to present an obstacle to those aims. As long as competition, as promoted through the metaphors of war, sport and the marketplace, is prized above cooperation, then educational aims that would contribute to a more cooperative and peaceful culture will be subordinated.
This mismatch between educational policy and practice, so apparent in Singapore, is not unusual or atypical. Like the world at large, while there are ample and idealistic intentions and policies engineered for social progress, in reality it is immensely difficult to effect real change because other factors need to be considered and vested interests are in place. Old world values such as competition, nationalism and authoritarianism are still dominant over those of cooperation, globalism and collaboration. It is obvious that while technological advances have been breathtaking, the development of social values have lagged behind, leaving a world precariously threatened by a political, racial and social divide and teetering on the edge of political apathy, nuclear holocaust, environmental destruction, and social distrust. A secular culture has developed in the powerful areas of the world (of which Singapore is part) that is extremely materialistic in its outlook, one in which personal satisfaction and gain appears to become the main arbiters of social values and behavior.

National institutions and government, in an increasingly interdependent world, are less and less able to address key problems, many of which have acquired an important international dimension. The increasing internationalization of the economy has led to an erosion of world governments’ capacity to do the things they used to do effectively. If the Singapore story has something to teach us, it is that the present moment calls for a statecraft that breaks with the past and which takes an unprecedented step towards an integrated earth. If the world is indeed one system, world order must ultimately be a “positive sum” game: in the long run, we all either “win” or “lose” together. Unfortunately, until now we have been unable to see the world as “one country” and so Singapore, as with many other well-meaning and ambitious states, while fully aware of the benefits of peaceful living, as evident in the promotion of cooperation and social harmony in school textbooks, has had no recourse but to make war, sports and the market their key metaphors. Like other countries that strive to survive in an increasingly interdependent world, it must be able to compete.

How are we to change the pattern of alienation, hierarchy and conflict, offshoots of competition, into patterns of harmony, collaboration, and cooperation so that a divisive world can move from an era of danger, anxiety and war into an age of collective security and peaceful cooperation? Language learning certainly has an important role to play since language is the medium through which the values and skills, key to the inculcation of moral values such as peace and cooperation are communicated. Moreover, it is an important subject in all educational systems. However, most of the time, in Singapore, as in many other nations,there are more complex factors at work that are capping its potential. Often the social context, within which language teaching must operate, is at odds with its more idealistic aspirations. Tragically, education has also become too important a field not to be colonized by powerful state interests, communicated, in part, through its metaphors. This issue will need to be addressed by language practitioners as they plan syllabuses and teach in their classrooms

Appendix

Textbooks reviewed:

Secondary (for ages 13-16)
ST1 Colin Davis and Faridah Tup, English Expressions,  (Singapore: Oxford, 2000) 
ST2 Mervyn Evan Blake et. al., Eureka. Interactive English for Secondary Levels, (Singapore: Singapore National Printers, 2001).
ST3 Heather Jones and Robyn MannStep Ahead, (Singapore: Pan Pacific, 2001)
ST4 Peggie Chan, Nellie Kwa and Simone Khoo-Wang, Odyssey, (Singapore: Longman, 2001)

Primary (for ages 7-12)
PT1 Chew Phyllis, In Step. A Course for Primary School, (Singapore: Pan Pacific Publications, 2001)
PT2 Ang Judy and Smith, Anne.My Pals are Here, English Primary 1 and 2. (Singapore: MPH, 2001)
PT3 Vijayan Shakuntala and Wong Maeli,Treks. Setting Off,  (Singapore: EPB, 2001)
PT4 Wong, Ruth. W. L.,Let’s Celebrate, (Singapore: Longman, 2001).

References

Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE). (2001). Quality education for all. Singapore: Aware.

Advisory Council on the Aged. (1988).Attitudes towards the aged. Singapore: Government Printing Press.

Curriculum Development Institute of Singapore. (CDIS) (1985).Confucian ethics textbook, Secondary 3. Singapore: EPB Press.

Chilton, P. and Lakoff, G. (1995). Foreign policy by metaphor.  In C. Schaffner and A Wendon (Eds.),Language and peace. London: Routledge.

Freire, P. (1972).Cultural action for freedom. London: Penguin.
Goatly, A. (1997). The Language of metaphors. London: Routledge.

Goh, C. T. (1993). National day rally.  Singapore: Ministry of Information and the Arts.

Jacobs, G. M. and Cates,K. (1999). Global education in second language teaching, Kata, 1.1. 44-56.

Jacobs, G.M. (2002). Cooperation in Education and Life.  In Phyllis G. L. Chew (Ed.),Towards a culture of peace: Perspectives .Singapore: United Nations Association of Singapore.

Khong, Lana Yu Lan (2004).Family Matters. The role of parents in Singapore Education .Singapore: Marshall Cavendish Academic.

Lee, W. O. (1999).Social change and education problems in Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong.  London: Macmillan.

Ministry of Education (2000).2001 Revised Syllabus for Primary and Secondary Schools. Singapore: Ministry of Education.

Ministry of Education (2004).Twenty years of gifted education .Singapore: Ministry of Education

Tan, Ai-Girl (2001). Elementary school teachers’ perception of desirable learning activities: A Singaporean perspective, Educational Research,43(1), 47-61.

Notes

1. See http://www.cabinet.gov.sg/CabinetAppointments/index.htm 11 September 2007
2. Straits Times, 14. 3. 1996.
3. Sunday Times, 8.12. 1996.
4. Straits Times, 1. 2. 1996.
5. Business Times, 16. 8 1995
6. New Paper, 2.2.1995.
7. Speech of PM Goh,  addressed to students at the National University of Singapore at a meeting organized by the university=s Democratic Socialist Club on 1.8.1985.  Quoted in Ong, Siow Heng and Govindasamy-Ong, Nirmala. Metaphors and Public Communication. Selected Speeches of Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong.  Singapore: Graham Brash, 1996): 128-130.
8. . Straits Times, 28. 4. 1999 “Singapore must capitalise on the winning battle.”
9. Straits Times, 4. 9. 1966, 61
10. Straits Times, 1.1. 2000
11. Business Times, 20. 9. 1999, 4.  This particular quote is taken from his speech given at the 15th anniversary of the Singapore Exchange.
12. Government of Singapore, Singapore. The Next Lap.  Singapore: Government of Singapore, 1991.
13. Straits Times, 24. 2. 1991
14. . Ibid.
15. . Straits Times, 17.8 1992.
16. . Straits Times, 17. 2. 1992
17. . Straits Times, 6. 12. 1996.
18. . “Why better, best are just not good enough for Singapore” Straits Times, 5.5. 1991.
19. . See “Eyeball Focus”, Project Eyeball, 7 May 2001  This is a Singapore newspaper, which has since folded.
20. . Taking top place was the US with an index of 2.02 followed by Finland with a score of 1.73. Ibid.
21. . Business Times 22.5.2000, 13. This article tells how Singapore was the second country, after Great Britain, in attracting the highest amount of US high-tech fund investments.
22.. Straits Times, 1. 5. 2000, 37
23. . Business Times, 19.4.2000, 2. This was a huge write-up on how Singapore achieved the position of second place (after the United States), as the “second most competitive economy in the world.”
24. .Straits Times, 17. 2. 1992.
25. . Sunday Times, 8. 12. 1996.
26. . Straits Times, 4. 9. 1999, 66.  “Everything to live for, nothing to die for”  “IQ” refers to Intelligence Quotient while “EQ” refers to Emotional Quotient.
27. . Straits Times, 4. 9. 1966, 61.
28. . Straits Times, 4. 9. 1999, 66. 
29. .. Straits Times, 4.7.1998, 58  “8 Core Skills for the New Economy”
30. . Ibid
31. . Sunday Times, 18.1.1998, 44  “Minister of Education stresses the importance of talent search in schools.” 
32. . “Making an Ability Driven Education Happen,” Ministry of Education Fiscal Year 2001 Committee of Supply Debate. 15 March 2001, 2.
33. . Straits Times,10. 4. 1998, 50. “Accept Change, Don’t Look Back.”
34. . Press comments by Parliamentary Secretary Chan Soo Sen and Principal Goh Hwee Choo.  Reported in Straits Times, 18.8.1998, 50 “Catholic High pulls up its socks.”
35. . Straits Times 4.7.1998, 48 “Schools set out to woo pupils.”
36. RI stands for Raffles Institution, a premier school in Singapore
37. RICE is an acronym for a computer program.  IT stands for “Instructional Technology”.
38. .See Straits Times, 11. 2. 2000, 43
39. Straits Times,15. 3. 2000, 70.  “All work and no play”
40. Sunday Times, 18.1. 1998, 1.
41. . Talking points for RADM Teo Chee Hean at the 1998 World Economic Forum Annual meeting.  Educating tomorrow’s Global citizen: What should we be teaching today’s youth (3. 2. 1998)  http://www1.moe.edu.sg/speeches/1998/030298.htm
42. See Appendix for the titles of the textbooks.
43. ST3, Secondary 1, 10.
44. They are ranked according to 3 criteria.  The first is a composite measure of student’s overall results in the annual GCE level examination. The second measures schools’ “value-addedness’ by comparing students’ examination performance with their examination scores upon entry to their respective schools.  The third criterion is a weighted index that measures a school’s performance in the National Physical Fitness test and the percentage of overweight students in schools.
45. “Many Parents try to come to the Child’s Rescue by attending workshops to keep pace with Junior’s homework” (Straits Times, 10.4.2000, 7)
46. According to a survey commissioned by Singapore’s main English daily, the Straits Times, of children aged 10-12, students are more afraid of examinations than of their parents dying; one in three thinks that sometimes, life isn’t worth living; nearly 4 out of 5 spend as many as three hours studying after school; and 7 out of 10 receive extra classes after school hours.  See Trish Saywell, Education: Thinking out of the box. Far Eastern Economic Review, 14.12. (2000), 62-63. 
47. Sunday Times, 9. 8. 1998.  “Dark Cloud 1: Aging Society”