We have had several
great ministers in the MOE with great slogans like holistic education, teach less
learn more and all kinds of jest or jazz in the past and our education system
is now world class or world best, if the rankings are to be believed. The only few
success factors today are more qualified taxi drivers and security guards and ‘no
talent or skill sets’ in important professions and industries. The damage, they
did not call it damage, is that we will need another generation to produce the
needed talents for our industry. We are so
short of IT, finance, banking and medical professionals despite the claims of
doing a great job in education that our standards in these professions and
fields are now compromised by half bakes from the 3rd World filling
the ranks.
With the new ministers
and the new changes, would we continue to under produced or produced the wrong
kinds not needed by the industries and economy? Or would it be another few
generations and with more professions and industries being hollowed out?
Our holistic
education, or hollow education, is turning out jacks of all trades and masters
of none, and incompatible to the needs of the industry. There are many good reasons for good quality
education. But yes, education should not be just for the pursuit of a piece of
paper that cannot be eaten. It must be a piece of paper that can be eaten or
give the product from the system a good life, good jobs and professions, and be
the best they can be. I only think like
that in my dreams.
The luxury of a
holistic education is only good for those who do not need to work, no need to
get a job, and education is for education’s sake. Many people still need to put
food on the table and education is the means to that, to move up the social
ladder, to uplift their stations in life. Isn’t that so, education the greatest
leveler? Have no doubts about that, not everyone is a son or daughter of a millionaire
or have parents who are millionaire ministers and want an education for the
sake of getting an education and no need to get a job.
How much can we teach,
what to teach, to get a good job and how much to enjoy education, to develop a
better individual, a holistic person, a renaissance man or woman, needs to be
carefully calibrated. We have failed in many areas in our education policy to
the extent that we have no talents or not enough talents in many critical fields
when good young men and women were wasted to spend time and money reading
things they did not like or wanted to do. And while they are wasting their
lives away in regrets, many half baked foreigners and foreigners with fake
degrees and qualifications are brought in to replace them. The wasted
generations due to clever or silly tweaking of our education system and
policies are a sorry sight and state of affair.
It is very brave to
jump into the deep end and start to think like a wise man or genius, a ‘knows
all’ and trying to mend or bend the education system into another mould. It is
better to think carefully, deeply, sleep on it or dream on it for a while, take
your time before messing around with our education policies and the future of
our young. Know where we are before thinking of going any where.
Should our young be
excited by the impending great changes in our education policies and system or
should they be shivering in fear of being experimental guinea pigs again?
