PSLE results: Hard to be content but parents should try

On Friday, more than 43,000 primary school pupils received their PSLE results.

In Facebook posts the night before, both Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and Education Minister Heng Swee Keat encouraged children and parents to be content with their results and said that the children would still get to be in good schools.

If you ask me, contentment with less-thanperfect grades (like Skye and Syahera on the previous page) is something we should strive for because the reality is parents and children are going to be upset when that top school is beyond reach.

And that pain is raw.

Jurong West Secondary school's vice-principal Pushparani Nadarajah put it this way at an education expo: "...how many of our leaders and top officers who say that every school is a good school put their children in ordinary schools near their home? (Only) until they actually do so are parents going to buy (it)."

GONE VIRAL

That her comments have gone viral bears out my point because she vocalised what some parents feel towards the official line.

Admittedly, the Education Ministry is slowly doing what it can to change mindsets. Last year, it stopped schools from naming their top PSLE students.

This year, it did away with publishing the highest and lowest PSLE scores - a practice that has been around since 1982.

PM Lee also announced at this year's National Day Rally that the PSLE grade will soon be awarded in wider bands instead of the T-score. The paradigm shift is aimed at sending the message that a child's PSLE score should not matter too much.

Hopefully, this would reduce the stress on children and encourage them to learn for the sake of knowledge and not just to get into a top school.

In the meantime, as long as secondary schools continue to take in pupils based on their T-scores, parents will continue to harp on these scores and benchmark their happiness at their child's PSLE score against this.

And Madam Pushparani's comments will continue to gain traction.

I asked Chairman of Government Parliamentary Committee for Education Lim Biow Chuan what he thought of her comment.

SWEEPING STATEMENT

He said he thinks that Madam Pushparani's statement was "sweeping" and "populist".

"She assumes that all the children (of leaders) are top scorers, which cannot be the case. We don't broadcast the schools of our children for privacy reasons," said Mr Lim.

"As parents, we try to do the best for our children and pick the school which is best for them.

"If they do well, they should be allowed in a school to perform to the best of their abilities, and if they don't do as well, they should pick a school that would allow them to meet their interests."

Member of the GPC Baey Yam Keng was quick to answer "why not?" when asked if he would send his child to a neighbourhood school.

"'Every school is a good school' doesn't mean that every school is equal academically.

"If my child is not academically inclined, she should not be put in a school where she cannot cope as this will affect her confidence.

"But we should not discriminate against the top schools as well. If a child is naturally bright, there should not be a stigma if she wants to go to a top school."

Share your views with Linette at linheng@sph.com.sg

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