Comments on: MM Lee admits “mistake” made in his education policy

By: LHL

LHL — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 09:31:19 +0000

MM has created the privilege English speaking class in the past where those proficiency in English were entitled to higher education and high paying job. The end result is of course the low standard of Chinese language. Many students in the past with good grades in Math and Science but failed in English language from depriving university education. The excuse by the government is that English is the working language in Singapore and thus it is important to acquire certain standard of English. But today, we can see engineers, IT specialists, etc from third world countries, who cannot speak proper English, working in Singapore. MM has made many mistakes in education !!!

By: Yoyo

Yoyo — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 02:38:09 +0000

Sadden: Let’s assume that there isn’t the ‘Stop at 2′ policy and each families decides to have 4 children in the 60s which in turn leads to population grown in the 21st centtury, and yes i get your point in term of the snow-balling of our population. Although we will have sufficient population by now, but still, we hve faced with declining population as a high % of modern couples will not want to have children (or less children). So this argument of declining population will be delayed but exist in the future as with all of the developed countries. If u were to visit places in western europe, u will realise that there’s a lot of indian and chinese. Reason behind it’s due to a aging population and there’s a need of sufficient population to support the social welfare. And even japan (with ’similar’ asian culture) is facing with extreme difficulties in tackiling aging population. Although i do hate the flooding of foriegn workers, but i do admit that there’s need of them (BUT NOT SO MUCH of them)

As for over-paid ministers, i do agree that our ministers are over-paid

graduate mother scheme wise, it is REALLY retarded… Most of the time, local graduates are not too smart(although i’m a graduate as well). Most local graduates spend too much time in academic and render themselves useless in the competitive commerical world where result is all that matters. In fact the more foreigners that i worked with, the more i realise that the over-dependency of the paper-cert, the less intelligent one can be. But not to say that there’s a lot of graduates that go to school for knowledge and even with poor grade, they are sucessful in the work.

By: Brendan

Brendan — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 13:11:01 +0000

“Another controversial policy was the “graduate mother scheme” to encourage graduate women to bear more children. A strong proponent of eugenics, Lee thought (and still think) that offsprings of graduate women will be smarter and of “better stock”.

The scheme was quietly dropped in the aftermath of the 1984 elections which saw the PAP lost a significant percentage of the votes cast.”

If there is anything that will cost the Pappies votes in the next elections, the CASINO will be it. Opening the casinos will be a big mistake and then they will have to halt it. BUT its too late!! Taxpayer’s money will have already been spent!

By: radar

radar — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 10:31:26 +0000

Those who are bilingual, be grateful. Those who are not, how many skip classes or didn’t put in the effort to learn?
Don’t just blame the teachers – MM and poor students. Some of you may recall that monolinguals were the lowest of the strata for streaming.

By: Sadden

Sadden — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 08:36:02 +0000

Yoyo
Still not convinced that the ’stop at 2′is the cause of the sad state of the birth rate now?
Let me paint you a scenario;
Suppose we have no ’stop at 2′in the 70s,and most of the citizens then gave birth to 4 or 5 babies,by now in the 21st century, the babies would have been in their 30s.They inturn,got married and produce 4 to 5 babies-imagine the increase in the population! the numbers keep double up!
Now back to today,we are desperately ‘lalong’ our citizenship
in order to fill up the lost numbers!If and only if our old man
(he was a very young man then)had the foresight,we would not have been in this dire situation now!
The reproduction and procreation process is God’s most sacred
gift to mankind.We should not temper with it.Once tempered, the whole process go haywired,and no amount of king’s horses
and king’s men can put Humpty Dumpty together again!
Back to the First Tier and First World termology.The so called
Elite ministers proudly call themselves thus in order to justify their $million salary.You judge for yourself whether the results of all the policies justify their pay!!

By: JJ

JJ — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 06:14:54 +0000

There seems to be a lot of emotional LKY bashing here rather than rational and objective debate, and it seems to be creeping into the articles as well. I rather enjoy reading articles from this website, but am seeing slanted points of view creeping into the news articles which should idealy be in the opinion section. This rather degrades the credibility of the reporting here. Please keep the news as pure news, with only the opinions of cited quotes of others in there, not of the author. For example, the last three paragraphs of this article are completely unnecessary for the reporting of this item and should clearly belong as commentary. I hope to see readership here grow, but please keep the journalism up to standard.

By: citizenofSG

citizenofSG — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 06:02:56 +0000

@yoyo, There’s no need to throw your tantrum, I will buy you a lollipop to pester you so don’t cry.

Old, I am not that old but just old enough to know. My laughter has hurt your ego and I shall not laugh.

Nonetheless in spite of the policy, the Malay was producing but not so much for the other race.

The tendency and trend of the more affluence and better educated is quite evident among the citizens of Singapore. The government’s “stop at two” policy helps to accelerate the process. The crux of the matter is that the then government could not preempt the future of Singapore. The policy has worked against us eventually.

Prior to that most families had five to six children being the norm. The tradition and believe of the time was that the more children you have the better is your well being. However to bring up a family of that size was quite a challenge and the government then was too worried that they were unable to create jobs to sustain such population growth. A country wide campaign was launched. It was extremely successful. So the country stopped at two.

Shameful refers to LKY who when was then at his prime did not realize that the stop at two policy created by him could become a disaster years and now we got make up for it.

Pitiful refers to a generation who miss to witness how the master of all master operates and work in a god like manner. He is good really damn bloody good. I hate and respect him at the same time.

You have to ask the older folks what was life like when Lee Kuan Yew was our prime minister. Get a comparison of him and the two other prime minister. Then probably you can understand the thoughts and feelings of the people then and now.

By: stupidbilingualism

stupidbilingualism — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 05:16:16 +0000

SO what if someone admits….damage has been done to many generations of force fed bilingualism, including mine. the people in this little piece of outcrop never admits its mistakes…very face saving and the MO is usually to lie low for a while and then implement a policy to improve things and say that they take the credit in making your lives better, when in actual fact, it was just a simple case of correcting their blunders. Just look at the ST headlines stating that chinese has to be learnt in a different way…so angkat balls..

Better to educate my children overseas and be overseas citizens…so no wasting of time defending…defending what…a little outcrop, piece of nose shit??? kekeke

have so many friends whose 2nd language is not chinese and yet have been successful doing business in China and learning chinese along the way, not learning chinese at such tender ages when your childhood is meant to be enjoyed….so long farewell….good luck or rather hard luck to the future generations who will still have to struggle with bilingualism

By: And Justice For All

And Justice For All — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 04:34:09 +0000

John John

You are absolutely right in bringing up the subject of what does the office of MM entail?

Firstly, if in the order of protocol, the position of MM falls behind the PM and DPM and then the SM, then why is it he didn’t take a pay cut since he no longer performs and take the responsibility of PM ? Why is he still getting $3m a year in salary. which is the same with PM and SM ? I mean if you are no longer the CEO but just another executive director on the board why is your director’s remuneration still the same as when you were the CEO ? Baffling isn’t it ? Money still motivates him at this age and time.

Secondly, you are right on inyour assertion that he is still the PM by any other name. If you name your dog Lassie he is still a dog.

By: Bobby

Bobby — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 04:25:59 +0000

To admit a mistake is one thing…to apologise to the people who have been victimised, marginalised because of his deciaion is what is needed.

I have never herd MM to apoligise before….the many “mistakes” he made has caused untoled misery to millions of singaporeans…some them are: Stop at Two; and punish those who refuse to stop at two”

Kill Dialects policy….wiping out a whole generation of people ..thereby causing a total disconnect with the childrens’ children….and causing a deterioration of bonds between the genrations and the killing off of the nuances of the various cultures….

Practice of Eugenics…..the Graduates must marry graduates,,,,poor and illiterate must not have more than two children…

Wrongful imprisonment of his Political Opponents…

It is time MM recant and ask for the forgiveness from the people he wronged. I hope He does so before he meets the Maker.