Yale-NUS Closure - Part I.

 In a break up, save the children. 

In a nutshell, that’s the theme of Assoc Editor Chua Mui Hong’s article this morning. Good read, balanced read. She addressed the angst, but reminded those who signed the petition that it is the future of the school that they will have to have hope in. Her concluding words are embracing to the heart and soul, and I will flesh it out later. Before that, let’s go for the jugular...

Leading the charge is none other than Yale-NUS College (YNC) President Tan Tai Yong. The break up more than ruffled his feathers. He expressed that he was “gobsmacked and flabbergasted.” Those are strong words. 

As an aside, gobsmack means “utterly astonished” and flabbergasted means “greatly surprised or astonished.” President Tan could even have been aghast, dumbfounded or even speechless, but you get the drift. 

If the decision to close YNC was a top-down reaction, then President Tan’s astonishment was also a top-down reaction. Just that it was a top-down that gave a good down-up suckerpunch on those who think they know better. 

And it also gave the YNC students, past and present, a good seize-the-day-and-gather-ye-rosebud kind of ventilation that they needed to sign on the dotted line demanding for an accounting and awakening. To put it bluntly, one can even see it as woke culture on steroid at campus. 

Anyway, Chua doesn’t mince her words here. From an objective standpoint, and written on official ink, she wrote: “Making a decision to shut a college over the head of its president and governing board smacks of hubris, a disregard for institutional autonomy and a total lack of respect and trust for the individuals involved.” 

She added: “Sadly, from my experience, this is by no means unusual in Singapore.” Ouch...how’s that for a returning-hand gobsmack serve?

Well, if you are into conspiracy theories, it is anyone’s guess why this was done under the student-body radar, even behind the back of the college’s president. Alas, that is the problem when you take matters into your own ironclad-hand and wring it from top-down. It just leaves big gaps for scurrilous speculations to fill. And, can you blame the busy grapevine and wagging tongues? 

Mind you, this is no ordinary institution. It’s the creme-de-la-creme of Southeast Asia, and tops amongst the world. That is, only the best brains are packed into those formidable four-walls that many can only quietly admire from afar. 

But then, we all know that the best brains do not necessarily equate with a good soul when push comes to shove, and I guess there is more than meets the eye here. That is why even YNC president is gobsmacked, utterly astonished.

At this point, let me just say that strict paternalism may be necessary when running the country in a crisis or in a state of genuine emergency, not one that is desperately man-made. 

But during more prosperous times, when a nation is in her grooves of secure development, the leadership must double-down on father-knows-best and double-up on mother-and-child-bonding. Anything less would generate more heat than light, or more suspicion than affection.

As Chua puts it: “...such high-handed decision-making is guaranteed to foment distrust and cynicism, loosen cohesion and drive a wedge between leaders and people. Already, some YNC students are talking about feeling betrayed.”

Here, I recall a phrase from Dead Poets Society that goes like this: “I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life. To put to rout all that was not life; and not, when I had come to die, discover that I had not lived.” 

That is the marrow-sucking energy of our young this day and age. And an institution of such repute and stature would want to harness that energy, not by a I-know-best stance, but with mutual respect, trust and nurturance.

For we need brain, yes, but we need soul too. More importantly, we need heart, and here is Chua’s heart-felt plea to those aggrieved as I end. Have a great weekend. 

“Your feelings today of hurt, anger, disappointment and betrayal over the decision are valid. Vent them safely with your friends, then set them aside.” 

“Be cool-headed and analytical about what's best about YNC that is worth preserving. Then channel your energy into trying to preserve the best of that spirit and energy in the new NUS college. Remember that disrespecting NUS is disrespecting half your heritage.”

“And deep within you, don't let the flame die. What you feel now is the rage and despair of the powerless in the face of decisions made by those with power that affect you directly. One day, when you become powerful yourself, when you are in positions of authority, remember how it feels like to be powerless and not respected.”

“And then resolve always to do your best to act differently - to make decisions in a different way, that includes not excludes, that shares power not removes it, that respects stakeholders, not treat them as dispensable.”

“Creating such a culture of collaborative leadership would be a good legacy of YNC for Singapore.”

 

RVHS I

8 hours sleep. That’s what our kids need. And three leading authorities have come forward to lend their weight to call for it.

First, the experts: Two associate professors Joshua Gooley and June Lo from Duke-NUS Medical School and Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, and one professor from Yong Loo Lin too, namely, Michael Chee. 

They are internationally recognised sleep scientists and have used their findings and objective data to transforms lives all over. Their advice therefore ought to be given a listening ear to. Mind you, they are not talking in their sleep. 

Second, the issue. It comes in this number - 6.5 hours. That’s about how much our students on average are sleeping. It is reported that “eight hours is enough, but fewer than 15 per cent of secondary school students achieve this.”

Third, the solution? Well, start school later. Start at 8:30 am. 

And if traffic is an issue, which coincides with peak hours, then stagger the timing, lessen the curriculum, make arrangements for transport with appropriate transport apps and car-pooling. Whatever is to be done, bend the solution to fit (or solve) the problem, that is, by hook or crook, grant our kids 8 hours sleep. But, why? Why 8 hours?

Fourth, the benefits. “In a top secondary school in Singapore, an increase of about 20 minutes of sleep on school nights was associated with fewer depression symptoms and lower daytime sleepiness...it improves alertness and improved mood.” Enough said? 

Fifth, the lesson. 

I know what you are thinking, or at least some of you parents. In terms of PISA and other academic scores, our kids are way up there. We excel so well in those assessments, attaining international recognition, is there really a need to change what is not only not broken, but it is working superbly? 

Well, what’s working may not be what’s best for our kids. The question is, at what cost are we achieving it? Or, what is the long term effect? And most pertinently, is there a better way to excel without burning our kids out, risking mood swings, depression and possibly suicide?

And we are not without precedent here. An experiment was carried out in Nanyang Girls’ High School (“NYGH”). Here is what is reported by Julian Lim and Lee Su Mei in a recent CNA article.

“NYGH spent half a year in preparing to shift their start time. They went through many rounds of revising the curriculum before rolling out one that would allow school to end at around the same time without comprising curriculum coverage.” 

“They were aware of the potential impact on transport, so they surveyed their students to understand their transport situation and concerns. The school also monitored local traffic conditions before the change to determine how much of a delay would be tolerable.”

“In short, NYGH spent significant effort to figure out how to delay school start time in the most optimal, least disruptive way. The results from the experiment were clear: Students were happier, more alert and more positive about going to school.”

So, where there is a will, there’s a way? 

At this point, I hear the naysayers: How about kids sleeping later then, if you tweak the time to 8:30 am? In other words, wouldn’t they just sleep later since they can wake up later?

Well, the professors have got this covered. Here is their findings: “Across longitudinal studies where delayed start times of more than 30 minutes are provisioned for, later wake-up times have consistently been observed. Bedtimes either do not change or are delayed by a smaller amount, resulting in real gains in sleep time.”

What is noteworthy is that bedtimes do not change. And if delayed, not by much, and they still wake up later. So in the end, if we parents, teachers, principals and ministers do the maths, our children get MORE sleep when school starts LATER.

And another unplanned experimental outcome is that during lockdown, “secondary school children in Singapore obtained about 40 minutes more sleep...as compared with their usual (short) amount of sleep.”

What is a bonus here (to start school later) is that “when sleep was extended to eight hours, performance resembled having nine hours of sleep. This suggests that every few minutes closer to the recommended sleep duration (of 8 hours) is worth reclaiming.”

Sixth, is it time to act? 

Well, MOE will tell you that they have decentralised the decision to individual schools. It is therefore not mandatory, but discretionary. It’s up to them. 

However, most schools are not acting on it. It is too much of an administrative disruption, and they rather sleepwalk through it or hold on to their more familiar security blanket, unless of course, as the three professors suggested, MOE makes it a law, similar to the laws requiring us to wear masks, keep a safe distance, and observe numbers at public places. 

Seventh, I always feel that as the population increases, we manage the masses by way of manicuring a culture via proper rules and regulations. How we organise society as a whole can affect its outcome, even the unintended effects arising from such structure or culture. 

For example, if you want policy holders to continue with their insurance policies, just tweak the option to renew section, and inform them that if they don’t do anything about it, the policy will renew itself automatically, thereby assuming that acquiescence is implied permission. 

By changing the option, you change the behaviour, en mass, for good or for bad. Likewise with schools and the long term health of our children. 

Inertia comes with its own resistance and also its own unintended consequences too. Before long, we become a byproduct of our enforced or entrenched culture. In schools, that entrenched, routinised culture is starting assembly at 7:30 am sharp, risking mental health issues in the long run, or forfeiting its benefits by default. 

If we know the benefits for our children are real, proven and enduring, and don’t worry, they will still continue to do well in PISA to maintain that international recognition, if not better, without sacrificing their mental well-being, then why are we not fighting the real enemy here, that is, inertia?

For all it takes is to push it back to 8:30 am (by order of parliament - if that’s what it takes) and everything over time will eventually adjust itself to it like cultural lemmings on a march, and then we can sit back and enjoy the better results, the happier kid, the less hectic schedule, the better absorption in class, the keener sense of learning, and most importantly, the better mood, for the most optimal social effect and benefits. What’s there to lose? 

Alas, there is no eighth lesson here. We don’t need any more, and one more would not make any difference. For enough has been said and done about it. Now, it’s time to act?

 

Meritocracy's dark side.

Our education minister Chan has got all the right words at the right place about meritocracy. I am sure his heart is at the right place too. 

He was addressing a virtual audience of 6000 educators at a Teachers’ Conference and he knew what to say about the loaded 11-letter word “meritocracy”. He started by reminding educators to keep the definition of meritocracy broad. “It means ensuring that meritocracy is continuous rather than having “one high-stake exam...define anyone for life.””

He added: “People develop different strengths at different stages of life. We must keep enabling porosity (that is, keeping society porous so as to allow for social mobility) and look out for opportunities to allow different talents to develop at different paces. Even the successful must never be complacent.”

He said those who are privileged “have a responsibility to pay it forward to those with less, for Singapore to be more inclusive.”

Well, I guess the benchmark of merit is far better than leaving such measurement of one’s fortune in life to a system based on hereditary rights, right? It used to be that where you are placed in the society all depends on your family bloodline. So, with meritocracy, gone are the days where you are born a future king, princess, duke or baron. 

Mind you, such an inequitable treatment is liken to the birth canal acting as the christening of your genetic fate, without you lifting a finger to earn it. In other words, you were pushed by an external force into being, not of your own will and control. 

But, if you think about it, aren’t the descendants of the rich and powerful entrepreneurs in this world, a variant form of royalty or aristocracy of days gone by? In fact, I hasten to add that the kids of Gates and Bezos and the princelings of China billionaires are far richer than the kids of royalty. 

And isn’t that hereditary rights all over again with meritocracy, save that their first generation worked hard and smart enough for it, and the subsequent generations are born into it, harvesting the fruits of their toil and sweat? Mm...another variant form of birth canal christening by order of genetic fate?

Of course, that is admittedly an oversimplification, but minister Chan’s reminder of not letting that “one high-stake exam” define all is, for all practical purposes, one part of the story; for merit in reality tends to define all, especially the way we as Singaporeans obsessively do merit. 

And yes, “people develop different strengths at different stages of life”, yet our society has little patience for late bloomers because they have not shown the merit needed (or prescribed, largely by the grade metric) to have what it takes. In fact, the message here is quite strident for Singaporeans at a young age: Succeed right now or you will never. 

Alas, and I think the good minister knows it, he is promoting a virtue often being held hostage in a system that represents anything but the effective advancement of it. Or, such promotion is caught in a system that pays only lip service to it, though the heart is undeniably still at the right place. 

For enobled reasons at the start, merit is one of the pillars of our national ethos. Mind you, all our high-achieving cabinet ministers swear by it, and has proven themselves through it. 

They are elected mainly, if not exclusively, by it. Most of them earned their stripes through the gruelling process under the handmaiden of meritocracy. And yes, I say give merit its credit, but to a certain extent. 

Let me end with these words by minister Chan at the Teachers’ Conference, which kept me thinking. He reminded teachers “the importance of values that will anchor future generations as they navigate a complex world”. 

In the same speech, he also mentioned meritocracy as one such value with this caveat: “But it is also important for Singaporeans to be open and inclusive, as well as a trusted and principled people.”

While I would not disagree with merit being a value, it crucially depends on how merit is defined right? And minister Chan was spot on when he told all 6000 educators that its definition has to be broaden to be inclusive - for different people, different strokes, at different stages of life. 

However, as I have written here, the greater relevance (or urgency) is to address the issue of what meritocracy has unwittingly spawned. And its dark side has turned it into less of a value and more of an impediment, if not a growing threat. 

On this, Professor Carol Dweck observed: “I think society is in a crisis. Kids seem more exhausted and brittle today. I’m getting much more fear of failure, fear of evaluation, than I’ve gotten before. I see it in a lot of kids; a desire to play it safe. They don’t want to get into a place of being judged, of having to produce.” She calls it a “crippling fear of failure.” Can we (especially parents) in Singapore identify with that? 

And then, there is the warped sense of entitlement and hubris that comes with the blind pursuit of merit. Max Weber saw that coming more than a hundred years ago. He wrote this: -

“The fortunate (person) is seldom satisfied with the fact of being fortunate. Beyond this, he needs to know that he has a right to his good fortune. He wants to be convinced that he “deserves” it, and above all, that he deserves it in comparison with others. He wishes to be allowed the belief that the less fortunate also merely experience (their) due.”

That subtlety of mindset inevitably destroys society; for it divides society between those who demand others acknowledge their right to good fortune (regardless of how they got it) and those whom they condemn as deserving of their lot (whether openly or privately). And at some point in meritocracy’s development, the drive to reach the top is based not so much on proving ourselves, with noble intent, but on a vindictive streak, because we do not want to be looked down at. It’s payback time.

Yet, not all will make it. No news there. Those who don’t make it, resign to their meritocratic fate. And with a predictable twist of fate, those who happen to make it, they unknowingly become what they once railed against. This vicious cycle goes on and on, endless, driven by intense envy, an entitlement mindset and hubris, all of which arises from the relentless pursuit of merit. 

So, kudos no less to minister Chan for a rallying speech, with personal anecdotes to boot. But, I sometimes wish he would warn us more about its dark side. Because at some point, the bright side has become too glaring for some of us.

 

Pritam Singh - Don't be a jerk.

What can you learn from the opposition MP in his speech at a graduation ceremony at NUS Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences?

Well, Pritam Singh seemed to have started with a confession. He said that he "wasn't a straight-A student. For years, he struggled to cross each successive hurdle in the education system."

He added: "I fumbled badly at the Primary School Leaving Examination, entering the Normal stream in secondary school, and really bumbled my way into junior college and university."

When he got into the Arts and Social Science faculty, he said he felt like he had "hit the lottery".

The Aljunied GRC MP eventually won the Straits Steamship Prize in 1999, "awarded to the top history and political science undergraduate of each cohort."

I have two lessons here captured in Pritam's words about success and life.

The first is what he said. "But make no mistake about it, when you are through that door (education), all bets are off. I hear this more and more at all workplaces - a degree is only as good as your work, attitude and diligence."

And second, he said this. "And as you climb the ladder of success, be nice to people along the way. Because you may meet the same people on the way down."

If you put the two lessons together, you get what I would call "don't be a life's jerk". Pardon the straight talk. 

You see, you can be rich and be a jerk about it, and you can be poor and yes, end up a jerk too. 

The dictionary defines a jerk as a contemptibly foolish person. 

And rich or poor, or somewhere in the struggling middle, you can be foolish and contemptibly so about it. 

When Elon Musk, co-founder of Tesla, offered to save the boys trapped in a cave with a self-designed, state-of-the-art miniaturised submarine and was told that it was "not practical," he was not happy. He fumed in fact.

He even called one of the cave rescuers a paedophile. Unsurprisingly, it was reported that the value of his company Tesla fell by millions after that remark. 

And recently, when Kim Kardashian's sister, Kylie Jenner, was tipped to soon cross over the billionaire dollar mark when her net worth was estimated by Forbes to be US$800m, the New York Daily tweeted this: 

"19-year-old Kylie Jenner is worth $900 million and on pace to become the youngest self-made billionaire ever. What are you doing with your life?"

The response? 

Well, in an article written by Christine Emba today, she wrote that it was "deadpan", with one that reads: "I am a priest." 

And another reply came from a former refugee turned clinical neuroscientist PhD holder. Still a number of them replied by saying that they "were mothers raising special-needs kids, and millennials just struggling to get by."

Alas, not everything that gives us meaning and character come from having deep pockets and topping Forbes' list. 

In the end, I think the greatest lesson (or aim) in life is not about raking in the dough, or chasing that elusive dream, or beating the competitors to stay at the top, or winning accolades and fame from all quarters of society. 

You can do all that, and yet be a jerk about it, that is, contemptibly foolish. And the world lacks no examples of how such jerks look like. 

Mind you, it cuts both ways and being in poverty does not give you tribal immunity against being a jerk. 

You can be crying, wailing and self-pitying over spilled, stale and stinking milk all your life because you just refuse to clean the shit you have partly contributed to and leave the heated kitchen once and for all to make something decent and noble out of your life. 

Let me end by saying this: I generally avoid a religious person. 

You can be religious in many ways without ascribing to a religion. The common thread (or rusty barbwire) that runs through all religious person is that he or she claims to know everything or has found the answer. 

It is basically an arrived-state-of-mind. The journey of learning has thus ended for such as this. 

For me an atheist can be religious when he boasts to you that he is dead sure there is no god. A preacher can be religious when he claims that only god endorses his thoughts. And a politician can be religious when he refuses to listen to the people (or listens condescendingly or patronisingly), or thinks he knows the answer to all their problems. 

This is different from a person who in my book is spiritual. 

Unlike a religious person, a spiritual person is a pilgrim, learning as he is travelling from one place to another, one phrase of life to another, and one growth to another. 

A spiritual person never arrived (or even implies it) because one lifetime is just too short to know much, not to mention to audaciously claim to know everything there is to know about knowing everything.

And I find an enduring affinity with a spiritual person because when we acknowledge our ignorance in the infinite scheme of things, we come together in the same and common journey of learning, of humility, of character, of fallibility and of correction. 

It is a journey that is mutually enriching because there is no ladder of superiority to boast about. There is also no scale of achievement to split society or class divide to stereotype, stigmatise and discriminate.

It is just a flat and equal cobblestone pathway for the both of us to walk, learn and grow. Cheerz.