How ironic that many months before the whole big talk, I mentioned to my friend that I feel like all my childhood friends are doing very well now, many are scholars, and those who went to polytechnics have done exceeding well during their term in poly, with many even being recipients of prestigious scholarships and external awards. I told my friend, E, that I felt terrible, I'm currently on a decline, my glory days are over while everyone else seems to be peaking now, when this is the time that matters most. E then mentioned that it's just who the people that I hung out with, I was surrounded by strong academics. E told me that at her church, there were some who studied at ITE, and they would mention how great her English was. And she said that they lived across the bridge in AMK, yet the difference was obvious.
This really made me realise that hey, it seems like everyone is doing well now because all along, I was surrounded by people of my own class. Not that I believe that those of a different class cannot be successful (hardwork gets you anywhere man!) but this really enlightened me to the idea of how similar my classmates and I are in terms of background. I barely know anyone living in a rental flat personally, I must admit. I do not have friends in other streams.
And I blame the government. Meritocracy is a great thing, I truly support the idea of fairness base on hardwork and skills, because if not there is really no point to working that hard if I am born poor and destined to stay poor. But I think we are slowly coming to realise that meritocracy has a dark side to it, it creates segregation. And with segregation comes elitism.
All throughout my educational years, I have been ranked based on my exam results. I am then sorted into classes based on my ranking. This means that my classmates are all around my standards, I do not get to mix with those of 'higher' or 'lower' ranks than me. When I joined the prefectorial board, out of the 150+ prefects, only a handful of them (I daresay less than 7) come from the N(A) or N(T) streams. Why? Do they see themselves as incapable? Because I can assure you, they are not so. I know of this girl in the N(T) stream who was a fantastic leader, much better than me, I believe.
But of course, there is simply no easy solution to this? In the documentary "Regardless of Class", one of the IP student mentioned that she does not think integrating the different streams into one class is a good idea as it may even widen the gap due to the different learning abilities. And I agree with her, I will never want to be in a class where I'm the small fish, that would make me frustrated and stress when I see others understanding concept so quickly, when I don't even know what the teacher is talking about. And when the results are out, I will feel so inferior and doubt myself.
But we don't want that for our children, do we? I mean, even the Government is shifting the focus away from exam grades, but this is what integrating the streams will lead us to. Afterall, we will always compete with the ones besides us, even if we are friends. And when self-doubt comes into play, the child has lost his motivation, nothing will enable him to be successful in life.
I don't have a solution to class divide, because it is here to stay. But what I think we can do to bridge the classes is to respect one another. Do not act based on stereotypes, and what we are going through in life is very different. We may never be able to fully understand each other, but the very least we can do is to acknowledge that we are fellow Singaporeans- there is something unique about each of us, and we all have that special talent somewhere in us where we can share it with the world.
