Depending on the reasons, tuition can be a boon or bane to both students and parents. From my perspective, anything done in excess will likely prove to be more detrimental than beneficial and this applies to both tuition and enrichment as well. Nevertheless, when given the right dosage, tuition can serve as a boon to those who truly need it.
Emphasis on grades has been an age-old obsession ever since the birth of the Chinese imperial examination system in the Tang Dynasty. Only the top scorers could be chosen to become office holders in the royal court. This was considered highly prestigious and officials brought high honours back to their hometowns.
In a Chinese majority society, Singapore seems to have inherited a similar system whereby top students are given government scholarships and serve in the civil service for a number of years. Thereafter, they will be considered for top political positions in the government. Almost all our cabinet ministers are past government scholarship holders and hence, a prestigious scholarship is often seen to be the first step toward power and wealth.
Now that we have understood why tuition is so deeply entrenched in our society, we can start to examine the benefits tuition may bring to students and parents.
1) Parents do not have the time to oversee and supervise their child
It is an ideal that parents should spend some time to make sure their child is able to keep pace with the work in school and to guide him or her along. Unfortunately and in reality, not all parents can afford the time to perform this task and do it well, especially after a long and tiring day at work.
2) Parents may lack the technical know-how and knowledge to assist their child
As the child gets older, some parents may not be able to keep pace with the higher level school syllabus. They may not possess the relevant knowledge and the technical know-how to help their child in the school work. As such, it may be more beneficial to outsource the work and engage the help of an expert such as a private tutor to assist their child on the academic front.
To put it simply, why not just hire a tutor and outsource all that fussing! All the parents need to do now is monitor and ensure that the tutor possesses the correct aptitude and expertise to coach and meet the needs of their child.
3) The ‘One-Size-Fits-All’ approach no longer works well
With mass education, the ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach may not work very well as every child has his or her own unique personality in terms of IQ, EQ, learning aptitude and interests. Some students learn faster, others may take longer. Parents care for their child enough to want them to build their confidence and love for learning in school. Unfortunately, these learning and confidence-building processes are hampered by our educational system's inability to slow down for weaker learners.
4) Students who require special attention and have special needs
The majority of students have no difficulty in coping with the mainstream syllabus. However, there exists a minority group of students who may have special needs and require special attention due to their learning disabilities. These learning disabilities include Dyslexia, ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) and Autism. Extra help for this particular group of students is often sorely lacking in a classroom setting.
5) Grades are not everything but they do mean something
Are you sick of hearing the saying: ‘Grades are not everything’? The same applies for ‘Money is not everything’. I beg to differ on these 2 statements and in fact I feel that ‘Grades are not everything but they do mean something’ and ‘Money is not everything but everything needs money’. These revised statements may make more logical sense in a high cost and meritocratic society like Singapore.
It is true that grades are not the only pathway to success in life but grades do serve as a stepping stone for many young adults to land a reasonable paying job and something that they love to do. Not every single employer who interviews you is going to look at your grades, but some will and grades say more about a student than many realise. Good grades show that you are passionate, ambitious, and driven. They prove that you have a lot of self-motivation as well as independence and you don’t need someone supervising you all the time to get things done.
6) Increasing difficulty level of the school syllabus and examinations
In a fast changing world, the school syllabuses seem to be ever changing and increasing in difficulty level year on year as well. Singapore exams are also well known to be notoriously difficult and the competition that students face is immensely high. Learning should be a lifelong process but due to the immense emphasis on the importance of academic excellence by the government and society, it has led to a ‘Do or Die’ mentality when it comes to major examinations for many students and even parents.
7) Stagnated Learning Curve
As former students, have you ever felt lost when faced with a challenging problem and there was no help available? The failure to address key doubts that students face along their learning route is a serious and critical problem. The persistent doubts that arise and the lack of help to address these issues may lead to an eventual ‘choke’ or eventual ‘death’ of their learning process. Some may lose interest and simply give up on their learning as they have too many unknowns but too little time and insufficient help to address them.
Despite the aforementioned reasons for tuition, tuition can still become a bane to students as well as parents for these reasons:
1) Tuition due to peer pressure
Some parents have cited that tuition has not helped their child much in improving their grades. If it doesn't help, why do parents still continue to do it? Some say it is because of peer pressure while others put it down to insecurity. This is likely the consequences of an overly competitive education system. This is symbolic of how our Singlish word “Kiasu” evolved from and got its way into the hallowed Oxford English Dictionary.
2) Herd mentality
Similar to what i mentioned above, the enrichment classes in Singapore seem to be a product of the herd mentality that many Singaporeans are guilty of. In a herd mentality phenomenon, people are afraid of missing the boat or leaving a sinking boat. They will continue to do what others do even if it is not beneficial to them.
3) Tuition as a "Cure" for Poor Work Ethics
With the influx of technology, the prevalence of internet and smartphone usage has greatly increased. Students are widely exposed to social media, online gaming and Korean pop idol groups, Netflix etc. There is an increasing phenomenon that students are addicted to the internet and develop addiction to entertainment and poor work ethics. online social apps, gaming and Korean pop idolisation. Their purpose for tuition is thus only to help plug their academic gap that occurs constantly due to their addiction of these online social ills.
4) Engaging incompetent tutors and tuition centres
There is a saying: “The Teacher makes the difference”. It is hard to overstate how much difference the right teacher can make to students’ confidence and engagement. Many parents and students know this to be true from anecdotal experience and there is no denial that good and responsible teachers and tutors have a very significant and lifelong impact on all of their students.
On the flip side, the engagement of an incompetent tutor or tuition centre based purely on branding and marketing can have a detrimental effect on the academic progress of the student. Confusion can arise due to the wrong impartment of knowledge and concepts. On a more serious note, the students may actually put this wrong knowledge into practical use during major examinations, leading to the eventual demise of their motivation and learning interest as they are persistently failing in major examinations.
In conclusion, even with the abolishment of mid-year examinations for certain school levels and the upcoming changes being made to the PSLE grading system, national examinations such as PSLE and GCE O-Level still remain. This simply means that any gratification effect or ‘pain and nasty surprise' is just being pushed back or delayed. At the end of the day, students and parents will still have to face the hard truth of the importance of academic excellence and comparison in a meritocratic Singapore. As such, I strongly believe that with the right balance, the benefits of tuition can clearly outweigh the risks.
Additional Reading
a) ‘Tuition seen as 'necessity' for students to do well” (The Straits Times, Sep. 2014)’
Tough syllabus, competitive system make it important, say parents, tuition centres
Website: https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/education/tuition-seen-as-necessity-for-students-to-do-well
b) ‘Is tuition necessary?’ (The Straits Times, Jul. 2015)
Yes, to avoid being left behind and stem any potential lagging behind
c) ‘Challenge for parents to accept that grades are not important’ (The Straits Times, Sep. 2018)
In its earnestness to reduce the stress in our education system, the Government constantly says that grades are not everything
d) ‘No exams? No problem! Some tuition centres rush in to fill gap, soothe anxious parents’ (Channel News Asia, Oct. 2018)
The reduction of mid-year examinations would not provide them with "a true gauge" of the child's academic performance in the earlier part of the school year, and they feared that it would lead to a "nasty surprise" at the year-end examinations
e) ‘Parents splash out on prep classes for gifted programme. Should they?’ (Channel News Asia, Oct. 2017)
To give their children a better chance of acing the GEP selection test, they are sending them for training - but is it advisable? Talking Point investigates
f) ‘New PSLE scoring system to have 8 grade bands’ (The Straits Times, Jul. 2016)
Aim is get pupils to focus on own learning as they will not be graded relative to their peers
Website: https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/education/new-psle-scoring-system-to-have-8-grade-bands
