The Big Con

Someone wrote to the papers this week to ask what has happened to the ‘No Wrong Door’ policy. Apparently, he wanted to make some feedback and was given the runabout by various government agencies. The No Wrong Door policy was launch in 2004 amid much fanfare but like all government initiatives, it was good only for brownies point and seriously I doubt it had ever work knowing the attitude of our civil servants.

Another policy with a nice fancy name is the ‘Teach Less Learn More’ policy. Now this one I must admit have succeeded beyond its wildest dream. To the disbelieving teachers out there, before you spank me with the text book, let me explain why so. To summarise the mumbo jumbo in MOE’s website, with this policy, teachers are supposed to come up with more creative method of teaching and not just reading from the text book and volia, the students will be stimulated to learn. So has this happened? Yes. Nowadays, it is so common to learn students complaining that the teachers did not cover all the syllabus (so we have the teach less part). And because the syllabus were not covered, the students have to pay external tutors to teach them in addition to their usual tuitions (learn more). So the teachers get to teach less, and the student learn more thanks to some brilliant MOE’s strategy to pass the buck to the private sector. But does that means teachers have more free time now since they teach less? Of course not! Which brings me to the next policy.

5 days work week. Many people in the civil service and especially the school teachers cheered when it was first introduced in 2004. But did the teachers really thought they were going to get Saturday off? Of course not course there is a loophole. Schools were not supposed to conduct any activities on Saturday. So all activities including supplemental classes, CCA etc got pushed to weekdays and so most teachers end up with a full day work week plus not forgetting the marking of assignment late into the night. And the Saturday? Of course, there is a loophole. Students can on their own initiatives organized their own events and go back to school on Saturday. Now those in the know, how can any students organize any official events without a teacher being present? And where in the world will there be students who will want to organize their own CCA training on Saturdays when they can be lazing at home playing their computer games. 

So I tell you, all these nice fancy named policies coined up by our elite administrative officer are nothing but a big con. What will they come up with next?