GEP 2012 - Screening & Selection

[laikiasu]

Any thoughts about GEP at ACS, anyone?

[PiggyLalala]

laikiasu:

Any thoughts about GEP at ACS, anyone?

Refer to the link below.
http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=4460&start=230

There is also some discussion in the acs primary sch thread.

[porcupine12trade]

laikiasu:

Any thoughts about GEP at ACS, anyone?

Hb and I like the ACS principal. We nearly asked if they would take our little girl

We visited nhps, nyps, hpps, rgps booths. Still unsure which to put as 1st choice, hpps or nyps, though nyps is nearest. My own opinion, I feel the children are most happy and humorous at hpps out of the ones we visited.

[Lock]

We have made our choice, submitted the form and now all we can do is wait for the posting.

[porcupine12trade]

Lock:

We have made our choice, submitted the form and now all we can do is wait for the posting.

Hi Lock,

Is it ok to share your choice and how did you arrive at the choice, thank you.

[meekopeeko]

Interestingly, spoke to a few teachers at the booths and all of them emphasized that our GE kids will be prepared adequately for PSLE.


Of course expectations can be different. What the teachers mean by being prepared may not be good enough for some of the parents and busybodies here.

Now I really understand what our kids are robbed of. LEARNING JOURNEY. It’s not just the GE kids, it’s also the same for mainstreamers taking PSLE. When we adults say we want to protect the children’s childhood, it should include the space for children to explore, learn and grow freely.

Being brilliant at P3 whether in GEP or mainstream does not mean that the same child will do fantastic at P6. Or at sec 4. Or jc2. Or uni. I don’t think parents ought to be over-confident about the prospects of a child regardless of the programme he enrols into, because there are many challenges yet to be overcome. It’s probably not wise to make decisions based on pigeon-holes.

[Lock]

porcupine12trade:

Lock:

We have made our choice, submitted the form and now all we can do is wait for the posting.

Hi Lock,

Is it ok to share your choice and how did you arrive at the choice, thank you.

First of all, we (DH and I) are not concerned with the PSLE score. If that was one of the deciding factors, we would have stayed in Rulang and not even go for GEP.

Rulang's result over the past years:
Highest Aggregate Score:\t281('08)\t283('09)\t275('10)\t283('11)
No. of Pupils Scoring 4A*\t20('08)\t20('09)\t32('10)\t20('11)
No. of Pupils with aggregate score of 250 and above: 65('08) 74('09) 78('10) 63('11)

Do bear in mind Rulang is NOT a GEP school and the school is located in a HDB heartland, hence, the profiles of the majority of the students there are mainly neighbourhood kids. For the school to do so well consistently over the years says much about the dedication of the teachers and the programmes there. We love Rulang very much and was torn with GEP or not initially.

However, having spoken to current teachers from various schools, friends whose kids are in the GEP programme and their kids, we have come to like what we hear about the curriculum and the close mentoring each kid can get from their teachers in GEP. This is something Rulang can't match up. (top classes have 40-45 students). Though Rulang also has very good enrichment programmes but a large portion of the time will still be taken up for drills and practices for PSLE. I would say the learning journey in Rulang will not be as enriched compared to GEP.

Once we have decided to go GEP, then the decision-making for the choice of school is much easier. After talking to DS and also knowing our kid's strengths and weaknesses, it was decided that he will not take HCL next year even though he did not score too badly for his SA2 CL. We do not rule out HCL in P5/P6 but for now we prefer to let him slowly learn and enjoy the language than to 'kill' it from the start.

Heard from friends currently in NHPS that the CL there is EXTREMELY difficult, plus from this forum, someone mentions that 75% of NYPS GEP kids have tuition. That, to us is an alarmingly high percentage. DS only has CL tuition currently and we hope to keep it that way even in GEP. With these 2 schs out, and other centres being TOO FAR away, we are only left with ACS and HPPS.

Finally, we put ACS as 1st choice due to religion and the CCAs they offer and that leaves HPPS to the 2nd choice. Yes. I only put 2 choices.

[laikiasu]

Wow, Lock, you have the exact same sentiments as me!

Nearest to me is Rosyth but I noticed they don’t offer as many CCAs as ACS. I was quite touched by my DS being so considerate over the distance we have to travel to ACS so he said he didn’t mind Rosyth even if he has to take HCL.
Well, my DH and I are more or less decided, it’s between Rosyth and ACS as first choice, but now will leave it to my DS to make the final decision and pen down the choices. After all, he will be the one who will go through the learning journey and life experiences. As parents, we can only guide them.

Oh, LOCk, do pm me if you’ve been posted to ACS.

[Kabby]

agree with the part about HPPS kids being very humorous. my ds was laughing away when they were talking to him. I was asking the trs some questions then so did not hear what they talked about. but after that when i asked ds, he said they were telling him all the pranks they played on each other and the teachers, and about science experiments that they tried out in class that were out of the world!


after that, ds kept saying that's the only school he wants....

[Zann]

marcolisa:

Ragamuffin shinobi:

Glad that we went for the briefing. DS is convinced that GEP curriculum is something he would like to try, he thinks the student briefing is great and he actually enjoyed the session. From not wanting to go to he is definitely going for it.

For the benefit of other who might want to know, this year out of 4000 who cleared first round, 557 made it to GEP, of which 325 are boys and 232 girls.

School posting result out on 26th Nov.

Hi JAR, I went for the briefing this morning and just realise that although I know the posting will be on 26th nov, I don't really recall how they said they would inform us... :oops: did you or any other parent happen to catch that?

When I submit the form jus now after the briefing, the staff tell me to check the address on the form if it is correct, they will post the result to us to this address.[/quote]

Can share with us what are your choices like?