Is GEP really necessary?
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Mawar:
I like the cater to kids with special needs part. I think that's what I think should be it, too! As it is, those who survive the GEP will survive anywhere and are great achievers with or without GEP. Let's land help to those who need it most. Those with special needs and learning disabilities but clearly bright intellectually and cannot fit in. That way, we nurture more capable folks into the work force and possibly lead in many areas as well.Is GEP really necessary?
If it's designed to cater to kids with special needs, yes.
If the intention is to groom leaders or specialists in a developing country to raise the quality of the human resource, yes. But Singapore has progressed beyond this need.
Unfortunately, the GEP is used as a guaranteed passport to an elite education. This is the grand prize that pushes all parents to overdrive.
So much is invested in so few, and these few are given the best tools and resources. And at the end of P6, the same students fight an unfair placement fight with the GEPpers given an almost confirmed DSA. The leftover places in coveted secondary schools forces parents to a feeding frenzy. -
verykiasu2010:
Ok, not IP school. School which school fees was $200+ then. Independent school?
IP only started in year 2004, and EESIS is not restricted to GEP only2ppaamm:
Plus a scholarship for the rest of your secondary school years, plus all the benefits you get, plus the cohort you mix with, plus the branding. Sure is the rest of your life for some poor families who cannot afford this kind of education.
O, plus better DSA chance into a good sec school.
Imagine a child gifted in English ONLY from a poor family. He will have no opportunities to go to a good sec school, deprived of a GEP class he deserves. I have one such case. Fortunately, he was identified in 1996 (P4). He could not afford an IP education without that GEP scholarship. Imagine, this same person nearly had no tertiary education. And, guess what. He is gifted, so gifted in humanities and write so well that he is rare...
I'll share a little about what he said.
He told me he felt out of place all these years in GEP because he was gifted in Humanities and not Science and Math. It exasperated the teachers, he could not cope at all with those subjects. But wow, his humanities was like really fantastic. So his teachers had wanted him to drop out of GEP at secondary school because of his science /maths subjects. However, he comes from a very poor family, and if they were to remove him from GEP, he would have to go to a neighbourhood school, because the school fees in his school was $200+, and his family could not afford that. So his teachers help him stay in GEP until Sec 4.
This student then went and signed on with SAF after A levels. He returned to school after his contract to finish his tertiary education after he earned enough to put himself through university.
As true as it can get.
Anything else to pick?
In today's world, he will have no chance of GEP, go to an independent school, but making it to uni? Maybe, if he did not go astray. -
Hello,
Just managed to skim through the posts here.
May I know what does EESIS stand for??
Thanks in advance
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autumnbronze:
http://www.abbreviations.com/EEISHello,
Just managed to skim through the posts here.
May I know what does EESIS stand for??
Thanks in advance
End-to-end Information System or Engineering and Evaluation and Investigation Services :evil:
Or, someone else will put up the full name of this scholarship.
Hm... good idea. Everyone should be on the same criteria before they get their scholarship, GEP or not. I think that is good. Do you think this will be fair? How come GEPers have a different set of criteria for EEIS as of today? Might as well don't do PSLE.
http://www.moe.gov.sg/initiatives/edusave/funds-grants-awards/eesis/ -
2ppaamm:
Ok, not IP schol. School which school fees was $200+ then. Independent school?
IP only started in year 2004, and EESIS is not restricted to GEP onlyverykiasu2010:
[quote=\"2ppaamm\"]
Plus a scholarship for the rest of your secondary school years, plus all the benefits you get, plus the cohort you mix with, plus the branding. Sure is the rest of your life for some poor families who cannot afford this kind of education.
O, plus better DSA chance into a good sec school.
Imagine a child gifted in English ONLY from a poor family. He will have no opportunities to go to a good sec school, deprived of a GEP class he deserves. I have one such case. Fortunately, he was identified in 1996 (P4). He could not afford an IP education without that GEP scholarship. Imagine, this same person nearly had no tertiary education. And, guess what. He is gifted, so gifted in humanities and write so well that he is rare...
I'll share a little about what he said.
He told me he felt out of place all these years in GEP because he was gifted in Humanities and not Science and Math. It exasperated the teachers, he could not cope at all with those subjects. But wow, his humanities was like really fantastic. So his teachers had wanted him to drop out of GEP at secondary school because of his science /maths subjects. However, he comes from a very poor family, and if they were to remove him from GEP, he would have to go to a neighbourhood school, because the school fees in his school was $200+, and his family could not afford that. So he remained in GEP until Sec 4.
This student then went and signed on with SAF after A levels. He returned to school after his contract to finish his tertiary education after he earned enough to put himself through university.
As true as it can get.[/quote]I know of a somewhat similar case.
In your case written here, the teachers wanted him to drop out, but he had a choice to decide that he didn't want to drop out and continue with the GEP program? So I reckon that the GEP program allowed him the choice, or did the review committee decided he was worth the effort to be kept in based on his ability in humanities subjects.
Cheers. -
simple2005:
He had no choice. Have a thought about this boy (now adult). He is from a poor family, parents illiterate. He was fairing badly in Maths/Science, he was very matured, but he was completely lost in those subjects. He felt GEP is too Science/Math-geared. So he was lonely and lost. Fortunately, they considered his family background and put him back into the program. I shudder to think what would have happened otherwise. You should see him today. What a fine young man. He writes better than many Singaporean Professors, no kidding!
I know of a somewhat similar case.
In your case written here, the teachers wanted him to drop out, but he had a choice to decide that he didn't want to drop out and continue with the GEP program? So I reckon that the GEP program allowed him the choice, or did the review committee decided he was worth the effort to be kept in based on his ability in humanities subjects.
Cheers.
I spoke to some GEP teachers in those era, and they shared how difficult it was to help such cases. They are so humanities-geared, or so gifted in one area, it is almost impossible to teach them maths at all! These teachers face the consequence of poor O levels results (principals will downgrade them), so they put pressure on these kids. Just so crazy... the same old KPI thingy...
So these days, to make things easy, just choose students who are good at both English and Math, and leave these gifted ones behind. Leave those who are more gifted in either behind... What a pity... what a pity...
And, remember, that's one of the reasons why I believe many GEP kids these days are not 'gifted' in that sense, but more high ability or prep'd children. They do take up places that would have gone to these gifted kids. Sorry GEP parents, I am just being very frank here. -
In life's nothing's guaranteed but a leg up goes a long way.
I have nothing against the GEP program. I think most of the GEPpers are smart but I also believe few of them are truly gifted. :siam: :siam: That's why I wrote earlier that to a certain degree, it is the luck of the draw.
I encouraged my own kids to go for the tests. The reason is the leg up to the secondary school of their choice. They are strong students, and I can confidently say that given the chance, they would do as well as the next GEPper. They did not go for special coaching nor do they have tuition. But they, like many other high ability students, will face an unfair competition at the end of P6. More than half of the DSA places will be offered to GEPpers who might present a lower score than them.
If we take away the DSA advantage, would the feeding frenzy cease? I think so. Then more parents will think twice. They will view the GEP as an alternative pedagogy to meet their kids' learning needs rather than an elite path to success.
I say let the kids fightly fairly and win squarely based on PSLE scores. -
Mawar:
Hahaha... I don't even think we should have PSLE but that's another topic.In life's nothing's guaranteed but a leg up goes a long way.
I have nothing against the GEP program. I think most of the GEPpers are smart but I also believe few of them are truly gifted. :siam: :siam: That's why I wrote earlier that to a certain degree, it is the luck of the draw.
I encouraged my own kids to go for the tests. The reason is the leg up to the secondary school of their choice. They are strong students, and I can confidently say that given the chance, they would do as well as the next GEPper. They did not go for special coaching nor do they have tuition. But they, like many other high ability students, will face an unfair competition at the end of P6. More than half of the DSA places will be offered to GEPpers who might present a lower score than them.
If we take away the DSA advantage, would the feeding frenzy cease? I think so. Then more parents will think twice. They will view the GEP as an alternative pedagogy to meet their kids' learning needs rather than an elite path to success.
I say let the kids fightly fairly and win squarely based on PSLE scores.
But I have to agree. Being able to do a test well once cannot be used to determine the future of 9 year olds, or 12 year olds for that matter. Times have changed, the sophistication of parents have changed, the society has changed, but the system is still there, after almost 30 years. -
Does taking away the so called 'DSA advantage' for the GEP students and solely based on PSLE score for the admission to the secondary school mean a fair and square game for all the P6 students. To get into the few TOP secondary schools, all P6 students must do extremely well for all 4 subjects. The GEP students must have the time to work on their weaker subjects too. The GEP students spent quite a lot of time doing the projects ( at least 2 projects on social studies - a non PSLE subjects per year and various other projects from the other 4 subjects ) from P4 to P6. Unlike the mainstream where PSLE preparation begins in P5 ( in some schools, even in P4), in GEP the preparation for PSLE starts after the P6 SA1. The GEP pupils face extreme stress to master all 4 subjects in a short time frame. Also not all gep students are successful in their DSA. To have higher chance of success, one has to do consistently well in all tests and exam in P5 and P6. They have to go through the interview process too. It is a lot of hard work. In short, the GEP students have to work hard to ensure a place in the top few secondary schools too. It is not something that is given to them because they are in GEP. They really work hard for it.
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simple2005:
:goodpost:
The gifted children in general terms are one who have higher abilities in specific areas, and/or in general, are able to pick up advanced concepts quickly. In many cases, mainstream way of learning through drilling/assessment books etc do not suit them, and perhaps they are repulsive to them. But having such abilities does not mean they will get the best results in school, the idea is to have a program where they can learn through their abilities, and the program is such that it will likely not suit other children, who benefits more from the mainstream teaching/study methods.
These children are sometimes also termed to have asynchronous development, meaning they have much high ability in certain areas, but normal in others. So for example, some are mature in understanding complex mathematical concepts, but struggle to come to terms with sharing, just like other children. The program is to not stifle their ability to absorb while they exhibit it so young, but also to manage their growth in other areas. In many cases, these children could be more difficult to handle, they can debate with advanced skills of logic and language, on the most trivial childish topics.
For a lack of a better term, GEP is also a 'special needs' program for young children coming to terms with their advanced ability which is not aligned with their development based on age.
It's probably also true that as they grow, the mainstream children do catch up, and perhaps be on par, or better then the GEP peers, that is possible. But the key (at least to me) is to manage the 'inbalance' while they are young.
This is purely my own personal views. Not a right or wrong, I'm still coming to understand how the program can help the child grow.
Cheers.
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