Aristocare
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Zeng:
The fact that CASE came out and stated its stand in our national papers and inviting people to take legal recourse in this case is already quite unusual. We have to give them credit for this.
Nope, relevant authorities won't check. As I've mentioned earlier in this thread, why would the government get its hands dirty? It'll just sit back, relax, and let the disgruntled parents hire private investigators and lawyers.ForumWriter:
[quote=\"Zeng\"]Thats why the relevant authorities (or anyone here can confirm) should check if this so called center is registered bec in its original website info before it was taken down and in this thread, it was mentioned that there is a $200 registration fee ( payable annually) and a deposit. So if it is not a tution center, is the Consumer Act that Case mentioned in ST applicable? If these are free lance private transactions, what kind of rules/law are applicable?
If you recall, in their website, Aristocare has 3 names as \"directors\" and \"principal\". Where are there? How come ST did not mention or interview all these directors?
The forum letter from CASE already proves it, right? Instead of starting its own investigation to find out who was affected and take action against KO, it chooses to write a letter, inviting people to officially complain and seek legal action. Easy way out.
Of course, it's obvious that not everyone reads the papers/forums every day and could have missed CASE's message, but CASE doesn't care, does it?
I still stand by what I say: Parents should not get refunds since they were told by the government that GEP can't be trained (implication: GEP training sessions are useless/fake). But the government should still take action against KO just like any other scammer, instead of waiting for people to take their own legal action.
Under what law will the relevant authorities be able to take action against aristocare?[/quote]Yup, if there isn't a law, create one! Or set up an independent panel to make recommendations on how to deal with these sort of tuition centres (not necessarily take action). That's why we have MPs and Parliament. Lim Biow Chuan, president of CASE, is an MP. He should raise this issue of scamming up in Parliament as well.
There is a law against scamming already, just that no one enforces it. After all, Singapore is best-known in the world for its laws, right?
Don't have to go through such elaborate scam as KO. Simple one of collecting payment then not showing up will do. Last time for music lessons, we paid an entire month's worth in advance, but the tutor just showed up for the first lesson and subsequently AWOLed. Reported to the police, they filed the case but took no further action even though we provided his name, contact number and address for their easy reference.
Look at it realistically. It is almost impossible for parents to get the names of all the affected parents to file a class-action lawsuit right? But if the government just demands his records, it will have access to the names of affected parties immediately.
The government needs to take more pro-active action; if anything, it shows that it is determined to stamp out scamming personally. Instead of just sitting back because this matter falls outside of its responsibility. -
Spanking and caning works. I got it, and I was more worried if my parents had found out that I had it meted out to me the House Head, at school.
They stopped doing it here, in the UK, in 1987. "Spare the rod, and spoil the child" has led to what one poster on here mentioned as the UK’s poor governance and societal decline - and the riots that we had last summer.
Bring back the cane; I am an advocate. -
Errrrr… ok… seriously… i use the cane to scare my child.
My dds can tell me "Mummy, caning is a form of child abuse". It’s true…
Kids nowadays read widely, they know, unlike us when we were young. -
optimistforum:
Actually, I was hardly & the least caned among my siblings.Spanking and caning works. I got it, and I was more worried if my parents had found out that I had it meted out to me the House Head, at school.
They stopped doing it here, in the UK, in 1987. \"Spare the rod, and spoil the child\" has led to what one poster on here mentioned as the UK's poor governance and societal decline - and the rights that we had last summer.
Bring back the cane; I am an advocate.
But I am an advocate too. As long as we are in control of our anger/strength, when used sparingly and rationally, I believe it works. :spank: :spank: :spank: -
NickleBee Tutors:
I'm all for tough questions in the exams, it can be as tough as possible and I still say it is alright if the teachers teach students the techniques in answering such questions. Sadly, this is not the case. There is a big gap between what is taught and what is tested. It is this gap that is the crux of the issue, not the difficulty of the exams. As you have mentioned, the parents are finding it difficult to teach their children. That statement shows that the responsibility of teaching shifted to the parents, which is wrong.
Most parents think that the curriculum is getting harder, especially for Primary School Maths. I am sorry to disappoint but it is not so. What is happening is that MOE demands that their students master skillsets such as critical thinking, problem solving and heuristics which are skills much needed in the brave new world that is the 21th century our children will grow up in. Such skills are indeed tough for parents who were brought up to absorb knowledge unquestioningly and regurgitate the information during exams to get the appropriate marks. I personally approve of the way MOE is teaching maths nowdays but I believe that MOE could get better returns by perhaps having smaller class sizes when teaching problem solving skills and heuristics.
The responsibility lies with the teachers, not with the parents, not with the tuition agencies.
The difficulty of the exams should be in line with what is taught in classes. If MOE wants to raise the bar, then please raise the pedagogy bar first. This is akin to sending your athletes to the Olympics games by just telling the athletes to train 7 days a week on their own, with very little techniques taught to the athletes. In the end, all the athletes are forced to employ personal coaches in order to compete. When the athletes do badly in the games, the coach is fired. Did they blame the parents of the athletes for non performance ? It is very clear where the responsibility lies.
Have a look at the Maths Q&A threads. Most questions asked are the same type of questions over and over again, simply because, in spite of all the heuristics and modelling techniques, the analytical thinking skill is missing. Students just use it without understanding the analysis. Some posters will even say: \" I normalize the ratio, now I'm stuck\". They don't understand why they need to normalize, just memorize first step, normalize, 2nd step, .... They are just memorizing the mechanical aspects of solving the problem sum, it is still memorization and regurgitation, just of a different nature.
Coming up with more and more complex problems doesn't solve the issue, they are always ways to solve complex problems by looking for problem patterns without true understanding and analysis. -
Assessment should assess what was taught and not what was not taught or else it wouldn’t be a fair assessment. But herein lies the difficulty. Schools claim the students are assessed on what was taught but parents claim otherwise. How to verify and who should verify?
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cimman:
enuf said of teachers and parents - all kinds of false accusations.
The difficulty of the exams should be in line with what is taught in classes. If MOE wants to raise the bar, then please raise the pedagogy bar first. This is akin to sending your athletes to the Olympics games by just telling the athletes to train 7 days a week on their own, with very little techniques taught to the athletes. In the end, all the athletes are forced to employ personal coaches in order to compete. When the athletes do badly in the games, the coach is fired. Did they blame the parents of the athletes for non performance ? It is very clear where the responsibility lies.
Have a look at the Maths Q&A threads. Most questions asked are the same type of questions over and over again, simply because, in spite of all the heuristics and modelling techniques, the analytical thinking skill is missing. Students just use it without understanding the analysis. Some posters will even say: \" I normalize the ratio, now I'm stuck\". They don't understand why they need to normalize, just memorize first step, normalize, 2nd step, .... They are just memorizing the mechanical aspects of solving the problem sum, it is still memorization and regurgitation, just of a different nature.
Coming up with more and more complex problems doesn't solve the issue, they are always ways to solve complex problems by looking for problem patterns without true understanding and analysis.
none has said whether it is the students not paying attention in class
I seriously doubt all the claims about testing beyond what was taught.
I asked my kids - they all said all have been taught in class, can even pull out the worksheet to show, every topic of them.
I would say all those claims are nonsense and rubbish. Okay, people are NOT happy at me for calling these claims as rubbish - but I will still say it here again. Some people are also unwilling to accept that their kids are no where near the top talent but expect them to perform the same as the top talent nonetheless.
I know people will not be happy with what I post here on this. Slam all you want, criticize all you want, ban me if you want. AND, don't expect me to reply to any of this. Enough said. No point rehashing all old arguments.
Dear cimman, this reply is NOT directed at you or your post, just borrowing your post as a quote. Thank you for your understanding.
Bye !
:siam: :siam:
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verykiasu2010:
no problem. Always good to see opposing views.....
Dear cimman, this reply is NOT directed at you or your post, just borrowing your post as a quote. Thank you for your understanding.
Bye ! :siam: :siam:
this world would be a boring place if everyone agrees with everyone. -
To bring everyone back to the original thread, this one is quite funnily written
Aristocare Great Bluff and the Singapore Kiasu Dream
http://pratapolitics.blogspot.sg/2012/08/aristocares-great-bluff-and-singaporean.html -
Interesting blog from NMP Yee and criteria for MOE reg center
http://yeejj.wordpress.com/2012/08/06/tuition-scam/
Reflecting on a tuition scamyeejj
August 6, 2012
The recent case of math tutor Kelvin Ong who cheated with false credentials is disturbing on two counts.
First, in a lucrative and highly unregulated industry that is overly subscribed to by the majority of parents in Singapore, it is all too easy to get away with fake credentials. Perhaps Kelvin Ong carried his boasts too far. He was never a gifted education student himself, never studied in a GEP school and at NUS which he had claimed, and was merely a relief teacher briefly in a school. In fact, it turned out that he was not a university graduate at all, much less a double mathematics major at NUS.
He simply played on parents’ anxiety to get their children into the gifted education progaramme (GEP) and threw up credentials hoping to get away with it. And it seemed he did so for a number of years before MOE, which usually do not intervene in the private tuition market, stepped in to expose his claims. NUS followed suit by verifying that he never attended their programmes. I am glad MOE took the initial step to expose Kelvin or else more unsuspecting public will be tricked.
That begs the question how many had practised this trade with fake claims unexposed, perhaps because they never carried it as loudly and as boldly as Kelvin did. It is hard for parents to verify claims as they usually trust the tutor or the centre to be honest with the credentials. Not all parents are also academically equipped to tell if a tutor is really teaching well or not, and the child may not be able to tell or may not bother to complain to the parents if the tutor does not seem up to the mark.
It is common to see tuition centre advertising themselves as MOE approved or registered centres. Just google “MOE approved tuition centre” and you will easily find many being listed. What does this mean? While MOE does allow learning centres to be registered with it, MOE does not endorse or accredit the quality of their courses. The process to register with MOE is purely an administrative one that most businesses can easily achieve. What it takes to be registered with MOE are the following documents:
■Approved floor plan by the Fire Safety and Shelter Department (FSSD)
■Fire Safety Certificate & Notice of Approval
■Grant of Written Permission from URA / HDB
■ACRA printout
■Committee of Management Forms Appointment Note (for sole-proprietor/partnership/LLP) or Directors’ Resolution (for company) to appoint the members of the Committee of Management
■Course Registration Forms
■Teacher Registration Forms
■School Constitution
■Memorandum & Articles of Association of Company
The process is simple. You will have many MOE-registered centres. I am not sure if ‘MOE-approved’ is even a right phrase to use, but many centres use that phrase nevertheless. It is designed to give parents unacquainted with this registration process a false impression that MOE has approved the quality of the programme and the teachers. Most parents do not know about this registration process nor do they check MOE’s disclaimer that “Registration by MOE does not in any way represent an endorsement or accreditation of the quality of the courses offered.”
Private teachers can also be registered with MOE online. The process and requirements are simple. It does not equate to teachers being National Institute of Education (NIE)-trained. Some tutors will also be advertised as having taught in MOE schools. Aparently, after he was exposed, Kelvin Ong reportedly said he had work as a relief teacher from 2002 – 2003 in a GEP school. There are several schemes nowadays that allow a non-NIE trained person to work in schools as allied educators, as relief teachers or with external service providers running enrichment programmes in schools. They would certainly have taught in schools but they may not have gone through the thorough and stringent training at NIE to be a true MOE qualified teacher.
One can say that tuition is something that is not part of our official education system. It is something parents desire and go into a contract with the tutor or with a tuition centre. However, the number of children having tuition is staggering. There are no official figures because there are many unregistered centres and even registered tuition centres do not report their enrolment to any authorities. A recent survey estimates 2/3 of students have tuition, but I suspect from my observation that this figure could be even higer. Administratively, MOE is not set up to have any resources to verify with every centre and with every tutor on a periodic basis to ensure quality. Hence, it implemented a simple registration process that is in no way a valid measure of the quality of the centre or the tutor.
It is easy for tutors and tuition centres to make false claims and credentials because there is no agency actively monitoring them, unless the claims have become so blatant and eye catching that warrants attention, like in Kelvin Ong’s case.
The second disturbing aspect is why there are so many parents desperate for tuition. In this case, it is tuition to prepare for the gifted education programme test, which technically should not be trained for because the tests are supposed to pick up natural giftedness. Yet parents had spent big time on Kelvin Ong and on other tuition centres advertising for GEP preparatory training. You can search online for “GEP prepatory classes” to see that such courses are common.
I had previously organised a few focus group discussions with parents to understand their mindset about GEP. It seems there are two strong reasons for parents to want their child in GEP.
The first compelling reason seems to be Direct School Admission (DSA) into the most desired independent schools at secondary 1. It seems independent schools roll out the red carpet for GEP students, so that when students are selected based on their GEP results in school, they only need to have a low minimum T-Score (usually 200) in PSLE to enter these top schools. I filed a parliamentary question in July to find out how many from GEP enter secondary school by DSA, and how many into the independent schools. 80% from GEP enter secondary school by DSA and 78% receives the Edusave Entrance Scholarships for Independent Schools (EESIS), which covers their tuition fees in these schools which are priced higher than other schools. That means 80% of the GEP students do not need to worry about their PSLE results. They enter into secondary 1 directly.
On EESIS, MOE’s website states the following:
“The EESIS are awarded up to the top one-third of the total number of Secondary One pupils admitted to all Independent Schools (IS), based on their PSLE results.
The EESIS is also awarded to P6 GEP pupils who are Singapore Citizens and who
1.meet the P6 GEP promotion criteria, and
2.are enrolled in the IP in an Independent School at S1.”
78% of GEP students (which is almost the 80% DSA figure) receive EESIS yearly. It does not seem to matter what their PSLE T-Score is, because as long as the GEP student is promoted to secondary 1 in the Integrated Programme (IP) of an Independent School, the GEP student receives the scholarship.
Independent schools comprised the top schools most desired by parents for their children. So entering GEP means an early and near assurance for the child to enter top schools like RI, RGS, Hwa Chong and Nanyang Girls High without having to compete with the rest of the cohort, and to get EESIS regardless of PSLE T-Score. Hence, parents are anxious to have this first shot at enrolling their child in the top secondary schools at primary 3.
A second reason is the programme itself, which comes with a small class size of 25 students, smaller than the typical 40-44 in other schools. Parents with children in both normal schools and in GEP tell me the small class size makes a lot of difference. Why would it not be with better attention that teachers can give to the smaller class. The GEP teachers are also specially handpicked to be in the programme and have gone through special training. Parents would naturally want these advantages for their children. It seems ironical that we can throw lots of resources at this 1% of students who mostly are naturally be able to do well regardless of the teachers but we are not able to commit similar resources at the lowest groups that need the smaller class size to help them catch up.
I think it is time to look at the situation. On the first count of lax regulations governing the industry, more could be done. Perhaps some registration body that verifies the certificates of tutors wishing to be registered tutors. This need not be done by MOE but can be by an association, for a reasonable membership or verification fee to list tutors on the database. Parents can then check the credentials of tutors from the online database without having to embarress the tutor by demanding to see proof of qualifications.
MOE lacks the resources to regulate the tuition industry under its current setup. It already has its hands full regulating the private education industry targetted at certification programmes for older students. While tuition can be said to be a private matter between parents and tution centres / tutors, I think more can be done by MOE to step in to shape the industry. I doubt an association of tutors would form naturally unless MOE intervenes to insist teachers on its registered database must first be on the association’s database. Getting registered centres to report their students enrolment and to keep an updated register of their teachers faithfully is also another step that can provide better data for MOE to monitor the situation.
I also hope MOE can take a review of the GEP programme to see if the DSA and EESIS advantages need to be in the system. If the motivation is to provide good programmes for these specifically identifed 1% of the cohort, there is no need for DSA and EESIS. The GEP students can go through normal DSA and compete for EESIS like all other PSLE students. Perhaps MOE can even critically examine if there is a need for centralised GEP and if they can decentralise the good aspects of GEP into every school, so that students need not be disrupted at primary 4 to be transferred to GEP schools. We should have faith that every school can be a good school and that we can work out programmes for good students in neighbourhood schools without having to signal that ‘good’ students must be uprooted to ‘good’ schools.
I also hope MOE can work more on assuring parents that teachers can sufficiently cover the curriculum without parents feeling that they require tuition to help their children catch up. One major problem is the class size. With 40 and more in a class, it is a challenge especially in some neighbourhood schools to get students to pay attention to the teaching. We should examine how class sizes can be cut across all primary and secondary levels and
how MOE’s budget or teachers’ loads can be rebalanced to achieve this.
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