jetsetter:

But did you and your peers continue to upskill thereafter?

jetsetter:

\"Underemployment\" is no good for the economy, i.e. underutilisation of talent 大才小用 means we're not attracting enough foreign investments/generating enough high-skill jobs for our grads (poly/uni regardless).

jetsetter:

OK, I've side-tracked...I know you were trying to say \"Underemployment\" isn't so much a problem as long as grads could apply their \"life/hard skills\"/flexibility to innovate those low-skill jobs to make them more efficient and profitable. But is this what we want to achieve in the long-run? Because once you leverage on innovation/automation, you would reduce your reliance on manpower and the underpaid, over-qualified PME (in an \"Underemployment\" situation) would be out of job sooner, thereby fuelling \"Unemployment\" in the country.

jetsetter:

sushi88:

[quote=\"pirate\"]
Often, this is knowledge that nobody will teach you, because nobody wants you to compete with him/her. This is knowledge you have to acquire on your own. Hence, while I laud the latest MOE exhortation towards the acquisition of \"hard skills\", I question how efficacious it will be unless we teach our children how to acquire the hard skills on their own even if nobody were willing to teach them these hard skills.

The university, even a second or third rate university, is usually the best place a young person has to learn this skill. A proper university education will equip one with the requisite research, logical, analytic, critical thinking and problem solving skills to acquire knowledge on one's own. I consider this to be a basic skill that Singaporeans should have if we are to be competitive. The 'hard' facts that one has to mug for, these can easily become obsolete.

Actually these skills and ways of learning are largely introduced in the curriculum whether in IP or 'O' levels.
Ah yes, my exact impression too, as I didn't read this before I replied pirate.
The IP route is not open to the majority of students. If it is, people would not be doing all sorts of funny things over DSA and PSLE. (Bringing us back to the original title of this thread! )

But you know what? Parents prefer to pay tutors $250 per hour to do it for the kids. This is our point of failure...not the lack of universities. MOE is already trying so hard to bring across such skills to be learnt regardless of what secondary school one goes to....but people make their own choices.... even astray ones....what to do? :faint:

Our govt is also kiasu to want to instill such basic skills for competitive...otherwise how we become so kiasu? What fails is we work a lot on the \"hardware\" and missing the \"software\"...perhaps software is harder to teach or convince people to pick it up.
Agree. I think pirate got it defined wrongly. It's soft skills he was trying to put across, right Mr Pirate?
Not quite. The soft skills equip one to acquire the hard skills that people don't want to teach for fear of competition, or as PM Lee says, the deep skills. Both are necessary to be competitive.

And I do not believe generally people assume that having a degree is a happy outcome...in fact people worry more to have a degree and no outcome, hence become more and more xenophobic, rightfully or wrongfully.
Yup, I also don't believe in this view of pirate. If people were happy, they won't complain so much!
Actually, I got the phrase \"happy outcome\" from PM Lee. If people do not generally assume that having a degree is a \"happy outcome\", then I don't see what the problem is with having too many graduates.

sushi88:

pirate:

Often, this is knowledge that nobody will teach you, because nobody wants you to compete with him/her. This is knowledge you have to acquire on your own. Hence, while I laud the latest MOE exhortation towards the acquisition of \"hard skills\", I question how efficacious it will be unless we teach our children how to acquire the hard skills on their own even if nobody were willing to teach them these hard skills.

The university, even a second or third rate university, is usually the best place a young person has to learn this skill. A proper university education will equip one with the requisite research, logical, analytic, critical thinking and problem solving skills to acquire knowledge on one's own. I consider this to be a basic skill that Singaporeans should have if we are to be competitive. The 'hard' facts that one has to mug for, these can easily become obsolete.

Actually these skills and ways of learning are largely introduced in the curriculum whether in IP or 'O' levels.
Ah yes, my exact impression too, as I didn't read this before I replied pirate.

But you know what? Parents prefer to pay tutors $250 per hour to do it for the kids. This is our point of failure...not the lack of universities. MOE is already trying so hard to bring across such skills to be learnt regardless of what secondary school one goes to....but people make their own choices.... even astray ones....what to do? :faint:

Our govt is also kiasu to want to instill such basic skills for competitive...otherwise how we become so kiasu? What fails is we work a lot on the \"hardware\" and missing the \"software\"...perhaps software is harder to teach or convince people to pick it up.
Agree. I think pirate got it defined wrongly. It's soft skills he was trying to put across, right Mr Pirate?

And I do not believe generally people assume that having a degree is a happy outcome...in fact people worry more to have a degree and no outcome, hence become more and more xenophobic, rightfully or wrongfully.
Yup, I also don't believe in this view of pirate. If people were happy, they won't complain so much!

pirate:

jetsetter:

I don't quite understand your worry about our tertiary placements, pirate. Didn't PM announce in his 2012 NDR that there'd be 6 universities. I quote:
[quote]Other countries have made this mistake, you produce unemployed graduates, underemployed graduates. Europe has got them, Britain, America, even China, many graduates come out looking for work, cannot find work. So we must avoid leading people up the wrong path, misleading them that if you spend three years of your life doing this, at the end you will have a happy outcome. We must make sure that if we let people go that way and encourage people to go that way, that at the end the prospects are good.

Need to get a post-grad certification, perhaps?

pirate:

Often, this is knowledge that nobody will teach you, because nobody wants you to compete with him/her. This is knowledge you have to acquire on your own. Hence, while I laud the latest MOE exhortation towards the acquisition of \"hard skills\", I question how efficacious it will be unless we teach our children how to acquire the hard skills on their own even if nobody were willing to teach them these hard skills.

The university, even a second or third rate university, is usually the best place a young person has to learn this skill. A proper university education will equip one with the requisite research, logical, analytic, critical thinking and problem solving skills to acquire knowledge on one's own. I consider this to be a basic skill that Singaporeans should have if we are to be competitive. The 'hard' facts that one has to mug for, these can easily become obsolete.

pirate:

I am not only talking about medicine, even though the fact remains that we have significant numbers of doctors from Malaysia, India, Myanmar, Philippines etc here.


I am flogging the horse because I can see that it is unfair to our youngsters to expect straight As or whatever from them, while we are obliged to recognize the qualifications of others who do not necessarily need to have straight As. In the specific case of medicine, even straight As may not be good enough to get you into the faculty.

There is a disconnect here, leading to double standards. It is not fair to our young. And it is depriving them of the opportunity to reach their full potential.

jetsetter:

I don't quite understand your worry about our tertiary placements, pirate. Didn't PM announce in his 2012 NDR that there'd be 6 universities. I quote:
[quote]Other countries have made this mistake, you produce unemployed graduates, underemployed graduates. Europe has got them, Britain, America, even China, many graduates come out looking for work, cannot find work. So we must avoid leading people up the wrong path, misleading them that if you spend three years of your life doing this, at the end you will have a happy outcome. We must make sure that if we let people go that way and encourage people to go that way, that at the end the prospects are good.

pirate:

jetsetter:

pirate:


haha, I was skimming through your post to find \"CECA\", but so far you only put ASEAN MRA.

Since the Population White Paper was released, SG has made significant changes to our EP Framework to reduce the inflow of foreign workers to strengthen the Singaporean Core, right?

pirate:

I am not too concerned about those who are able to get into NUS, NTU or SMU. They should be expected to be able to take care of themselves and to compete with the best of the best.

My question is, what about the rest of our children? What about those youngsters who are not able to get into the likes of NUS, NTU or SMU, but if they were nationals of other countries would have qualified for university courses in their home countries which would lead to home country professional qualifications?

pirate:

but if they were nationals of other countries would have qualified for university courses in their home countries which would lead to home country professional qualifications?

pirate:

Hence, I am still flogging the horse that Singapore needs a second or even third tier university. And we need it fast. Many of these FTAs have been in effect for years. Until we do, we are limiting the space and opportunities for our children to be the best that they can be.

Can we pull our heads out of the elitist sand that is our obsession with producing the best of the best for a moment here, and think about the average joes, or in this case, even the above average joes?

pirate:

Hence, I am still flogging the horse that Singapore needs a second or even third tier university. And we need it fast. Many of these FTAs have been in effect for years. Until we do, we are limiting the space and opportunities for our children to be the best that they can be.

Can we pull our heads out of the elitist sand that is our obsession with producing the best of the best for a moment here, and think about the average joes, or in this case, even the above average joes?

pirate:

The MRA does not allow us to impose any other additional tests.

pirate:

The MRA does not allow us to impose any other additional tests. That would defeat the whole point of the MRAs.

The control that exists is in relation to MOM foreign worker ratios. The ratio does not apply to employment passes. The MRAs mean that MOM cannot say that their home country professional qualifications are not \"acceptable\".

jetsetter:

pirate:


haha, I was skimming through your post to find \"CECA\", but so far you only put ASEAN MRA.

Since the Population White Paper was released, SG has made significant changes to our EP Framework to reduce the inflow of foreign workers to strengthen the Singaporean Core, right?

sushi88:

You make a valid point to look at these MRAs. However, I would mitigate it with a locally prescribed test to set the standards we want in each industry for all these graduates of foreign countries. We should not be taking in professionals not qualified enough from the second or third tier universities if they fail this qualifying test in SG. It is true that best talent in each country differs and our students not selected for the much coveted industry could actually be stronger candidates than the best talent elsewhere. But do we need so many top best talent in the same industry?


I still maintain the fact that we do not put all our best talent in the same basket in the interest of the country. In the interest of individuals, I support your proposition. Having said this, perhaps the door is indeed currently too narrow now...and may be worthwhile to evaluate how much we should open that door, not risking the fact of converging all top talent into one area. You know I know who know the best statistics to look into the issue. Also, the oversupply locally may no longer be such an issue if MRA is an option for our local grads to go work in those countries too.

Btw, the highlighted...are you sure is any number of? Should there not be a quota or is limited by our demand for such professionals?

pirate:

There is one moving part which we have not discussed here, and that is the Asean Mutual Recognition Arrangements. Apparently, professions such as doctors, dentists, nurses, surveyors, architects, accountants, engineers and tourism practitioners are now covered by these MRAs. Under the MRAs, Singapore is obliged to recognize the qualifications of practitioners who are qualified in their ASEAN home countries. This means that doctors, dentists, architects, accountants, engineers etc who are qualified to practice in say Malaysia, Indonesia, Myanmar, Philippines, Vietnam, Cambodia etc are entitled to have their qualifications recognized in Singapore.


In the bigger scheme of things, does nobody see a problem with the potential oversupply argument? On the one hand, we deny our children the opportunity to pursue their professional dreams even if they actually qualify for these university courses, all in the name of preventing oversupply and keeping up the reputation of our universities. On the other hand, we are obliged to recognize the qualifications of any number of foreign nationals from ASEAN countries even if they graduated from what we seem to happily dismiss as second or even third tier universities.

How do we think our children are supposed to compete with these foreign graduates if we are not even prepared to equip them with the relevant tertiary education (unless they qualify for supposedly top tier universities)? Is our education philosophy so full of hubris that we actually think that our children with diplomas or A-levels are able to compete fairly with these foreign graduates with home country professional qualifications?

Or is it a case of, so far as middle and lower tier graduates and professionals are concerned, it is cheaper to import foreign graduates than to educate our own children?

pirate:

sushi88:

True but another possibility could be the number of medical students recruited is small because they find many students unsuitable even though their grades qualify? The fact that Malaysia is suffering quitters half-way, this is likely what SG is trying hard at interviews to determine and avoid the problems here.

The government has already admitted that the reason we cannot ramp up the training of enough doctors to meet our projected needs is because we do not have enough teaching doctors. What they have not said is that this is a legacy from the policies in the 70s-90s to limit the number of doctors, even though this is painfully obvious.

Yes, that is a reason cited but only one. The implications are multidimensional as mentioned earlier. However, the effort to increase vacancies via NTU is one alternative solution so I am not so sure about this legacy whether it is as stringently practised as you believe it to be.

The government may have had good intention, ie. we cannot have all the top students studying medicine etc etc., but history has shown that they are equally susceptible to messing up their projections. If we cannot even produce enough doctors to meet our population's projected medical needs, how are we supposed to build up a medical tourism sector?

A direct answer to the question, I believe a combo of many-ways-to-solve-a-problem approach and give-me-some-time posturing has been adopted

Experience has also shown that those rejected are just as likely to not have given up halfway - viz the number who could afford to go overseas on their parents' scholarship and became doctors. In terms of effect, getting accepted or rejected was practically random.

I do not draw the same conclusion from the same experience you mentioned on random acceptance and rejection because (A) the selection criteria is not one-dimensional, i.e. only to suss out people who would quit half way (B) we do not know if people do not give up because parents' scholarship are even bigger stakes they cannot afford to fail,i.e. if done locally, they could give up faster with lower stakes? So your data point on statistics of people not giving up overseas can be scrutinised further. What I am saying is this statistics alone cannot conclusively tell us that what they can persist to achieve overseas, for sure they would persist if done locally. I still believe the interview plays an important role to decide the candidates, not as random as you have put it though I would agree it is not perfectly flawless.


The idea that one can assign good students more or less randomly to other fields of study is just as flawed as what is happening in Malaysia. Students with no interest in the field (such as engineering) they are assigned to will eventually quit as well.

The assignment is not exactly random...it is still one of the choices of the students...just not their first choice. If they have no interest, they should not even apply to engineering.... and the only reason they would is because they just want to get a degree...so this fallacy of wanting to pursue their passion need to be re-looked. After medicine, one should choose pharma right? or if one knows the doctor trait in self is to solve and cure problems, then perhaps being a computer doctor is still closer than engineering which is broader in scope?

As for Malaysia, if you know the sort of students they admit to medical school due to their affirmative action policies, you would not be surprised with what's happening.

It is true that Malaysia has never successfully surprised me.. :rotflmao:

Ultimately, the question boils down to this. Who is more likely to quit? Someone who professes an interest (even though it may or may not actually be the parents' ambition), or someone who professes no interest at all to begin with?[/color]

We agree that interest is important except that we define this interest differently. For example, like what someone mentioned earlier, if one has no heart to heal but using medicine practice as a springboard to make megabucks, I believe most of us have a concern in that kind of interest. From what I infer in your advocate of broader \"interest\"i.e. as long as there is interest, regardless of types of interest, it includes this category and hence a bigger door is still what you would like to see.

I am not completely closed to your idea too because I also believe that if there is more supply of doctors, we, the patients, also have more choices to choose who we want to see and control the megabucks dream in some ways if the interest is misplaced but of course there is a risk involved.

sushi88:

pirate:

[quote=\"sushi88\"]
I thought you know? :?
1.Interest must be genuine coming from self.....not just results qualify and pander to parents' wants.

Keeping the number of medical graduates artificially small does not ensure that those selected for the course have genuine interest coming from self.

True but another possibility could be the number of medical students recruited is small because they find many students unsuitable even though their grades qualify? The fact that Malaysia is suffering quitters half-way, this is likely what SG is trying hard at interviews to determine and avoid the problems here.

The government has already admitted that the reason we cannot ramp up the training of enough doctors to meet our projected needs is because we do not have enough teaching doctors. What they have not said is that this is a legacy from the policies in the 70s-90s to limit the number of doctors, even though this is painfully obvious.

The government may have had good intention, ie. we cannot have all the top students studying medicine etc etc., but history has shown that they are equally susceptible to messing up their projections. If we cannot even produce enough doctors to meet our population's projected medical needs, how are we supposed to build up a medical tourism sector?

Experience has also shown that those rejected are just as likely to not have given up halfway - viz the number who could afford to go overseas on their parents' scholarship and became doctors. In terms of effect, getting accepted or rejected was practically random.

The idea that one can assign good students more or less randomly to other fields of study is just as flawed as what is happening in Malaysia. Students with no interest in the field (such as engineering) they are assigned to will eventually quit as well.

As for Malaysia, if you know the sort of students they admit to medical school due to their affirmative action policies, you would not be surprised with what's happening.

Ultimately, the question boils down to this. Who is more likely to quit? Someone who professes an interest (even though it may or may not actually be the parents' ambition), or someone who professes no interest at all to begin with?