lets be clear - even the so-called neighbourhood schools require an average of 80+ to get in. (My sincerest apologies) But i just found out that a secondary school in CCK requires a minimum of 244 to get in to its Express stream !

I do agree that it is us as parents and what is it we are expecting from our kids. just heard on radio this morning that (long ago) as shared by a listener, he got 216 and got a present but his cousin got 267 and got caning ! (for not topping the school).
Like it or not, PSLE is a necessary evil. Its for us and our kids to know where they stand in their cohort at this age. They can do better and parents should take PSLE, ‘O’ and ‘A’ levels as milestones check to gauge how our kids had progressed / developed and what else is required. once they are out in the workforce, its their own efforts that counts.
But we as parents owe our kids to help them grow up. Help them understand that the world outside is that much bigger.
While we cannot overemphasize the impact of PSLE, the truth is our kids need to know that there are others who are much much much more brilliant than them. our kid may be 1st in class but not in School. 1st in School but not in Singapore. 1st in Singapore but not in the world. this is believe is important.
sure, many of us are worried that our kids would give up knowing no matter how hard they try, they cannot be the best. do you want them to know now (now when you can help them) or later when they come out to work ?
being a parent is difficult. we need to first bond with our kids so that they can trust us and then we have to both wield the stick and carrot to encourage them to grow and do their best. I believe our kids need to always do their best because the ability to "geng" would come naturally !!
so let us as parents help our kids grow, let us push them to do their best but let us not forget we need to be their safety net - for as long as we can and for the little time we have on this earth.

i went for the RI open house. my sense is that there is no quota in terms of students that would be taken via DSA. its whether the students would (in the opinion of the school) fit. anyway, MOE had announced that the number of places in each school is increased from this year - As announced at MOE’s Committee of Supply Debate in 2017, all secondary schools will be able to admit up to 20% of their non-Integrated Programme Secondary 1 intake via the DSA starting from this year’s DSA-Sec Exercise. With this increase, students will have more options and opportunities to find a match between their strengths and interests and a secondary school that offers suitable programmes. so for RI, it’d mean 20% of 400 = 80 although at the open house, they mention they’d take about 30%

is there anywhere we can try to get the statistics of how many singaporeans at each stage ??