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Surpassing Shanghai: Education and Economics in Singapore
Singapore has had a good half century. Achieving independent sovereignty in 1965, the southeast Asian city-state has developed with incredible speed and is now one of the most competitive economies in the world. A significant amount of credit for this goes to Singapore's obsessive focus on education after it gained its independence, and it has lessons for us to learn despite its size.
The best way to think about Singapore for purposes of education in the U.S. is as a particularly empowered state. Singapore's population is roughly 87% that of Minnesota, and it contains significant cultural and linguistic diversity.
Let's assume that Minnesota decided it didn't care about federal funding linked to programs like No Child Left Behind or Race to the Top (and, really, it's not like we get a lot of money from those programs anyway). Having declared educational independence, what could Minnesota emulate from Singapore?
For starters, we could look at the close connection between Singapore's economic planning and its education system. Recognizing that its economic future lay in innovation and knowledge-based work, Singapore put a serious emphasis on skills related to those fields in its school system. Even now, they are re-evaluating their testing policies and instructional practices to de-emphasize rote skills and better develop students' penchants for creative thought and original problem solving.
Along similar lines, we might also consider beefing up our vocational training system. Too often consigned to second-rate status, vocational schools in the U.S. are chronically undervalued. Singapore, by contrast, has put significant energy into building a world-class vocational school system so that the 75% of its students that don't go to university still receive excellent preparation for current and future industries at high-quality junior colleges, polytechnics, and institutes for technical education.
As in Shanghai, Finland, and Japan, teaching is a highly regarded profession, and the top third of secondary students make up the recruiting ground for the National Institute of Education. Teachers' compensation is routinely adjusted to stay competitive with the private sector, and a multitude of indicators are used to guide professional development.
We would do well to consider how well our education system really does at serving all students. As I wrote earlier this week, we no longer have the luxury of relying on the Exceptional American to lead our economic development. It's time to put our efforts into educational equality.
[This is the fourth post in a series on the findings of Surpassing Shanghai: An Agenda for American Education Built on the World's Leading Systems. Read part 5. ]
Posted in Education | Related Topics: K-12 education Education Administration Education Funding Teachers
1 Comment
Yi Li You says:
January 13, 2012 at 8:44 am
Please don’t admire Singapore education system. They are “elite” education system. They only care for 20-30% top of students population. Schools don’t care for those who are below 50% at all.
I lived there for 4 years. I worked as a tutor: 75% of K-12 students hire family tutors at home; substitute school teacher: teaching in elementary and middle schools; and school social worker in Special school: work with bottom 20% students population: whose family have no English background, and too poor to afford the 2 years of kindergarten education. So students entered 1st grade, jump into all English environment. Of course they cannot adjust. At 2nd grade, these students were streamed into “special school”, which is completely separated from mainstream school. These students even cannot go to regular middle schools, cannot seek regular employment in factories. They are grouped like: “handicapped” peoo;e. or work in extremely low wage jobs.
Only 20% students at top can enter high school which can go into universities.
In Singapore, no real physical education teachers: any teachers who is physically healthy can teach phy ed class. Same as musical teachers.
Singpaore education system like its political system mainly from feudal system. It seems to be econonomically advanced. That is because it is small city state, easily managed and strong powerfully controlled.