Elite Student

Is it necessary for them to go for tuition?

I read two articles about the education system in Singapore, ‘Why tuition centres for elite students flourish’ and ‘Exam offers troubling peek into school attitude’. Both of the articles are talking about the level of exam that is being implemented in most of elite schools in Singapore like Raffles Institution, Raffles Girls School, Hwa Chong Institution and Nanyang Girls' High School, is too high. In the first article, the writer admits that these schools are really prestigious school, producing a lot of talented students that will excel in the global competition. But what makes the school prestigious enough in the eyes of public? Of course it is because of the ability of the student to solve various problems with different levels, even one level higher than he or she is supposed to learn. Now, it is being questioned how the students are able to achieve such a commendable result. Is it because of the competent teachers who are able to maximize the potential within the student or is it because of the tuition fees that parents have spent in order to make their children cope up with the subject that is far beyond the children understanding? This issue is still debated among Singaporeans parents.

My opinion about this issue is it is true that most of the elitists in Singapore succeed in their studies due to this private lesson, whether it is at home or the private teacher’s home itself. Not saying that teachers are completely hopeless in teaching the students with all knowledge that they have but this tuition is helping children tremendously in their studies. It is almost the same like they have a revision time at home or somewhere in routine like as usual. The difference is just if parents pay for tuition for their children; parents hired an ‘extra teacher’ to guide and supervised their children during their revision time. Of course the process of the children studying becomes more effective and efficient rather than the children who study without guidance. They can ask to the tutors about a specific topic in great detail. Hence, children who are supervised by the tutors can learn further than children who study without them.

Maybe the alternative besides having a private tutor is to buy a lot of practice or revision book. This method is not as effective as hiring a tutor. There is a high possibility that children get stuck in a specific topic, so they have no choice but to ask it to their teachers, seniors, friends, or parents. Sometimes their senior and friends refuse to help as they are also busy with their own study. Parents are most likely busy with their work. So, they have to wait until tomorrow’s school and ask their teacher about the topic, if they have some spare time to explain to the children. From this reasoning, we can see the efficiency of having a tutor.

Education is like a matter of speed. School teachers and private tutors are racing in giving materials to the student. I can mention one example, several years ago, when I was still studying in Indonesia. One of my friends was having Physics tuition despite his brilliant brain was able to make him scored more than 85% in his previous Physics final report. Later I found out that every time the teacher gave a topic about Physic, he was able to master it in a day. Because of my curiosity, I ask him how often he studied Physics. He laughed and said that few weeks ago, his tutor had just finished covering the topic. At that time I wanted to protest to my friend. It was defeating the purpose of going to school. If you can get the knowledge from tuition, then schools is like a market where you can buy your certificate.

I believe that a true elite student doesn’t need tuition for their studies. They are supposed to be the brightest student. There is no need for them to go for tuition. The purpose of having tuition is to help the student in their weakest subject, not to push their marks until they got 90% in their final progress report.

A Limited Democracy

A Limited Democracy

Is Democracy creating Stability in the Society?

Democracy can be said as the best way of creating the stability within a society. Democracy is a form of government that practices a system where the citizens become an important key for the government to decide aspect –aspect within a country like politic, economy, etc. Many people believe that this is an ideal form of government for a developing country. Most of the western countries and developing Asian countries apply democracy in their government. Because the people inside the country satisfied with the form of government, there are tendency stability within a society will be formed. There will be little conflict within a country as the people satisfied with the consensus.

Democracy make the flow of the government is controlled by the citizen. Every citizen has the right to vote according to their ideas, wishes or opinions. The government will become a platform for all the ideas from the citizen and re-evaluate the ideas and implement it. The government will receive a lot of feedbacks from the citizen as the implementation is executed. Therefore, the citizen will have satisfaction from the result of this implementation as the implementation goes according to their opinions. We can look countries that have already implemented democracy system, like Singapore. They can vote for their representatives in the government so the outcome of an implementation can satisfy their will. If the government receive a lot of complain from the citizen, they can evaluate the implementation and renew it according to the citizen’s will. Like the case of Chek Jawa, the government originally wanted to make a resort there, but a lot of petitions come from the citizen and the government cancels their programme. The citizen thanked the government and there will be no conflict as they were satisfied with the outcome.

Although democracy satisfies people will, there are some problems encountered in this method. As there are a lot of differences in ways people are thinking, of course there are differences in people opinions or ideas. These differences will lead into a form of clash or conflict between people ideas. These conflicts usually happen between the majority and the minority and it will disturb the stability within a society. For example Indonesia, which is a democratic country, has conflicts between the citizen and the government due to different interest. The government keeps raising the oil price. They are planning to earn more money from this resource and secure the country’s budget. The citizen are complaining because the rising of oil price also force the price of food and other daily needs rise up. The government promise to give subsidy, but only a little realization appears as along the process, a lot of corruption happens. The citizens are powerless against the government. As the result, riots and demonstrations continue to happen.

So, the methodology of democracy depends on how the people put a limitation for the democracy itself. They cannot act or choose something so freely. There must be a kind of limiter to prevent the clashing between other’s opinions and will, like a form of law. If the democracy is controllable, the stability within a society will be formed.

Teenagers Issue

Some Troy High School students, two girls and four boys, had been charged with drug abuse. There was also another girl who was charged with drug trafficking. More likely, all seven students will be expelled or suspended from the school. This news was taken from www.10tv.com. There are a lot of drug abuse cases you can get on the news, whether from television, newspaper, radio, magazine, etc. The case of drug abuse has never ended until now. Even children can become the victim of drug abuse. Why children can be victimized by drug abuse? There are several factors for it.

First, like the news has written, it comes from a friend who offers them drugs. Sometimes it is very hard for us to decline something what our friend has offered to us. The reason could be that we don't want to disappointed our friends feeling. Maybe we want to be "a super human" who are not afraid of everything, or perhaps we want to follow the "trend" like our friends do, so our friends can accept us to their group. In short, we want to keep the relationship with them. Some children will like to do anything for their friends to be included within their friends. If these "friends" want to abuse the child, the child will be in a serious problem. What the boys and girls on the news lack is the power to control themselves. I'm sure that they know what the danger of taking drugs is. Once they know the danger, they should stand on the knowledge that they had learned.

The parents also can be the factor why the child is taking drugs. Parents are children's partner to share and solve their daily problems. If parents don't do this role properly, children will feel isolated and unhappy. As the result, there is higher chance that children will take drugs as a solution for their problem; they run away from the problem or reality. The relationship between parents and children also will become worse. Children will disobey their parents advice as a form of “rebellion”. A simple case: If the parents forbid them from taking drugs, the children will take it to express their anger towards parents.

Children who take drugs are not likely to have a bright future. In future, they are less likely to get a better job than other people as their testimonial will affect the company’s (interviewer’s) opinion about them. They need to work hard to overcome the habit of using drugs. Drugs can deplete their budget of living as they continue to buy it again with unreasonable price due to addiction. Organizations that take action in child’s drug abuse case like UNICEF, NIDA, DARE, and PATS trying their best to prevent drug abuse case among children. We can also take part to protect the children form drug abuse. So teens, keep your eyes from the danger of drugs.

Source of text: http://www.10tv.com/live/contentbe/EPIC_shim.php?story=sites/ONN/content/pool/200802/476231112.html&sec=home