Citizen's Blog

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Not top student despite best results
Posted by: Andy Loh

Chong Huey Ee is baffled. She scored 15 1As and a 2A and she is not ranked among of the top students in the country.

I read this piece of news with utter disbelief.  The response from the Education Ministry officials is that since she did not score straight 1As, she cannot be among the top students of the country. In fact she is not even named as the top 115 students in her home state - Perak.

Are we sending the right message to our youths - don't challenge yourself and just play safe ? Have we thought about how this will impact her and her parents ? Are the procedures in the Education Ministry outdated?  Or the standard response - Just following the rules good enough? All these questions are bothering me.

I suggest as an interim solution I will pay for all the officials in the Education Ministry tickets to watch the Singapore produced movie - "I Am Not Stupid Too".  They will have a good laugh, and at the same token realize that government procedures and policies have a big impact to the well-being of the students and also parents.

Comments

I commend you the honest and brave post concerning our kiasu attitude to achieving tops results in Exams. Its the total media hype of scoring tops number of As thats feeding this frenzy.

Can one wonder why the distraught girl
fell from the 3 floor building?

The Education Minister asks "Why? Why?" upon hearing the news about her fall. I think he can best asnwer that question himself.
By eltoro61, 15-Mar-2006
Frankly, I really do not understand the present pre-occupation with getting the maximum A1s possible by all at every level of examinations.

While the Education Ministry's response may not be the most intelligent of answers, what is more disappointing is Chong being baffled by why she is not ranked among the top students in the country.

Did she study just so that she can see her name in the limelight or have her photo highlighted in the frontpage of the newspapers????

With the pressure the students are putting on themselves and not being happy with A2s and B3s, very soon we will be heading the way the Japanese are heading...increased suicide rates resulting from so called 'poor results'. Already it is happening in Kangar where the student 'fell' off the 3rd floor after collecting her SPM results.
By metramac, 15-Mar-2006
This is the weaknest of our education system. Why not set a fix number of subjects which student can take? No confuse and argument will occur then. Extra subject can be taken as extra courses. You may say that she got 15A1 and 1A2 and shall be recognised as top student, so what about the 10A1 and 1A2 student? they are the top student also.. both also score 1 A2..
By leghome, 18-Mar-2006
nothing great about 15 A.
By gopala2020, 14-Mar-2007
gopal2020 might want to try achieving the same feat before coming to his hasty conclusion. Her results are indeed commendable. What's not to be baffled? Logically speaking, she has the highest number of A1's and that matters more than the number of A2's she got. If another student scores 15A1's for all the 15 subject he/she takes, then there's no contest. That student wins over Chong for getting straight A's. Unfortunately, this is not the case here. Personally, I think she deserves to be the top. I agree with the subject quota too. Our target is not quantity but quality. While the Lembaga Peperiksaan is announcing great increases in PMR, SPM etc, I wonder whether has our students' capability increased over the years or the reason behind the increases is that the bar has been lowered. Having studied abroad, I also noted that Malaysian students are somehow not as competitive as their counterparts in other countries.
By lx89, 12-Nov-2007
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