Was browsing one thread on Overseas Uni funding.
Why are we natives even needing to fork out our retirement savings to send our kids overseas for tertiary education? Is it because our kids cannot enter courses of their choice in the preferred top 3 AUs? Or is it because no one likes to be bonded?
Recently I logged in to Rednote, the place where many TikTok refugees have migrated to. I was alarmed to receive newsfeeds of multiple posts by PRCs studying/living in SG, thanks to my IP address. So, I thought, they are all hiding in Rednote (& WeChat), not KSP forum!
I learnt about AEIS, the entrance test that PRC junior high (or some primary school kids) students take to enrol in our MOE government schools. I don’t know if it’s the algorithm’s fault, but I kept seeing loads of applicants sharing their success stories (more than successful applications for our citizenships and PRs, as the PAP is smart to block out future voters with communist upbringing).
Did the opposition MPs get an update from CCS, the MOE minister? There appears to be an influx of PRC students, post-Covid. I do not see Indian AEIS students or Indian 陪读 Peidu Mamas/Papas/Grandparents sharing their joy as they do not use Rednote nor WeChat.
Another piece of news that I gathered from Rednote is there are so many straight-Acers in the recent (& past) GCE exams. They were shared by the current cohort, past-year fellow compatriots now turned seniors who are currently in or have just graduated from top IPJCs, as well as PRC Immigration & Overseas Education Agents.
The latter would tell readers, whose kids are still 卷 “Juan-ing” in PRC, that it’s easier to enter Ivy League/Oxbridge if their kids went through the AEIS path to enter our globally acknowledged education system. The agents even tabulated the no. of top IPJC graduates accepted by Oxbridge, giving prospective immigrants high hopes that SG is the ‘short-cut’ that could help their middle-class kids escape the highly competitive 高考 GaoKao in PRC, and of course, with the GCE A level/IB cert could help their kids “impose” as a Singaporean student to apply to top western universities, thereby circumventing any possible quota limits or discrimination considerations.
This same trick is pulled by PRC mainlanders who fought hard for a seat in Band 1 secondary schools in HK, as top students from HK are given bonus points to enter Peking U and TsingHwa U. Basically, the PRC mainland big fishes just want to get our of the huge student population to go to smaller ponds to compete, at the expense of smaller fishes native to those ponds, needless to say.
Here in SG, the Overseas Education Agent hardsells to potential Peidus that we’re a smaller population and PRC kids usually do better than the locals, hence will secure top IPJC and AU seats to guarantee them a better career path., and eventually the coveted No.1 red passport.
Also, I found out many PRC students used HCL as their L1 to substitute EL, which is the working language in SG, and the lingua franca that many native SCs use at home. I pity the English-speaking SCs who have to fight with the PRCs who are sure to secure A1/2+Distinction.
Given that the other R5 subjects (C.Lit, Mats, Sciences) are not EL-demanding, the PRC students from various neighbourhood schools were able to ace their exams and vie for a seat at the popular pre-U schools, displacing many hardworking native SCs who were asked by CCS to apply to polys to enter the workforce earlier, if the rest of Singaporean voters are forever complaining about the import of foreign uncivilized EPs/WPs.
What shocked me further was most of the Rednoters had up to 4-6 bonus points to deduct from their raw score. Were they Presidents in some Chinese Drama Society? Chinese Debate Team? Table Tennis School Team captain? Basketball Team captain? EXCO? Or simply because our neighbourhood schools have more lower-income, Phase 3 immigrant kids and minorities, so naturally PRC AEIS students could become their top scorers 状元 easily and gain leadership roles to earn more LEAPS points?
The 6 bonus points was most shocking to me. I’ve never heard of such generous discounts during my time in JC. Wouldn’t most PRCs pick CLEP to enjoy the 6 bonus points if they just want to occupy a seat at one of the more popular Pre-U institutes?
Is this concerning, dear CCS and LW? Or is this the direction the govt is deliberately pursuing in view of the low TFR, poor retail/F&B takings (and of GST, service charges, admin charges, stamp duties across all industries), glut of rentail condo/HDB units, closure of MOE schools, redundancy of teachers? Is it because the PAP CCCs and sponsors are in need of revenue from the Peidus who are unemployed and have plenty of free time to loiter and spend in the REIT-malls and rent our 2nd or 3rd properties. ROTFL!
TBH, to this government, they do not care if the PRCs eventually relinquish their NRIC after they grow up, as they just want to earn their GST etc whilst they and their Peidu Mamas are here in SG, some working full-time or part-time, for at least 10 years or so.
But the PAP in doing so, is cannibalizing the interests of our very own Pioneer- and Merdeka-gen’s descendants, right? These AEIS kids, who only come to SG for a mere 2-4 years studnet life to enjoy the short-cuts/express lanes to top schools built up by PG/MG alumni & taxpayers, are obviously not going to stay in SG until they die.
For there’s no land to bury their bodies in this little red dot. But to the wealthy PRCs, the fengshui of the ancestral tomb is above anything else, compared to your Nirvana Columbarium in the heartlands.
Put simply, as always, they are using us as their stepping stone. C’mon, they grew up, underwent their formative pre-school education, sang the National Anthem daily, and received at least 15 years of formal ethnonationalism education under the CCP, more specifically, after the opening up of China, during the more affluent Hu JinTao and Xi Jinping’s administrations. Do you CCS at al imagine they will have any affinity to SG?
They’ve already had a taste of modernity and have witnessed how progressive their own motherland aka Zu Guo is today, relative to SG, which is small, hot & wet, and boring all-year-round.
In light of that, does CCS and gang still believe the AEIS students they are actively courting would want to settle here for generations to come, like the founding coolies and refugees who fled from a worser war-torn motherland to Nanyang for a better life?
