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 What price will parents pay to ensure that their children do well in the exams?
Assessment books and reputable tutors… check.
Suspending all ‘unrelated’ activities so that kids get enough time to rest and revise… DOUBLE check.
But will parents grab the chance to get ‘leaked’ exam questions?
I was reading a TODAY article about a tuition agency that had placed misleading ads in the papers, offering PSLE revision classes ‘by this year (sic) exam setter. ‘O’ level revision by SEAB teachers Oct 1st’. Not surprisingly, these ads raised alarm bells among parents, the media and the authorities. Mediacorp investigations revealed that the ad was not true, and I was glad to note that SEAB was now investigating the case, and it seemed that the agency owner who had placed the ad was neither an SEAB staff member nor a PSLE question setter.
The agency owner had claimed that only two parents responded to his ads and only one signed up for the revision class. I wonder if he was telling the truth… would the SEAB come down harder on him if hordes of parents had signed up for his programme instead of none or a mere handful? And what would that say about the values we hold as parents?
On the basis of sheer common sense and logic, I believe that most parents would decline such an offer. Just as how we would probably shrug our heads and smile at the kopitiam uncle hawking tomorrow’s ‘sure-win’ 4D numbers for the price of a cup of teh, or junk that email offering an iPhone ‘for just $250’. Because – it CANNOT BE THAT EASY. MOE and the SEAB go into lengthy explanations each year to reassure one and all that they have safeguards in place to maintain the confidentiality and integrity of the examinations, such as the requirement that ‘all setters, including teachers, of national examinations sign an undertaking declaring that there is no conflict of interests and to comply with confidentiality requirements and safeguard all official information they have come across in the course of their duties’.
But, suppose we have reason to believe that the leak is genuine? Would we give in to temptation? I would like to hope not, but for as long as the PSLE remains the major source of worry for parents of 12-year-olds everywhere, there will be some who succumb, in the hope of being spared the (potential) look of dejection on their child’s face, or to secure their child’s future - at least for the next few years.
And if such a thing does happen and word gets out, it would undermine the entire system that local schoolchildren have been geared towards, whether we like it or not – that dogged effort and diligence will pay out; that if you’ve been playing one too many videogames at the wrong time, your results WILL suck.
I hope that it will never come to that. There are good tutors and honest tuition centres that don’t promise the moon or 4 A*s, but will work reasonably hard with our children to bring out their potential. The more we see of them, and the less of underhanded tactics, the better for all of us.
What do you think of such tuition agencies with misleading ads? Would you be tempted by such offers? Do share your thoughts below.
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Personally, i will not react to such advertisements or offers, as S'pore has a very structured education system & such confidential info will be easily assessable.