Monday, May 04, 2015

Singapore wants kids to skip college: good luck with that...

Singaporean Carmen Kok regrets that she never made it to university. She’s not letting her daughter make the same mistake, even if she has to send her abroad to get a place.

“You can’t rise up in Singapore without a degree,” said Kok, 47, who plans to spend three times what she makes in a year as a hairdresser to send her daughter to college in South Korea. “She may be able to get a job if she doesn’t go to university, but she can get a higher salary if she goes.”

Singapore’s Tiger moms are becoming a headache for Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who is trying to persuade the population that they don’t need to go to university to have a good career. After a clampdown on immigration and a slowdown in the economy, he needs fewer graduates and more workers to fill the shipyards, factory floors and hotel desks that keep the country going.

Lee, who graduated from Cambridge University in England with top honors, is leading a campaign that includes speeches and roadshows to persuade more youths to join the workforce under a system modeled on Germany’s apprenticeship system. The “earn and learn” program would place graduates from technical schools into jobs, while giving them the chance to continue part-time education. Full story...

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