PRIME MINISTER Lawrence Wong’s National Day Rally included two big policy shifts towards a Singapore where people can flourish and thrive in education and sport. He is discontinuing the current form of the Gifted Education Programme (GEP) across Singapore’s primary schools. He is also revitalising Kallang as the new home for the Sports School and Team Singapore athletes.
“We will equip the schools to identify their own high-ability learners — so this will benefit more students,” said PM Wong (18 Aug) of the post-GEP approach to educating Singapore’s pre-teens. “Every primary school will have its own programmes to stretch these students in their areas of strength and interest.”
Source: Lawrence Wong / Facebook
He was similarly forward-thinking about how the new Kallang Alive masterplan will support Singapore’s athletes.
“We will build better facilities for our Team Singapore athletes at this location. We will have new sports science and sports medicine facilities,” said PM Wong. “We will move the Sports School here from Woodlands. And in this way, our student athletes can study and train, together with the senior athletes.”
Our young Singaporeans can look forward, then, to more paths towards pursuing their sporting passions. Parents can also look forward to an education system which will give more of Singapore’s high-ability primary schoolers more opportunities to stretch themselves, but also more time to enjoy simply being kids.
As PM Wong also noted, the new high-ability system lets these kids continue in their own primary school and keep the friendships they have built.
Our Party MPs have a history of querying the Government on education and sports policies
The announcements at the NDR also include more resources — funding, teachers and staff — for schools teaching students with special needs, or from disadvantaged backgrounds.
A two-stage Institute of Technical Education (ITE) Progression Award has also been announced, rewarding students for their dedication to bettering themselves. This includes $5,000 for enrolling in a diploma after ITE and another $10,000 for completing it.
Sources: Jessica Tan, Gan Thiam Poh, Lim Wee Kiak / Facebook
Our backbenchers, like MP Jessica Tan (East Coast GRC), welcome these shifts to education.
“The changes for education — for the Gifted Education Programme, for extra support given to schools — recognise the different abilities of students,”said MP Tan. “These changes will encourage and provide greater opportunity to enable every student to develop to their full potential.”
These changes have their roots in views and debates our PAP MPs have brought to Parliament in recent years.
In January 2018, MP Gan Thiam Poh (Ang Mo Kio GRC) asked the Ministry of Education about creating multiple paths towards career success for ITE students.
In November 2017, MP Lim Wee Kiak (Sembawang GRC) questioned if the GEP had been tweaked to meet the changing needs of education.
Sources: Darryl David, Tin Pei Ling / Facebook
Similarly, the announcements about revitalising Kallang for sport were part of an overall enhancement package. This package includes a new 18,000-seater indoor arena for top-end events — think more concerts on the scale of Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour — and a pedestrian-friendly community boulevard which will make Kallang a new lifestyle destination for families.
As for more pathways for training athletes, MP Darryl David (Ang Mo Kio GRC) asked the Government to support more new sports and nurture a pipeline of sporting talent during the Committee of Supply 2017 debates. MP Tin Pei Ling (MacPherson SMC) pushed for the Government to support sea sports like ocean paddling in November 2022.
Here, PM Wong’s policies for education and sport are concrete action for, as he titled his maiden NDR speech, “A Singapore where we realise our dreams”.
“We need a renewed social compact where every Singaporean feels there is hope,” said PM Wong about the ideals behind these policies. “Where all citizens, even the most disadvantaged amongst us, know that they can get a fair shot in life, that they can get ahead if they make the effort and work hard.”
“That is what Forward Singapore is about,” added PM Wong about his flagship nation-building exercise. “It is to keep our society strong and united; to share the benefits of progress with all, not just some; to uplift all Singaporeans, not just a few.”
