The only thing you got right is the attrition rate. The economic boom from 05 to 07 resulted in many scholars receiving irresistible offers from management consultants and banks. As it is, it is not uncommon at all in Singapore for people to leave their jobs after 3 to 5 years and switch to a different company.
For NTU/NUS/SMU farmers who graduated in the last 10 yrs, they actually switch companies every 1 to 2 years, don't they? I'm sure you know their pattern..
Even if scholars were to break bond (i suspect you'd come up with that), as many many many of the scholars from government sectors and the GLCs are from rich families, most of the bond breakers don't break bond before the 4 year mark. Hence there is nothing earth-shattering shocking for a scholar, no matter how high flying or handsomely paid to feel the itch or curiosity to leave the AS for a stint, when faced and offered a platter of enticing packages, after six or eight years (bond duration).
The MAP programme is so new, that NOT a single batch of scholars who kena the MAP programme is up for confirmation. Please check with whoever feeding you the gossip, probably one of your local grad farmer friends that you didn't know was a farmer.
The first batch of scholars that kena the MAP is the 1980 batch. The 1978/9 batch and those older, were all absorbed in the AS scheme without MAP. All scholars of the three prestigious classes (SAFOS, SPFOS and OMS) have direct MA from the 1983/4 batch onwards. The 1980 batch is still not up yet, and there are even people who haven't started their postings for long.
Please tell your farmer friends to sleep on the job less, gossip less and do more work instead of wasting taxpayers' money.
The most prestigious and most difficult to get into universities are HYPSM and in the UK, Cambridge and Oxford, but the statement is dependent on the department in question. I know some NUS fools who manage to make it to post-grad of some renowned college overseas, but in the easiest and most ridiculous department that the college is not even known for. And i'm sure you don't know this. It's very much easier getting into a top school through post-grad than at undergrad level. If you have the brains sufficient for O levels, you might figure out why after pondering it for a few hours. In fact, the higher up you go, the easier it is to get a place in the same school.
A few years ago, NUS promoted itself by feeding info to the state press that it trumped Harvard in the Engineering rankings of some dubious ranking board (that no one gives a rat's ass about) when no American scholar worth his salt goes to Harvard for engineering!!!! It was such a tragic comedy, Singaporeans studying in top universities, both scholars and non-scholars alike had a great time laughing their socks away.
As for universities of scholars, no problem there. They are still going to the most popular and top programmes in top universities, pretty much the same choices made by their predecessors 5 years ago and 10 years ago.
The only change in trend witnessed and recognised by the powers that be and the scholars, is how the UK universities used to be the only place scholars go to before 1990. Anyone who knows anything knows that our scholars were only sent to the UK before that, starting with Lee Hsien Loong. After the mid 90s, the IT place to study became America, as engineering and science departments of American universities were recognised to be superior, as Singapore moved further away from its fading memories as a ex British colony.
The only scholars who went to the UK after 1995, were those doing Arts (although a very high number of scholars went to American premier universities for humanities such as Yale, Harvard, Georgetown, Northwestern, Stanford - which is good at everything). These would be scholars going to Oxford's world famous PPE (Politics, Philosophy and Economics), and those going to Oxford and Cambridge Law (the favourite of OMS legal service).
There was another shift in trend, when the Humanities gained unexpected favour in the middle of 2000s.
Before 2000, no one denied that the overriding perception of the powers that be, and stereotyped notion held by top students and teachers are that top people, are in the science fac in JC. A quick perusal at the disciplines of study of our ministers who were JC kids in the late 70s and through 80s will yield the same results. Engineering made up most of the CVs of our scholar policy makers.
This changed in the middle of 2000s, when humanities became the flavour of the day and 9 out of 10 PSC scholars choose to do humanities in universities. Because of this, the balance between US and UK universities swung back in favour of the UK because of the strong humanities history of the country and strong departments in Oxford, LSE and Warwick. When I say "swung back", i only meant swing back to 50-50 between US and UK, because before the Humanities trend, it was 70-30 US and UK since the mid 1990s.
You don't know a thing about the system, PSC or scholars and most definitely, about top universities.
Anyway, instead of repeating your same line over and over again without any substantiation, as if you believe that if you say the same line over and over again, it could actually fly (it doesn't), why don't you put your money where your mouth is? You have been overturned time and again by Mugabe's facts and evidence. He was even kind enough to show you a list of the universities that PSC scholars of the last few years have gone to, making it so convenient for you. Maybe you could pull out your own data from your skiving farmer friends in the system, ask them to come here and back up their idle gossip or otherwise, offer something substantial beyond repeating the same one liner over and over lah.
Out of 3, 2 infos are duds. If you're paying for this rubbish, you've been sorely fleeced.
And DD is DEFINITELY not Director. In some cases under the Director there are at least 4 DDs!!! Goodness. LOL.
Last edited:
LSE stands for london school of economics.
