Comprehensive vs grammar, the UK vs Singapore

Hi guys, I thought I'd do something interesting that will open the eyes of my Singaporean readers up to an alternative system of education here in Europe. There's always the assumption in the eyes of most Singaporean parents that there's little wrong with the system in Singapore per se and if a student is not doing well in school, well that's the fault of the child and it is up to the parents to try to fix the situation be it through enforcing discipline at home or turning to private tuition. Ironically of course, the education system in Singapore is based on the British system - but do Singaporeans realize just how differently the students are taught in the UK? I sat down with Nina, a very experience head teacher and had an interesting chat with her about her experiences in the British system and it was one of those somewhat awkward moments when I realized that you can take the boy out of Singapore, but you can't take the Singapore out of the boy.

Alex: Nina, Could you explain some of the terminology we are going to use in this discussion for my Singaporean and foreign readers. What is the difference between a "comprehensive" and a "grammar" school in the UK please?

Nina: A grammar school selects the pupils who get to study there based on the 11-plus exam taken at age 11...

Alex: In Singapore, that's like the PSLE, except kids in Singapore take that at 12.

Nina: Typically, if the kid does well in that 11-plus exam, they will apply to go to a grammar school where they will get to do their secondary education with other kids who have also done well enough to get into that school. Then on the other hand, you have the comprehensive schools who will take pupils of all abilities and they are taught together without any notion of trying to 'stream' them according to ability or potential, they serve the majority of the local population.

Alex: That quite different from the Singaporean system that I grew up with - when I was a kid, it was all about streaming and you wanted to get the best possible grades, to get into the best possible schools which will lead to a degree at the best possible university which in turn will hopefully lead to a great career. Things have changed somewhat in Singapore in recent years: in 2012 the government has abolished league tables for secondary schools and from 2021, primary school leavers will no longer get a precise score and will instead receive a broad grade. So change is coming, at least from the government, they are indeed bucking the British trend but ultimately, it will take a very long time for the mindset of the people to change - don't forget, even though the kids in Singaporean schools now are experiencing a different system, their parents who are around my age were brought up in the old system and still think with the old rules in mind.

Nina: In the UK, this trend from grammar schools to comprehensive schools started a long time ago, the number of grammar schools dropped dramatically in the 1970s under Labour and never recovered. This is mostly because grammar schools are seen to be divisive and elitist, they would appeal to a certain section of the population but not to others. The comprehensive system is designed to create a more equal, more equitable and fair society, the aim is to eradicate social inequality amongst the social classes. Has it achieved that? No, but nobody expected this one small step to solve such a huge issue, but it is certainly a step in the right direction. Such social problems don't have simple solutions, all we can do is take many steps in the right direction and hopefully one day we'll be in a better place.

Alex: Can we then talk about the independent schools, in the private sector?

Nina: Yes, the grammar and comprehensive schools are all state schools which receive government assistance and follow the national curriculum. But in the private sector, you can open an independent school, elect your own board of governors and basically do what the hell you like. You don't have to follow the national curriculum, you can set your own exams, you can make your own rules and more to the point, if a rich family has a really stupid child you are allowed to bend the rules and admit that child as long as they pay a substantial bribe like build the school a swimming pool. These independent schools are extremely expensive and most charge substantially more than any British university for fees. There is a cap of £9,250 for universities fees for UK and EU students in the UK, but you can pay over £40,000 a year at one of these super posh boarding schools - there is no regulation about how much they can charge, that's down to market forces. One can only assume that there are people willing to pay £40,000 a year for a place at one of those schools, otherwise they won't get away with such prices and there are plenty of rich people out there who want to educate their children at such independent schools. Oh these independent schools attract international students too.

Alex: As in the case of Prince Harry. He was not intelligent at all. He went to Eton and only emerged with two A levels, a B in art and a D in geography - then it emerged that he cheated on his art exam, since he needed at least two passes to meet the admission criteria at Sandhurst. By any standards, academically, he's an idiot but hey, he's third in line for the throne so Eton was willing to do whatever it took including help him cheat in his exams. And he got away with it, WTF.

Nina: If you think Prince Harry's an idiot, you should see some of the students whom I have had to teach before.

Alex: Go on...?

Nina: Nah, that would be an abuse of trust. I can't divulge details, sorry - people trust me as a teacher.

Alex: So are the independent schools in the private sector selective like the grammar schools or are they more like the comprehensive schools whereby you don't need to be smart, you just need to be able to afford their prices. A bit like a 5-star luxury hotel really, they don't care who you are, as long as you can afford to pay for one of their suites, they will welcome you as a paying customer. Is that a fair assessment? Are they really good schools or more like a country club?

Nina: Yes and no. On the whole, schools like Eton do both - in general, they do provide a very high standard of education, they do make sure that a large number of their students do end up in top universities like Oxford and Cambridge. But people just kinda accept that such schools will gladly accept someone like Prince Harry and they don't mind or care really because he is posh, he is royalty and there will be a number of students like that in the school. So as long as they are posh and stupid, that's fine because one of the key reasons people do want to send their kids to such independent schools is to make sure they make the right kind of friends from a very early age. So if you went to Eton, your friends' parents would be royalty, judges, barristers, hedge fund managers, CEOs, MPs, billionaires and others of that kind of super high calibre whereas if you send your children to a comprehensive, the parents of their friends might be janitors, taxi drivers or even unemployed. Now I'm not saying that the latter is a bad thing, but you have to remember that we do live in a class conscious society and the question is whether you want to try to break down those class barriers by making the kids study together, socialize and make friends across the social divide at an early age, or do you want to focus on building your child's social circle even at that age? What kind of lessons do you want your children to learn?

Alex: Then there are also some specialist schools as well to add to that mix.

Nina: Yes these are like music academies for example where the students get a very specialized education from a young age rather than a more general education, then there are also the specialist religious schools where religion forms a major part of the curriculum but very few students actually opt for such a route.

Alex: So if we can look at the overall picture in the country please Nina - please, could we try to break it down, what percentage of the primary and secondary schools are comprehensive, grammar and independent today?

Nina: There are regional variations in the way education is organized in England, Scotland and Wales. In terms of the secondary education sector, there are 163 grammar schools in the UK currently, compared to about 3,500 comprehensives and then there are 2,500 independent schools. But don't be misled by those numbers, some independent schools can be quite small and exclusive whilst a city center state comprehensive school can be huge. There are currently about 615,000 in independent schools compared to about 3,250,000 in the comprehensive schools, of which, only 120,000 are in grammar schools. After taking into account the small number in specialist school, the numbers show, about 80% of the students in the UK go to comprehensive schools whilst the remaining 20% go to independent, grammar or specialist schools. To be honest, it is hard to obtain accurate statistics as this is such a political sensitive subject that the government doesn't like to publish statistics, because the moment they do, there will be people baying for blood, screaming 'class war!' because in their eyes, one grammar school in the country is one too many. So let me ask you now, how does that compare to the situation in Singapore? Your system is essentially British at heart, right?

Alex: Oh that's a complex question because there's a gulf between what the official stance is by the ministry of education and what actually happens on the ground. Clearly, the government have made it clear they want to remove the huge gap between the 'elite' schools or popular schools that used to be at the top of the league tables before they were abolished in 2012. But you have schools that have built up pretty good reputations over decades - my alumni is 195 years old and has always been regarded as one of the best schools in Singapore: you're not going to suddenly convince a whole nation that my alumni is suddenly just the same and equal as any other school in Singapore. You can abolish the official publication of the league tables, but those league tables still exist in the minds of a lot of Singaporeans and you have unofficial league tables cropping up on the internet with parents still wanting their children to get into the best possible school. So the government does want to take a step towards comprehensive school system like in the UK, but most Singaporean parents still don't buy into that idea at all because they are not convinced that it will be better for their children. Perhaps they may even have enough imagination to see how it could be good for the wider society in promoting social cohesion, but when it comes to the future of their children, they're like, no don't mess with the future of my son, I only have that one child. I'm not gambling his future on some crazy social experiment that some idealist came up with.

So even in the absence of official published league tables, it is clear that those league tables still exist in the heads of Singaporeans and indeed online. We believe in GIGO: garbage in, garbage out, that means if a school takes in dumb students, guess what? They're going to churn out dumb students. I saw this with my own nephew - by the time he was ready to go to secondary school, everyone in his family including himself wanted to go to the best possible school that he could get into with his grades. So even without a league table, the schools still have the right to choose whom to admit - so let's say if there are places for 200 students in this intake for this secondary school, naturally they would give the places to the best 200 students who applied with the best results. The school wouldn't have it any other way, like why would they say choose the  200 students by alphabetical order, by lucky draw or by some other bizarre rule like "we'll pick the 200 students who live closest to the school"? So by that token, some kind of pecking order still exists amongst the schools because of this selection process on the basis of merit. Hence when we got my nephew's PSLE results, we're like, okay don't bother with the top schools, he won't stand a chance, but the results are still decent so we'll ignore the schools at the bottom of the pile. Then it was about looking at the schools in the middle and trying to work out the best possible one he can get into with his results - it was a rather long and complicated process to make the right choice.

That mentality is not that different from shopping: let me tell you about a process I did with my friend Justin recently. He's just graduated and found a job, so he wanted to get a nice suit for work. So I asked him what his budget was, he replied, "about £200, hopefully a bit less." And I was like, okay, that's a decent number, we can work with that. You can spend thousands on a designer suit but clearly we're not in that market. Likewise you could get bargain basement suits at rock bottom prices from as little as £50 to £70 from places like Malatan and Primark and if you're really desperate, you can even get a second hand one off eBay for even less - but buyers beware, you get what you pay for. As Justin was prepared to invest at least £200 in a good suit, we had a mission to get the best possible suit for him within budget - one that will look classy, professional and most importantly, it will look as if it costs a lot more than £200. Eventually, after much shopping, we managed to get one which came in at £189 and it was actually on sale from about £325. It looked the part, he liked how it felt and I agreed that it was a very good choice. We did see some cheaper suits of course which were well within his budget, but why should he compromise on quality when he had the money to spend? Ultimately, he felt great about his purchase because he felt like he got great value for money - he got a good deal. By the same token, whilst my nephew didn't get into one of the top schools in Singapore, he were still pretty happy with the way things turned out as he got a good deal in terms of the school he managed to get into with his results. And that's what we all want at the end of the day: we want to get a best possible deal, whether it is about shopping for suits or our children's education.

Nina: Oh yeah, that's one of our most basic human instincts. The other day I paid £1.69 for a big bag of onions thinking I got a good deal, then I saw the same thing for £1.29 in another shop and immediately I felt ripped off. It's not much money, but it's just that feeling of frustration when you know you had a bad deal. We want what is fair - so if children have worked hard to get good grades, they expect to be rewarded somehow and for the parents, that reward usually means a place in a better school or something tangible, otherwise the child will fail to see the correlation between working hard and his future, if there is simply no pay off, no reward for having done well. Sure I can understand that sentiment. We all want a good deal and it is natural for parents to want to care about their children's education, of course. But the question is whether or not the grammar school system works or not in the long run for the children. I need to ask you please Alex: why do the Singaporeans believe so strongly in the notion of streaming then, to divide children up according to ability?

Alex: Well, the teacher's worst case scenario is to get a mixed ability class, where you get some kids who are brilliant whilst others who are absolutely struggling with the basics - that just presents all kinds of logistical challenges. How do you organize your lesson plan to cater for such a wide range of abilities? How are you going to teach a class like that? Goodness me. If you cater for the kids who are struggling the most, then goodness me, they need so much help that you're effectively neglecting the better ones. The brilliant kids will get absolutely bored because they're not being challenged and then they will get disruptive because they're not learning anything - it's like they're being punished for being good at the subject and that's wrong on so many levels. But if you then cater for the smarter kids, then the slower ones will just get left behind for the simple reason that the lesson is not pitched at that level and there's no way they can catch up unless the teacher creates a lesson specifically catering for their needs. And if you pitch the lesson in the middle for the most average kid, you still can't win because you'll lose students at both end of the spectrum because catering for the most average kid still isn't an effective solution. There's only one teacher and so many students: at least presenting the teacher with a class of the same standard will make any kind of lesson planning so much easier for the poor teachers who are just trying to do their jobs! Why create such a no-win situation for both teachers and students?

Nina: May I offer a different perspective? I think you're describing a worst case scenario - like you're convinced that the comprehensive system is a bad idea so you're already biased. Having taught in a mixed ability class, let me break it down to you how an experienced teacher would deal with the situation. I would present the basic principles of the lesson to the class, I know that the brightest students would grasp the concept the first time I explain it - so I then give them various challenges and exercises to see if they know how to apply the concept and solve problems using what they have just learnt. Whilst they are busy doing that, I would then turn my attention to the weaker pupils whom I know still don't get it and spend some time, doing a much slower explanation of the same subject matter - maybe I only attempt to explain a part of the concept so at least they can walk away from the lesson having learnt something, maybe I need to revisit the concept with them at some other time to ensure that they do understand - but all this time, the brighter kids are not bored or neglected: they are given plenty to do to continue learning about the subject and often I give them group activities so they are challenging each other as well - the brightest kids are actually quite capable of creating a very vibrant learning environment when they work together, they don't need to be spoon fed at all. All this, whilst I am helping the weaker students out - with good time management, it is really not that hard. You make it sound impossible but it can be done.

Alex: Can I be cynical and honest? Okay, hats off to you Nina for coping so well with a challenging situation like that. But it sounds like you're trying to make the best of a terrible situation but if I actually gave you a class where the students are pretty much the same standard, wouldn't that make your life a lot easier? Even if experienced teachers like you could cope with a mixed ability class, it doesn't make it the better way to organize a class. I reminds me of those people who wear crazy costumes to run a marathon to raise money for charity - hats off to them, running a marathon is hard enough but to do it in a ridiculous costume? But at the end of the day, you know they would complete the marathon in a much faster time without the ridiculous costume - the same way a teacher could probably teach a lot more efficiently without having to deal with the challenges of a mixed ability class. But can I ask you why British people believe so strongly in the comprehensive school system then please? I fail to see why people can justify it with such conviction without concrete proof that it will deliver tangible results. British people are way too emotional when it comes to the grammar schools.

Nina: As you know, our society is already so divided by class, if you don't force some kind of social mixing from an early age at school, then you will have sections of society that never mix together. My son went to a comprehensive school and he now has a good job working with some people who have gone through the grammar or independent school route - the difference is stark. My son has at least the experience of having made friends with people of all kinds of backgrounds and some of his colleagues have probably only spoken to a working class person when they ordered their coffee at Starbucks - it was notable that my son's ability to form rapport with the people he is managing is far superior because of his experiences at school. That's why he has been able to rise through the ranks a lot quicker to management than those who went to those posh independent schools or grammar school with smarter kids - you don't learn about the wider society and people you may one day have to work with in those environments. I believe I made the right choice in making my son go to a comprehensive - he turned out alright, he went to a good university, got a good job. I could have sent him to a grammar school, I was tempted but decided against it ultimately when I weighed out the pros and cons. If he was unhappy or doing badly at the school, then I would not have hesitated to change schools for him.

Alex: Now a lot of Singaporean parents would not approve of what you did. They would have pointed out that your son was clearly very bright, why did you hold him back by making him study at a comprehensive school where he may have had stupid classmates? Yeah his stupid classmates would love it if your son could help them with their homework, but what does he get out of the process? Some Singaporean parents might even blame the stupid kids - perhaps they are perform badly because they lack discipline, they don't know make a real effort to study, they have dodgy parents and have fallen into bad company from a young age; that they could be a bad influence on your son when he was young and impressionable. They just want their children to be in good company, to have a more conducive learning environment.

Nina: So what if he had stupid classmates? He had a lot of stupid classmates along the way, I don't deny that. But you can't catch stupidity from your classmates, it's not a cold. Don't be silly. Stupidity is not like chicken pox, it is not contagious! If he was interacting with kids who were equally bright or even smarter than him, then sure he could have learnt more in that kind of environment. But if he was helping the slower kids with their maths because they have no one else to turn to, then whilst he may not be learning anything academically, I believe that exercise is really good for his character as he is exercising compassion and empathy at a very young age. He may end up in a job where he never has to use that mathematics formula ever again, but he can take that compassion and empathy with him wherever he goes for the rest of his life and it will serve him well. Education is not just about scoring As, it is about preparing the young person for life as an adult. And I knew my son was bright, he was going to be alright no matter what - the bright kids don't need to be pushed too hard, they will find a way. They can be incredibly resourceful and motivated, they will surprise you just how incredibly mature they can be in their work ethic to get the results they want. So in the meantime, why not use school as a way to teach them about other more practical aspects of life beyond the academic curriculum?

Alex: So you're pretty much saying that the smart kids will do well regardless, so we may as well spend more resources such as the attention of the teachers on those who need more help such as the weaker students, right?

Nina: It's one way to look at it.

Alex: Well, allow me to be the devil's advocate then. There's an element of trying to nurture the next Nobel Prize winner, the person who will be the next Marie Curie, who will come up with a cure for cancer or broker the next peace deal in the Middle East or become the next world leader who will halt global warming. Well in Singapore, they have the habit of gathering up all the brightest, most promising individuals in each cohort and then giving them the best education, facilities, guidance and anything else they need in order to make them achieve their full potential because we simply recognize that those are the kinds of individuals who will go on to do something truly amazing and become mega successful in a few decades. And even if say a small handful of those people become that successful, then the impact they will have on the world will be on the scale of Newton or Einstein. What is wrong with trying to foster and create the next prodigy like that? What if Marie Curie decided to have many children and become a housewife instead - no, you want to take individuals like that and tell them, "you're gifted, you're special" and nurture that talent. Surely it makes complete sense to invest in people like that, rather than just say, oh if they're so smart, then they'll succeed anyway.

Nina: Won't you end up kissing many frogs in that process? How much resources would be wasted in that quest when it could be used to help so many more people across the wider society? What would be more pragmatic then?

Alex: Some may argue that if you have to kiss a thousand, ten thousand or even a hundred thousand frogs to find the next Mozart, Einstein, Newton or Comăneci, then it is worth it. Think about it, I'm from a small country, can anyone in the West even name a famous Singaporean? Some would probably be able to come up with the name of Lee Kuan Yew but apart from him, who else has a name that is recognized around the world? I'm afraid there is really no one else. Perhaps this sounds really harsh, so you help someone who struggles in his education and he ends up eventually ends up in a slightly better job than he would have otherwise had he been left to his own devices. Would that really make that much of a difference compared to fostering a future leader who may start a company that will create thousands of jobs locally?

Let's take someone who was born in Singapore - the famous violinist Vanessa-Mae. She had a typical Singaporean tiger mum who pushed her super hard and she started piano lessons at the age of 3 and violin lessons at the age of 4. Her mother paid for Vanessa-Mae to get the best possible training she could to turn her daughter into one of the world's best violinists: she trained in National Conservatoire of Music in Beijing and London's Royal College of Music. Is Vanessa-Mae talented? Of course she is, massively so - the best training in the world could only help her realize her full potential, it couldn't give her talent if she had none. Would she have become as great a violin player if she had attended a comprehensive school and perhaps had one music lesson a week? No way, she probably would have never ever touched a violin, much less become one of the world' greatest violin prodigies. Her talent would have been undiscovered, she would be ordinary. When you spot talented children like that, it makes complete sense to take them out and allow them to flourish in an environment where they can achieve greatness rather than force them into a comprehensive school system where they are expected to do the Clark Kent thing and try to blend in with all the other ordinary kids devoid of talent. I say we need truly exceptional people like Vanessa-Mae in this world to make the world a better place.

Nina: That's when we have to agree to disagree. That's not the point of education - we're not trying to discover the next star, you're almost treating the whole process like some kind of reality TV show. You know the kind where they allow thousands of ordinary people to audition and sing for a panel, they they go through singing contests week after week until ultimately there's one winner and that winner goes on to have a a recording contract along with number one hit at Christmas. So you get one winner but what about everyone else? The job of the teacher is to help every single student we teach regardless of their background or circumstances, we're not there to find a winner and reward the best student.

Alex: I see your point, but this will never work in Singapore. The problem in Singapore is that everybody wants their kids to be the straight-A scholar and if you're totally hopeless at studying then you're probably let off the hook. But those in the middle are punished the most and my poor nephew is one of them. Most parents will go into denial that their children are average: they'll be like, if we drill them through the exam exercises with the best tuition teacher in town, then maybe we can get them to do just well enough in the exams to get into a good university - then we'll get whatever help they need to get through that degree so by the time they graduate, maybe nobody will notice that they are plain average. There's a Chinese expression: 打肿脸充胖子, it means to seek to impress by feigning or exaggerating one's abilities. Many Singaporeans really don't care whether or not if their children are really talented or not, as long as they can somehow give others the impression that they are. It's almost like, "sssshhh, Daddy knows you're just average, but we must make sure everyone thinks that you're brilliant and it's our little secret, we're going to fool everyone out there." So in this context, if you can make it to a good school or university in this system, then people are going to think, "if you're smart enough to make it to this school, then you must be pretty intelligent!" So there's no smoke without fire - if someone was an Oxford graduate, we'll automatically assume they must be intelligent, right? That's just the way most people think.

Nina: Oh dear. Education doesn't work like that. Even if you somehow do that at secondary level, you can't get away with it at university. It is pretty pointless - what we would recommend as teachers if we come across as child who isn't academically gifted is for them to start looking for more specialist niche areas they are interested in, where they can start working toward a vocational qualification so they can think about forging a career with those skills. We would never subject a child to a punishing tuition schedule just to try to make sure nobody realizes that the kid is but average.

Alex: Another important point I'd like to make is that you can only try to enforce this kind of social-mixing in the name of trying to achieve a more equitable society for so many years - how about asking Oxford and Cambridge university to adopt a comprehensive school approach and admit anyone? No, that would undermine the very basis of why they are our nation's greatest universities. And how about asking the big investment banks to accept anyone and everyone into their graduate recruitment programmes instead of recruiting the very best on the basis of merit? Oh that would crash our financial services sector. The way I see it, if you try to enforce those noble ideals of achieving an equitable and fair society in the real world, you just crash anything that has depended on meritocracy generating value like our best universities or banking sector. What's the point of that? These kids have to end up in the real world eventually when they grow up and the real world works on the basis of inequality - it depends on meritocracy rewarding those with the right skills and abilities with more money and punishes those who don't with a life of poverty. Did you ever think what the next step was, once the students leave the comprehensive school and have to step into the real world, where reality bites hard: they realize no one is going to try to level the playing field for me in the name of trying to achieve a fairer society?

Nina: So you're attributing the Singaporean economic miracle to this brand of meritocracy? Isn't it a rather divisive approach whereby you have winners and losers - you don't care about those who lose out in the process because the country only needs the winners? What kind of society are you creating then and is social mobility even possible like that?

Alex: If I may be frank, the Singapore system isn't as divisive as you may think. Sure I went to a good school, but my classmates had only one thing in common: they were smart, they scored the grades to earn themselves a place in the school - it was meritocracy. I had classmates who were rich and some who were very poor.  I'm not from a rich family - yet I earned myself a place in a good school because I studied hard and had the brains for it. Nina, I feel you're assuming that there's a correlation between wealth and performance at school and whilst I think that correlation is weak...

Nina: This is a complex issue which I want to respond to, but go on, finish your point please Alex.

Alex: Sure. In Singapore, one can argue that the system offers far more social mobility. You may be born into a really poor working class family, your dad may be just a bus driver or a labourer and your mum an uneducated housewife, but you can study hard and earn yourself a place in a really good school that will lead to a good education, a degree, a much better job than your parents could ever dream of. It is that system of meritocracy which is the basis of that hope - whereas the cynic in me looks at the comprehensive system and I think, yeah you're just forcing kids of different abilities to mix together in the hope of achieving some kind of social cohesion as a result of that interaction, but that doesn't address the issue of how the hell you're going to address the issue of social mobility. I'm not saying that social cohesion isn't an important issue - but so is social mobility and it seems you're prioritizing one over another. But Nina, go back and make your point you wanted to make about the relationship between wealth and performance at school please.

Nina: Yes, it is a big ask for kids from deprived backgrounds to be motivated and organized enough to score straight As, it could happen but you need to recognize at least that the odds are stacked against them in the process. Compare them to a child from a wealthy family: the parents are encouraging, they make sure the child gets access to all the help he needs for school and attends other external activities from tennis to violin to foreign language lessons. The child can see that mummy and daddy have professional friends who also live in nice houses and can immediately work out that correlation between getting educated and becoming wealthy. Contrast that to the kids from broken families and difficult backgrounds, some of them don't even get breakfast before turning up at school and you can tell they're wearing the same clothes as the day before as they smell bad. Their parents are either working dead-end jobs or on benefits, unmotivated and unemployed. Never mind violin lessons, some of these kids have to spend their free time either doing household chores or taking care of younger siblings. I've seen kids like that from such families, every single odd has been stacked against them from the moment they took their first breath and it is entirely the fault of their parents who had no business having children whilst their lives were in total chaos. You can't blame the child - but to then say, "study hard and score As, then you can have a better future" to the child is naive because you're not recognizing the crazy struggles such a child faces on a daily basis. The children are not stupid but under such circumstances they don't succeed.

Alex: I do empathize, but what will the comprehensive system do to fix that problem? Nothing. You need some kind of poverty alleviation programme to deal with the underlying problems that you've described - those problems originate in the home, not the school; so it is nothing that the school can possibly fix by that token. What good would making such kids study next to kids from well-to-do families achieve? It might just make them feel incredibly jealous, "gee, why do you have nice parents and why are my parents so fucked up? Why is life so incredibly unfair?" How is that going to solve anything? The problem you're talking about is that of social mobility and I just don't see how the comprehensive system is going to make it any better. Perhaps you can take the boy out of Singapore but you can't take Singapore out of me, but I do not believe that there is much to be gained from any kind of the "social cohesion" angle from the comprehensive system and even if there are some benefits, it creates new problems for the teachers having to struggle with a mixed ability class. I think there's just a lot of hot hair by people with nice ideals but no real solutions. But look, I'm not just criticizing the comprehensive system because I wasn't educated under it - I had my own experience back in Singapore.

Nina: Ah okay, what was that?

Alex: In Singapore, all males had to serve national service if they are citizens or permanent residents. So regardless whether you're rich or poor, highly educated or illiterate, you still have to serve so it did bring together men from all kinds of social backgrounds. I served 2 years 4 months and in my time there from 1995 to 1997, I had to work with a lot of men with whom I had very little in common when it came to our social backgrounds. Don't get me wrong, it was great training to pluck me out of my comfort zone and through me into a situation like that where I had to learn very quickly how to get along with people who were very different from myself. But here's the thing: did I actually learn to understand them or even like them? No. Did I actually form new friendships with people who had a different kind of social background? Absolutely not. I drew the line at learning how to get along with them as that was a bare necessity for survival, but the shared experience certainly did not make me bond with them. At some level, I didn't want to bond with them. What was the point? Would I be friends with these people outside the army? No, the moment we re-entered the civilian world, we would go our separate ways. So I learnt to get along with them when I was forced to live and work alongside them, but that was all so temporary. I wasn't obliged to like them, I just had to work alongside them and get through my time there.

Likewise, even if you send kids from different social backgrounds to the same comprehensive school, do you really think the shared experience of studying together would make them bond? I am cynical I would say no because the moment they leave the school gates, they are back into their own worlds - they return to the world which their parents have created and the kids who sit next to each other in the classroom could literally be worlds apart if they have very different kinds of parents. Would the poor kids who lived in the council estates want to invite their rich friends home to study or play together after school? I just don't see that happening. Yes I know in the UK, we live in a vast country and sometimes in more rural areas, the local comprehensive school is the only school available for miles and short of sending your kids to an expensive independent boarding school, there can be quite a lot of social mixing that goes on in those schools. But do the relationships formed under those circumstances persist or crumble, once the kids step out of the school gates? I think that most of those relationships don't survive - not for long anyway - once you remove the kids from the school environment. Perhaps I'm wrong, please correct me if you think I am wrong on this point but I am merely basing this on my army experience. Did I learn something useful from a social point of view in the army? Definitely - I learnt a lot of people skills. Did I develop empathy or understanding for those different from myself? Actually, far less than you think.

Nina: I think you're too cynical.

Alex: You are probably right.

Nina: I think there was some benefit in you having gone through national service and as you've described it yourself, you developed a lot of new skills when it came to dealing with people from very different social backgrounds whom you were forced to work with. Something good did come out of the experience - it is only if you set your expectations unrealistically high that you guarantee that you will be disappointed. So for example, if you expect everyone to have been through a comprehensive school or to have served national service to somehow have the compassion, the capacity and the social skills to get along with everyone from all sections of society - then of course, you're setting yourself up to fail as that's never ever going to be possible of course. But if some good can come of it, if individuals like yourself can walk away having learnt something new perhaps about others or even about yourself through the experience, then I believe that's to be celebrated. So you didn't become good friends with everyone you met in the army - so what? Nobody expected you to like them all, that's just totally unrealistic. But you walked away having learnt something useful from the experience nonetheless and that's still a pretty good result, I believe. Anyone who is reasonable will think that's a very good result.

Alex: I don't think we're ever going to reach consensus on this Nina.

Nina: No. Don't get me wrong, I do see the merits of the Singaporean system and sure there are all these reports about how well Singaporean kids are doing at school - but I'm not arguing that our comprehensive system is better because we produce better students. Yes there are things we can learn from Singapore. I'm arguing that the reasons why we do this is not for results that we can measure in terms of results at the exams and the wider picture of course is to manage education in a way that allows the maximum benefit for as many students as possible without giving favour to those who have already come from privileged backgrounds. The good intentions are there, have we achieved what we set out to do? No - things can always be better of course, but at least we're trying our best and moving in the right direction.

Alex: Likewise, I'd like to say that I am not saying the Singaporean system is better because it makes the rich richer and keeps the poor where they are - I actually believe that the Singaporean system does allow for more social mobility but I think this has far less to do with what actually happens in the school itself. I say this as I know Singapore extremely well.

Nina: Oh you have to explain this one to me please.

Alex: With pleasure. You see, even in the poorest of Singaporean families, I would say that most of the parents would still put a lot of pressure on their kids to study extremely hard in order to do well in schools in order to get into a better school, to get into a good university and get a good career. The pressure comes from the parents and the root of that is our culture so really, the biggest difference between what happens in the UK and what happens in Singapore is not so much whether or not we adopt streaming as part of the education process but rather what happens at home. The way children are brought up by their Asian parents are radically different in Singapore because the culture is so different - ironically, for the rich kids, their parents probably have some money for them so they won't starve if they can't find a good job, their parents can send them to a university abroad if all else fails and it's not the rich kids who get pushed the hardest in Singapore, it is the poor kids. The poorer you are, the more incentive you have to succeed when there's no welfare state, no safety net. They don't have the option to go study in Australia or America, they need to get into one of the good local universities or they're screwed. In some extreme cases, they need to score well enough in order to secure a scholarship or they can't even go to university because they're so poor their parents cannot afford to pay their university fees. There's that ethic of hard work so deeply ingrained in our culture and that's what makes the difference - not the education system, it is specifically that aspect of our Asian culture that is fundamental, that allows our system to work so well.

In the UK, many of the working class parents just don't push their kids as hard as their counterparts in Asia. There's almost a sense of resignation that if working class kids don't turn out to be academically gifted, they'll merely follow in their parents' footsteps and do working class jobs - people then start getting extremely defensive about being working class. You get all that rhetoric about, "hey what's wrong with being working class? Are you looking down on working class people? How dare you." I remember being on a ferry some time ago and I overheard a conversation between two young men who worked on the ferry - very working class indeed. They were earning about £250 a week doing manual labour and the irony was that they actually sounded happy about the situation, they genuinely thought they were doing better than their peers because now they know they have the money to go out drinking and partying on the weekend. I rolled my eyes and thought, £250 isn't going to get you very far if you've got to pay your bills, your rent, buy food - you're not going to have much left to go partying on the weekends. People like that probably never had parents who pushed them to study hard, achieve more, earn more money and that's the parents; it is the upbringing and ultimately their culture that has created this situation. You can't look at people like that and blame the education system or the schools, whilst conveniently ignoring their social background and culture out of this irrational fear of offending working class people.

But contrast that to the Singaporean working class parent who would smack their kids if they didn't study hard enough, "I didn't work 12 hours today at the factory despite my back giving me so much pain just for you to get average grades at school - do you want to end up like me working in the factory like that for such long hours, for so little money? Why do you think I work so hard to put you through school? Just so you can have a better future, so you won't end up like me - yet you let me down and bring shame to the family by not studying hard enough!" I'm not saying British working class parents will never behave like that, but I'm pointing out that this is the norm in Singapore and that's the huge difference in attitudes between the two countries. By that token I'm not sure what to suggest apart from looking at the root causes of the problem instead of blaming the education system. I remember this silly but true story: the owner of a restaurant decided one day that he would make the restaurant a lot classier if he went to buy some expensive, beautiful wine glasses but despite having spent hundreds of pounds on those new wine glasses, he was still serving very cheap wine as the house wine in those fancy wine glasses. So, the moral of the story? If you're not going to fix the root cause of your problem, the problem will still be there to haunt you no matter how much effort you put into treating the symptoms.

Nina: I'd like to think that education plays a much bigger part than you think in shifting attitudes to where they need to be, to where they ought to be, but I do take on board your point about different cultural attitudes in Singapore on this issue.

Alex: Nina, thanks so much for doing this and taking the time to talk to me.

Nina: Thank you.

Okay, that was a very long piece. Please let me know your thoughts, do leave a comment. Many thanks for reading.