The Anti Neo-Democracy Theorist

Random Thoughts on Home School Education & Reach of the State

I read with fascination on the phenomena of home schooling as reported in the Straits Times today. Home schooling, as with many things in Singapore, have their own share of critics and myths. Home schooling often does not entail merely studying at home - in America, home schoolers often form their own community, with group activities stressed even as individuals study at home. Many home schoolers attend enrichment classes such as piano and not surprisingly many of them are involved in community and political outreaches to broaden their social circles. The church often becomes a focal point for home school kids - and considering that many students today do not consider their friends in school as the people they necessarily hang out with (think stereotypical church kids, temple kids, street kids, arcade kids, sports kids, gyms kids, game kids, hang out at the mall and waste time kids) ,I wonder how problematic will it be for a Singapore kid about not going to a formal school in light of the former situation.

And the advantage of being a home schooler in Singapore is that unlike suburban America, Singapore is a place where it is very compact, forcing individuals to interact with each other on a daily basis. Of course, this doesn’t mean that home schoolers will interact with their neighbors and street kids, but this is based on the assumption that all home schoolers are introverts because of their educational socialization, which I am not sure whether it is true. With rising concerns of social problems in our education system, I wonder if more Singaporeans will home school their kids.

Yet, the most interesting piece of information for me in the ST article was this section:

“They are also required to clear the National Education quiz, a test of their knowledge of Singapore’s history and the challenges facing it.”

It really opened my eyes to the idea of burden of citizenship. While many people will argue that the burden of citizenship includes paying taxes or serving the nation service, in actuality, the burden of citizenship begins with formal education, where students are supposed to imbue the qualities of a model Singaporean citizen.  It is akin to working on a blank slate. And even home schoolers cannot escape the everyday levels of “orthodoxing” in formal schools. Despite not investing in the same common space in schools, they are subjected to the state’s discipline. They have to internalize the party-state discourse of the past and “the challenges facing it.” They have to become model economizing citizens in their studies and while the state allows the citizen to perform private acts of education upon their sons and daughters, they realize that these home schoolers might forget they are Singaporeans. For education, just as freedom can be stretched and appropriated in Singapore, but please, please, for the sake of Singapore, remember to take your NE pills before heading to the age of 13.

Question of the day: Does a PSLE student knowing the answers to an NE quiz makes them more of a Singaporean than one who has not taken it?