I'm a 13 year old studying in Catholic High's IP programme. Including WRP, 3rd language and MEP, I take 11 subjects and have an intensive CCA which trains until 7 2-3 times a week. While my other friends in other schools are knocking off at 12.30, the earliest that I can go home is at 3.30.
However, after a day of CCA training, I would probably reach home at 7.40, shower, have my dinner, change and then finally do my homework. The amount of homework in Catholic High is ridiculous. My average sleeping hours are around 6, or if I am lucky, 7.5. I feel that this is inappropriate for Secondary 1 students. What happened to the 'children should get 9 hours of sleep' thing? Furthermore, we have to work on countless projects, and if we have any time left, revise for the never-ending tests.
If you take music exams it is worse. Where do you get time to practice your instrument? If I were to take everything into consideration, I would be sleeping at 3 in the morning everyday. And let's not forget that some students live far away, thus they have to wake up earlier. So I'd be getting 3 hours of sleep if I were to do everything. As you can see, that's not possible.
So what do I do? I compromise and stop practicing my instrument, 3rd language, revision and just focus on the work and projects. After dealing with all of that, the earliest I sleep is around 11.
What happened to a holistic education? If this is MOE's idea of education, no wonder our society is screwed. Look at England, Australia- they enjoy roughly the same success as us in terms of education but their system is way less intense and vigorous when compared to ours. This is definitely not the way to go to raising another golden generation. By cramming never-ending tonnes of work onto pressured students you'll either make them crack or turn them into raging delusional maniacs.
MOE stated that they'll give students a well-rounded education. All I can see here is results flying around. "Did you fail? Ha loser.""Did you get A?""Did you pass?""Did you get A?" This is NOT the environment we want kids to be in. I have some friends (me included) who already know their results have hit rock bottom and they're working hard on it. There's no need for anyone, not the students, parents, teachers to rub it in. This happened to me and now I'm an unhappy student who snaps and gets into fits of rage whenever I see a 'C' on my paper. All they teach me is useless stuff I'll never have to use in my life and how to get a PhD and a fancy Porsche and a Condo by working hard. NO NO NO NO. What you should teach us is the importance of earning a living and being independent in working and making money. Students have to know how to make decisions, especially when things go wrong. When they're happy, they're as high as a drug addict taking vodka. When they're sad, it's like they've reached rock bottom.
MOE needs to be aware that what they're doing is ruining the future generation. I know some adults will think that I'm a pussy and that they had it much worse back then, but we have never experienced what you have, so they shouldn't judge us.
Thanks for taking time out your life to read this bad article.
A kid
TRS Contributor