MORE THAN HALF OF FOREIGN SCHOLARS ARE ACTUALLY JUST AVERAGE STUDENTS
4 Sep 2014
Singapore spends over $350 million each year to bring foreign scholars to Singapore to study in our local educational institutions [Link]. However, despite the considerable investment, more than half of these students do not even achieve honours when they graduate.
These students are supposed to be the brightest students and most of them are required to serve bonds with a Singapore company after they graduate in order to "contribute back" to Singapore as thanks for their free education and spending allowances.
When these students are brought in over local students using our taxpayer money for their fees and living expenses, it is expected that they really are foreign "talents" that are the brightest of the bright, much better than any of our local, non-scholar students. If this is not the case, the money spent to educate them here is wasted.
unless these students are much better than our locals, there is really no point to spend such huge sums to attract them here.
This is why it is so worrying that 55% of these foreign "scholars" do not even achieve high honours.
According to a Parliamentary reply by Sim Ann, the Minister of State for Education, about 45% of foreign scholars receive second upper class honours or better.
This means that 55% get second lower or worse. This means that this 55% is really only average, similar to the bulk of our local graduates.
In fact, there are undoubtedly many local Singaporean graduates who are not recipients of any scholarships or bursaries that achieve better than these 55% of foreign "scholars".
So why is there a need to fund so many foreign scholars with taxpayer money when most of them are not even highly talented.
Meanwhile, local Singaporeans are denied entry to our local universities. Currently, less than 30% of each cohort are able to make it into local universities [Link]. The rest are forced to settle with a diploma or cert or fork out lots of money to get an overseas degree.
As if it wasn't bad enough that so many of our locals are denied a place in a local university thanks to the large number of foreigners, even with 45% who do achieve good results, not all of them even stay to contribute back to Singapore.
Minister Heng Swee Keat admitted in parliament earlier this year that only 80% of foreign scholars actually found work or were approved to study more. The other 20% are missing in action and most likely defaulted on their bonds and went back to their countries with their fully paid degrees, never to return.
Seeing as so many of these foreign "scholars" are actually just average students, and 20% of them completely default on contributing to Singapore, wouldn't this money be much better spent on allowing more locals into the public universities or funding top local students so that they can concentrate more on their studies?
4 Sep 2014
Singapore spends over $350 million each year to bring foreign scholars to Singapore to study in our local educational institutions [Link]. However, despite the considerable investment, more than half of these students do not even achieve honours when they graduate.
These students are supposed to be the brightest students and most of them are required to serve bonds with a Singapore company after they graduate in order to "contribute back" to Singapore as thanks for their free education and spending allowances.
When these students are brought in over local students using our taxpayer money for their fees and living expenses, it is expected that they really are foreign "talents" that are the brightest of the bright, much better than any of our local, non-scholar students. If this is not the case, the money spent to educate them here is wasted.
unless these students are much better than our locals, there is really no point to spend such huge sums to attract them here.
This is why it is so worrying that 55% of these foreign "scholars" do not even achieve high honours.
According to a Parliamentary reply by Sim Ann, the Minister of State for Education, about 45% of foreign scholars receive second upper class honours or better.
This means that 55% get second lower or worse. This means that this 55% is really only average, similar to the bulk of our local graduates.
In fact, there are undoubtedly many local Singaporean graduates who are not recipients of any scholarships or bursaries that achieve better than these 55% of foreign "scholars".
So why is there a need to fund so many foreign scholars with taxpayer money when most of them are not even highly talented.
Meanwhile, local Singaporeans are denied entry to our local universities. Currently, less than 30% of each cohort are able to make it into local universities [Link]. The rest are forced to settle with a diploma or cert or fork out lots of money to get an overseas degree.
As if it wasn't bad enough that so many of our locals are denied a place in a local university thanks to the large number of foreigners, even with 45% who do achieve good results, not all of them even stay to contribute back to Singapore.
Minister Heng Swee Keat admitted in parliament earlier this year that only 80% of foreign scholars actually found work or were approved to study more. The other 20% are missing in action and most likely defaulted on their bonds and went back to their countries with their fully paid degrees, never to return.
Seeing as so many of these foreign "scholars" are actually just average students, and 20% of them completely default on contributing to Singapore, wouldn't this money be much better spent on allowing more locals into the public universities or funding top local students so that they can concentrate more on their studies?
