Is it me or is this FT damn demanding? He expect everyone to bend backwards for him?
Father frustrated by 'lack of support' for son's talent
Above: Ainan Celeste Cawley with his father Valentine Cawley. Ainan is only 9, but he has already passed his Physics and Chemistry 'O' Level paper.
HE CALLS his son 'the boy who knew too much'.
Dad Valentine Cawley (right) also describes Ainan as a 'binary science prodigy', who has proven himself in more than one subject.
But it has been difficult to get support for Ainan from the Singapore education community, claims the father.
According to him, education officers were sceptical of his son's talent and tried to block rather than aid Ainan's access to educational facilities.
He has even written posts on his blog titled 'The boy who knew too much: a child prodigy'.
Are Mr Cawley's complaints justified?
He said the family's main difficulty was in trying to get Ainan access to a chemistry laboratory so that he could get practical experience.
He went to Ainan's primary school, which did not have a lab, for help.
The school referred him to the Gifted Education Branch at the Ministry of Education (MOE).
Interrogations
Mr Cawley said MOE put Ainan through 'a battery of tests and interrogations' before assigning them a case officer, who took a 'long time' before arranging for lab sessions.
An MOE spokesman said it helped arrange six lab sessions at Raffles Institution to build up Ainan's lab skills.
Mr Cawley said: 'It seemed an awfully short course, but we accepted for something was better than nothing,' he said.
He said the teacher there had a good rapport with Ainan and the family was grateful for the chance, but they wanted the lab access to continue.
MOE then referred Ainan to the NUS High School of Mathematics & Science in February 2007.
Mr Suresh Balakrishnan, its deputy principal, said that after a preliminary assessment, followed by a more detailed diagnostic testing, the school determined that Ainan had the ability to accelerate his learning of chemistry.
'However, the school cautioned that advanced chemistry concepts would require corresponding advanced understanding of mathematics and physics, which Ainan may lack,' he said.
NUS High School allowed the boy to take part in the classes free of charge.
Mr Cawley said Ainan's first lesson at NUS High School was a 'great disappointment', as 'they had placed him in a class below his ability'.
He said Ainan told him he was learning only 'one new fact a day'.
Ainan's parents asked for him to be moved to a different class. But he claimed: 'It was much the same problem. There was very little that was new.'
But Mr Suresh said: 'Ainan had difficulties keeping up with the rest of the class and learnt more effectively when the teachers coached him personally while the rest of the class was doing their own work.'
Mr Cawley insisted his son had more than been able to keep up and that perhaps the teacher misinterpreted Ainan's shyness.
After trying out one Year 1 and one Year 2 module, Ainan's parents eventually pulled him out of the school.
Said Mr Cawley: 'We stopped sending Ainan to NUS High because it just wasn't worth the taxi fare there. He learnt nothing concrete, so it seemed pointless.'
The MOE spokesman said it further got the support of Singapore Science Centre for a number of chemistry workshops on topics like chemistry of food and the human body that Ainan could attend, but his parents did not take up this option.
Mr Cawley said they decided not to go ahead as it was never explained to them in detail what the classes would involve and there would be a fee.
During a meeting later with MOE officials, a frustrated Mr Cawley said he walked out of the meeting and refused to have anything to do with the ministry any further.
Said the MOE spokesman: 'Upon the father's request, MOE did not make further recommendations regarding Ainan's education from February 2008.'
It was after looking at some private schools, that the Cawleys chose Singapore Polytechnic.
Dispiriting
Mr Cawley said the whole exercise had been 'very dispiriting', and it shouldn't have been this hard to meet Ainan's intellectual needs.
He said: 'It is rare to find such a young child with such a developed gift for, and interest in, science.
'It shouldn't be too difficult for a rich nation to accommodate such needs, automatically, without the parents having to spend two years in a long search for somewhere to allow him to grow...
'I can only hope that the path ahead is more open than the one behind has been.'
