"International Student Movement"

On the day when we had that International chat at GMT 3pm on Sunday, 11 Oct 2009, I really wanted to share in the chat that in Singapore and also many other Asian countries, the tuition fees are very high too, unless you're in the creme de la creme to enjoy scholarship funding, you're faced with the pressures of funding a tertiary education; but hardly anyone is doing anything about it, esp in Singapore. Somehow, I feel that we should be ashamed of it how we've been turned into robotic-law-abiding citizens...enough to evoke people to say and know that we folks wouldn't do anything without a 'license'.

I got this from an article: "'It will be nearly impossible to protest in Singapore for locals,'' Sinapan Samydorai, head of Think Centre, a human rights NGO, told IPS. ''Locals trying to express any political opinion in public will require a license. The licenses are often denied to locals.'' 

The situation's so severe that it's already formed a social stigma in many people's minds that S'poreans wouldn't have the chutzpah nor would people even bother to come in solidarity to express their distress and express their opinions to the government; less alone form protests and demonstrations. Everyone's blinded by competition and only through meritocracy would education be well deserved. Did they even think otherwise, that the less "clever" you are as socially perceived, the "more" one would require education?

It boils down to a mere rejoice when I see and know that in some part of this world, somebody/someone is doing something to fight for 'emancipatory' public education. Somebody once asked me if I don't know how to make people get involved or even concerned, I have to admit; perhaps so, I'm a mere individual, what can I do? I can do something, but there's only so much I can do. 

It is undoubtedly difficult to change the mindsets of people to think that it is not legitimate for people to 'pay a price' for education but that education should be a fundamental right to all! 

The government may subsidize education under the compulsory 10-years-education scheme approved by the Ministry of Education, but is that sufficient? Not to mention, with the street full of graduates, being your high school grad wouldn't allow one to emerge from poverty/ignorance/oppression from the right to education and knowledge at a higher level !