SINGAPORE'S pressure-cooker, rote-learning education system is being revamped to turn out workers who can compete in the world of ideas and technology.

"Remaking itself" to avoid being overwhelmed by cheap, large economies like China and India is a phrase often heard - and taken seriously - in Singapore these days.

To succeed, the republic has to discard many of its past low-risk policies that ranked obedience, efficiency and long working hours just as highly as the Japanese - with similar results.

Singapore now wants its people to not only be engineers and scientists but gain entrepreneurial and creative skills, too - starting, of course, from the schools.

It is easier said than done.

Standing in the way is a centuries-old mindset among parents and teachers who define a good student as an unquestioning, hard-working youth with top exam grades.

He is someone who listens and does what the teacher says and sticks to a set programme of studies - no "ifs" and "buts."

In recent years, Minister of Education Rear-Admiral Teo Chee Hean has been steadily making radical changes, adapting many of America's methods of promoting critical thinking in schools and universities.

The island's lack of natural resources has led it to place a heavy load on human capital and has resulted in a fiercely competitive education system.

At this start of the 21st century, more fundamental changes are being considered -- urgently. They range from doing away with "O" and "A" level exams for top students to allowing private schools to operate.

Pre-university students may have to do more community service and original research work. There is already more emphasis on projects than on tests on memorising data.

In university, more of its grading will be open, in which a student is tested on his ability to use - not memorise - data. In fact, 25 percent of entry scores will be based on America's SAT system with its emphasis on interpretative skills.

Not well-versed enough with the new direction, parents are still putting pressure on their children "to study hard" - not read more, debate more or think more about creating things.

In general, Singapore students are hard-working, probably among the most diligent in the world. It is partly caused by a system that rewards high grades - and these come mostly from rote learning and plenty of homework.

Over the years, many teachers from the top schools have mastered the art of identifying exam questions and hard-working (not necessarily intelligent) students benefit from it. And, of course, pressure from parents and grade-conscious teachers contribute to it.

The result is enormous pressure on the children. More and more pupils, as young as kindergarten and primary classes, are seeking help from psychiatrists for study or exam blues.

On Mondays, this "school refusal" illness appears for more and more pupils in the form of a tummy ache, headache, nausea, fever or dizziness, according to a research conducted by a government hospital.

It is not a physical sickness. The children are so desperate to avoid school that the symptoms of these ailments appear at the start of the week.

The spotlight on Singapore's high-pressure education system followed suicides earlier this year of two girls, aged 10 and 12, because they did not perform well in examinations.

Surveys of nine- to 12-year-olds in the city-state have found one in three say life is not worth living because of the fear of academic failure. Five per cent of all pupils in Singapore are now said to suffer from "school refusal," and the Health Ministry recently brought in an Australian expert to study how Singapore's school system impacts on the health of children.

Dr Jill Sewell, a child health specialist at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne, spent a week visiting hospitals and talking to children before making recommendations to the ministry.

"These (school refusal) pains can be very real. But underlying these physical symptoms is deep anxiety," Dr Sewell said.

In another controversial development, a secondary school caned 41 boys for skipping tests in one month recently.

An enraged parent, whose son was reluctant to go to school after being caned, told the Straits Times: "I believe the school's counselling programme is a complete failure if the principal has to resort to caning."

But the principal, Saminathan Gopal, stood by his decision and described the punished students as recalcitrant, and that "they were irresponsible and did not turn up for an important test."

Each boy received two strokes on the buttocks and was sent for counselling later. Seventeen girls were sent for community work for skipping the tests as well.

While the Education Ministry gives principals the discretion and authority to cane students, it allows only a maximum of six light strokes on the palm or buttocks, and does not allow girls to be caned.

To critics, this use of corporate punishment instead of counselling does not augur well for efforts to promote thinking students.

Not all parents condemn this strictness. One parent, whose 16-year-old son had overslept and missed five tests, said: "Missing tests is ridiculous. He should be caned, and if he misbehaves again he should be caned again."

The competitive workload and exam system has resulted in Singapore students producing the highest scores in the world in Science and Mathematics.

Parents play a major role pressuring - or trying to bribe - their kids to perform. The richer ones buy condos close to premium schools to meet residential qualification. Others contribute to school funds hoping to get in. Thousands of dollars are spent on private tuition, grooming classes, music lessons and holiday study camps.

Some parents promise their children monetary incentives to get good grades in school or, at the lower level, a toy or a meal at the child's favourite restaurant.

Some find this reward scheme a good way to motivate a student to work harder. Others condemn it as inculcating materialistic values on their young. "These kids may or may not be engineers or doctors one day, but they certainly will grow up to become materialistic citizens who won't do things without being paid," said one counsellor.

Someone posted this online warning: "Parents, beware, you are in danger of raising a generation of disgruntled, unappreciative and potentially arrogant snobs."

Seah Chiang Nee is a veteran journalist and editor of the information website littlespeck.com

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