Singaporean Educational Planning: Moving from the Macro to the Micro

Abstract

This paper looks at current reforms by the Government and Ministry of Education, which are moving from a tight national system to a more locally based system, where schools and teachers will have more choice over what they study and teach. This paper addresses this reform at three levels. First, it highlights the changes in the Singaporean education system at a national level. Second, it examines the issues surrounding these changes, in particular in relation to the dichotomy between the global and local demands of Singapore’s education system. Third, it explores how these demands will change local realities, benefiting certain students and affecting the status of humanities, in particular subjects like English literature and connects macro-level planning with micro-level planning. Increasingly, the language planning literature is stressing the need for education planning to move from a focus on the national to a focus on the local. Singapore, which has adhered to a heavy top-down planning model, with a significant focus on language issues, presents an interesting case study of whether such change is possible.