UPDATE (3 Aug): Mr. Mohan wrote to us to clarify that his daughter was not intimidated by MOE as alleged in the Facebook note. But he said that they did tell him not to compare his daughter with scholars from PRC as they are elites.
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A Facebook user Mohan Sinnapillay claims that his daughter is being unfairly penalized by the Ministry of Education (MOE). She is a teacher in a public school and was sponsored by MOE for a diploma in education course at the National Institute of Education (NIE) soon after completing her A Level exams. She had to serve a two-year bond for MOE’s sponsorship.
At the end of the two-year bond period as a junior teacher, his daughter’s principal recommended her for a degree program in NIE and she was eventually offered a place in the institution of higher learning. MOE granted her unpaid leave to pursue her degree as well.
But now that she has completed her undergraduate program MOE wants her to not only serve a 3-year bond but to also pay for her degree. She now owes $30,000 in debts to MOE. When she enquired why she had to pay for the degree course when she was recommended by her principal, and when MOE itself granted her unpaid leave to pursue it, MOE allegedly told her that the conditions were in the fine print.
Mohan said that he had written to Education Minister Ng Chee Meng about his daughter’s predicament, but got no reply from him. Mohan also escalated the matter to the Public Service Commission, and they told him without properly answering his questions, that his daughter has to pay the money and still be bonded for 3 years.
This was when Mohan brought up the topic of scholarships for foreigners by the Singapore Government and asked why they not only have to pay for the degree programs but also do not have to serve bond periods (http://bit.ly/2aHYWfZ). And he claims that a human resource manager told him, “Don’t compare your daughter with those PRC scholars because they are ELITES.”
Mohan alleges that after this, his daughter was also warned that she would land in trouble if her father kept protesting.
Mohan said that he posted the topic in his Facebook not because he was expecting justice from MOE, but because he wanted to highlight the unfair treatment citizens were getting from their own Government.
Read also:
MOE says it has disciplined schoolgirls who beat up a student in carpark, public calls for harsher punishment – Singapore News
Netizens comment on the efficacy of MOE’s proposed buddy system – Singapore NewsÂ