"Why are our K2 students going for leadership training programmes!?!?"

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http://news.asiaone.com/news/edvantage/too-much-tuition-singapore-pm-lee

At the youth dialogue held last night, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong gave his take on the tuition situation in Singapore after one student expressed concern about parents sending their kids to tuition and other extra classes from a young age.

The student said his niece in her second year at kindergarten is going to so many classes - including one on leadership skills - that he fears that she is losing her childhood.

He was one of about 350 young Singaporeans aged 12 to 35 who attended the post-rally dialogue.

In response, PM Lee acknowledged the situation and noted that many parents are overzealous in arranging for tuition classes for their children.

"Why are K2 students going for leadership training programmes? It's partly because our system is competitive, I think it's [also] partly because parents are very anxious for their kids. And I think sometimes their kids also want to make sure they get the few extra points and they ask their parents to arrange tuition for them," he said.

"But I think it's too much. Tuition can help if you are really struggling with a subject. But generally speaking, we want the teachers in school to be teaching you the whole subject, not teaching you the basics and then saying 'the rest you go and ask your tuition teacher.'"

"So I think that actually, we are doing too much tuition in Singapore," he concluded.