I wrote a letter in response to an article I read in Today.

I REFER to "My son deserves a second chance" (Jan 6).
My two children were home schooled up to their O-levels. They did well enough to qualify for a polytechnic.

In 2008, while my son was doing his third-year Diploma in New Media in Republic Polytechnic and my daughter was doing her second year in Mass Communication in Temasek Polytechnic, he suggested that they take their A-levels as private candidates.

I was worried that they could not handle this in addition to their poly studies, but they went ahead.

They signed up for English Literature and Geography at A-level and General Paper and Maths at AO level, and studied using the syllabus available from the Singapore Examination and Assessment Board.

Half-way through, they dropped Geography and Maths because of the heavy workload at the polytechnics. They took Literature and General Paper.

My daughter obtained a distinction for Literature and a B for General Paper. My son got a C for General Paper and a D for Literature.

Did sitting for the A-levels affect their other studies? It, in fact, helped with their poly performance. My son graduated in the top 5 per cent of his cohort and has a place in the National University of Singapore. My daughter has not finished her final year yet; so far her Grade Point average is about 3.2.

My reason for sharing our children's education journey is to encourage Mr Vincent Tan to seek an alternative route to further his son's education.

The junior college route is only one of several his son can take. He can take up a poly course or, alternatively, he can complete his A-levels on his own.

I am sure that this experience will give Mr Tan's son the motivation to pull himself together and complete his education one way or another.

More comments on the subject at www.todayonline.com/voices

This is the article that I am responding to.

My son deserves a second chance

Letter from Vincent Tan

05:55 AM Jan 06, 2010

THE new school year started on Monday, but my son, who was in his first year of junior college (JC) last year, will not be attending school this year.

My son qualified for his JC having scored an O-Levels aggregate of 10 points. Except for Chinese, which he failed, he scored either A1s or A2s for his subjects.

However, my son was not a consistent worker. He has the habit of slacking during non-crucial years, only to outperform and surprise peers, teachers and parents alike and make the cut when it matters. At PSLE he topped his school's EM2 stream, with A* in three subjects and an A in Chinese.

Last year, he did badly in his "promo" exams, only getting passing grades in two subjects. Prior to the exam, the school vice-principals (VPs) and his civic tutor (CT) had flagged his "attitude problem" and warned that he would not make it to JC2 if he did not meet the promotion criteria.

Having fared badly in his exams, my playful son was given his report card with a blank under "status", meaning it had not yet been decided whether he would be retained or promoted. The VPs warned that my son was under review and that his performance in the ongoing Project Work (PW) would determine the outcome of that status.

We wanted my son to be given a fair chance and pleaded that his status not be determined and revealed to him until after the PW final presentation was over. However, his CT told him in no uncertain terms that he would be "expelled" and would not even be retained for JC1.

That pulled the carpet from under his feet. For him, all motivation was lost.

A few days after the PW presentation, we were told by the CT to meet the VPs. My son was very happy that day, as the CT had changed tack and told him that he would be retained. As parents we were elated when we were told the news and we went to the meeting with a happy heart.

My wife and I stepped into the room to meet the VPs and were given a report card with the status "retained". As a concerned parent, I voiced out the difficulties we had motivating our son for the PW and we wanted to make sure that in his repeat year he would not face such a setback again. I pointed out that at his young age motivation was a key factor in performance.

To our disbelief, one of the VPs at that point pulled back the report card, said they had made a terrible mistake and asked for our forgiveness. My son was not to be retained, they said - he was being asked to leave.

While my son fared badly at the promos, was it not overly punitive to deprive him of a chance to at least repeat JC1? My son's entire future was at stake.

My son is determined to do JC in Singapore, but when we contacted the other JCs, we were told that they, too, are also weeding out weak students. We have not received so much as a call from any of them.

Back in my school days, some of my more playful classmates used to do badly in non-crucial years only to ace their school-leaving exams when it mattered. Many are eminent members of society now.

Are JCs now too competitive? In their hurry to raise their "value add" quotient, are they pressuring weak students to drop subjects and prematurely weeding out students they deem unsuitable?

I hope the Ministry of Education will look into the school ranking system, which may have seen sacrificial lambs such as my son paying the painful price.