lee_yl wrote:Yeah! It’s each school’s perogative to set their own promotional criteria. So long as everything is transparent and applied consistently across the board without fear or favour, there’s nothing to complain about. We just need to be informed and supervise the kids to work hard. Even for my DD1’s IP school, their promotional criteria for year 1 is min overall of 60% with an additional condition that Lang & Arts must be above 60%.
If the schools recognise early that some students really can’t meet the academic rigour, then channelling them to the O-level route may not necessarily be a bad thing after all. After all, every kid develops at a different pace.
I believe the UAS for both HCI (JC) and RI (JC) for the 2017 (last year) A-level batch should only have minimal difference? Both schools are equally good.
From my own personal experience, when I chose secondary schools for my two kids, I didn’t even know the details of the promotional criteria, I just consider more important things (to me) like school culture, environment, curriculum and programs, teachers’ quality and a qualitative assessment whether my child will be a good fit in their respective new schools. Whatever the school’s promotional criteria, I just play by the rules.
When come to choosing Secondary schools, knowing what kind of school culture, environment, curriculum.etc, as what u mentioned, is only the basic fundamental groundwork checked. However, these not enough, insufficient. One should also do further homework, find out how each year's Promotional criteria, is like ? heard of Chinese saying, "yong bei er lai ?"
give u an analogy, say eg, check into a hotel, overseas, in a foreign land. When u open the door, step into a hotel room, may see a gorgeous, beautiful dining or sleeping area. However, something far more important is, u must remember to also go and find, "Where is the fire-exit escape route ?". In the event of a fire, where the flames keep devour, destroy everything, as the licking flames go higher and higher up the storey (level), one cannot possibly take a lift down, because trapped inside the lift. Saw the movie, "Towering Inferno ?" So how to escape, in the event of a fire emergency break-out ?
Which situation is better ? to go and find out first where is the fire escape route, or in the event of really a fire break out, start to scream and panic and start digging for a torch-light in the dark, frantically trying to find the escape road ?
Same thing, when one enter an IP school, must go and find out : how to escape ?
In the case of NYGH, the escape comes in the form of a SIP programme, in case emergency : cannot cope, inside IP.
Future batches of IP-seeking candidates, targeting (intend) to study in other IP schools like
(National Junior College, Temasek Junior College, Catholic High, SCGS, St Nick, ACSI, MGS, SJI, Victoria, Cedar, Dunman High, River Valley High, NUS High) IP, esp. those taking 2019 PSLE candidates, pls do yourself a favor, find out in detail what is the Promotional Criterial like each year, from Sec 1 to Year 5 ? After u had checked thoroughly the detail, u remain confident of taking up the challenging IP program, then go for it. Check this out, even before start to accept DSA offer, binding yourself down to the IP contract, for next 6 years.
Below article describe the constant pressure and competition, as typical challenges faced by students, from the rigorous IP program.
ln IP, group work and projects assignment determine a certain big weightage (proportion) towards your continuous GPA / MSG score. This means that your results also dependent upon how reliable (or un-reliable) your team members you working with are, and there’s constant competition.
At so young an early age of 13 years old (Secondary 1), not all IP students like or adapt well to Projects-oriented style of studying (learning), or towards university type of “Lecture-Tutorial” studying, or towards "book your own personal consultation time periods with individual subject Tr, to clarify all your doubts & problems that you faced or encounter" very independent way of studying expected. .
