purple.light

Monday, November 24, 2003

Do not stereotype SCGS girls 

To say that I am furious is an understatement.
I am livid.
And totally annoyed that our local broadsheet is actually stirring up a storm (a very pointless storm, I might add) that is way past its expiry date.

If you took a read at our national paper this morning, you would undoubtedly have read an article entitled Which schools do you think these students come from?. In it, the reporters tried to confirm if the stereotypes about certain schools and the students that they produce are true. And this is following the flurry of comments from readers about a columnist's insistence, last Sunday, that she would never send her daughters to her alma mater because the girls from that school are too confident and hence, unmarriageable. In that particular column, she also mentioned that girls from Singapore Chinese Girls School have been known to trade up in marriages but only if you belong to the upper tier of society. If you don't, then tough luck, you can't marry up.

In today's articles, the reporters harped on the notion that SCGS girls want to be tai-tais and are known to be boring. Bullshit, I say. Ask around my friends and they will tell you that I am anything but boring and inane. And to add insult to injury, the article mentioned about our school's infamous uniform. Well, I happen to like it. It's cooling and the school does teach us about proper grooming such as shaving, you know.

I am annoyed that these reporters chose to portray my school as a bimbo school. I could tell them a thing or two, given that they probably were never privileged enough to experience life there. Without my school, I would never have had a chance to studying there because they paid for my school fees throughout the four years I was there. Not only that, I also received free, brand new text books every year.

Why did they not talk about how artistically inclined the girls are, given that we were always exposed to a variety of arts, from Russian dance troupes to Australian theatre performances to the Singapore Symphony Orchestra? How about the fact that we were taught every sport under the sun, be it hockey or touch rugby? That we had so much fun even if we ended up with bruises on our legs? Or the fact that we were encouraged to take a mixture of Science and Arts subjects so that we can be balanced beings with knowledge? That we were all made to take Literature and the school will never drop the subject so that our ranking will go up?

I don't understand what the big brouhaha is about independent single sex schools and the students they produced. Why doesn't anyone talk about co-ed schools? Or, why bother even comparing? I suppose it's meant to be tongue-in-cheek as a friend says but hey, the subject is rubbish to begin with.

Please, the papers are full of advertisements as it is. Save your newshole for more worthy subjects than comparing which students from which schools are more marriageable.

SCGS has made me "grow nearer the sky" and I am all the better for it. I am proud to be from the school of Emerald Hill.

yAnn at 11/24/2003 11:31:00 AM