\n<\/p>\n
Not all alumni parents are opposed to the changes, with some saying they are willing to give up an advantage if it means creating a more inclusive system.<\/span><\/p>\n Mr Lester Lee, an alumnus of Nanyang Primary School with a five-year-old daughter, said alumni priority matters to him as it offers “an added dimension of shared experience”, but he would sacrifice that advantage if it did not serve the common good.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIf excessive alumni benefits are worsening inequality then we should intervene,\u201d the 35-year-old healthcare professional said.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Reducing competition, he said, also requires strengthening schools more broadly.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIf every school was a good school, or at least unique and empowered, there would be less of a need to try to game the system,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n Anglo-Chinese School (Junior) alumnus Gabriel, who wanted to be known only by his first name, similarly placed little importance on securing an alumni advantage for his children.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSharing the same school name as my child would be nice, but surely the parent-child relationship has depth to it beyond what schools we went to,\u201d said the 33-year-old, who works in administration.<\/span><\/p>\n He described the changes as \u201cperfectly reasonable\u201d, though he questioned what it means for a registration system to be fair.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cFairer for who?\u201d he said. \u201cThere must be a logic and process to evaluate school placements. Why can’t we have one that’s genuinely fair-minded, then live with the consequences?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Others were more circumspect about whether the changes could be characterised as fair.<\/span><\/p>\n Jean (not her real name), an alumna of Raffles Girls\u2019 Primary School who has a daughter, said she was surprised by the changes as \u201calumni priority appears to be an established practice in national schools\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n But she said fairness in the registration exercise could not be viewed in absolute terms.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cMy view is that the concept of \u2018fair\u2019 is a subjective and reductive label. There is no broad-brush version of fairness, in that for the rules to be \u2018fair\u2019 to one group, another group loses out,\u201d said Jean, who is a lawyer.<\/span><\/p>\n From a policy-design perspective, no simple registration system may satisfy all parents, said Associate Professor Jason Tan, who works in policy, curriculum and leadership at the National Institute of Education.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThere is probably no way of ensuring that the registration framework will appease the concerns of all parents,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n A completely randomised lottery system could appear fairer and ensure a wider spread of demographic backgrounds, but it would come with its own trade-offs, he said.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cMany parents would be upset at not being able to choose a preferred school,\u201d he said, adding that the young age of Primary 1 pupils would also raise concerns over travelling time and whether children can attend the same school as their older siblings.<\/span><\/p>\n More broadly, Assoc Prof Tan said policymakers are “grappling with the practical difficulties involved in making moral, not just technical, decisions that affect parents and students”, including how much priority to give to different policy goals.<\/span><\/p>\n Even alumni who are not yet parents are willing to accept the changes.<\/span><\/p>\n St Margaret’s School (Primary) alumna Rachel, who wanted to be known only by her first name, said she would want her future child to learn alongside peers from different backgrounds and cultures, as this could help develop empathy and understanding.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cWhen you have all your children coming from the same socio-economic background, we live in a bubble, and they don’t get to experience other perspectives,\u201d she said.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe country is not just children living in Bukit Timah or people living in Bukit Timah. If you’re living in this bubble, you’ll miss out on the perspectives of the rest of the population.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n She added that other aspects of primary school education were also “worth debating about”. To her, bigger priorities include equal access to educational resources, teaching quality, the syllabus and addressing student stress.<\/span><\/p>\n