So it’s the June holidays. End of the third week of it. And everyone knows holidays of Singaporean students from primary 5 onwards to JC aren’t holidays at all. Holidays are supposedly time for students to take a break from word yet the week before the holidays start, each subject teacher had already begun planning out OUR holiday homework schedules, giving us a whole list of work to complete, completely not taking into consideration the possibility of us having other activities or the need for us to take a breather. What’s more, teachers just decide to plant a major block test after the holidays. And what is the result? 4 weeks packed with tight homework and revision schedules plus activities squeezed here and there. In other words, no holidays, more like Home-Based Learning. Honestly, I haven’t had any real holidays since two years ago, after I graduated from primary school.

It isn’t as if the school can’t liberate us for just four weeks? The least they can do is cut down the assignments and limit them to one per subject? Ultimate solution is put block tests BEFORE the holidays such that students can consolidate all they have learnt in the term BEFORE they go off to enjoy an enriching holiday and start afresh in the new term. Moreover, I really do not see what is wrong with extending our March and September holidays for a couple more weeks. Instead of affecting curriculum time, that could perhaps be beneficial to students’ learning as they can take time to acquire new skills that they would otherwise have been unable to in the classroom. To ensure that students spend their holidays well, the school can simply assign reflections for the student to write about what they have learnt in that duration. Nothing else academically-related. We’ve had enough of that for the term.

What with MOE telling parents that they try not to let students be so busy during the holidays? All crap talk. Students, especially those in elite schools such as Nanyang, all have no life. When the teachers post a homework list online, students like us would not possibly be able to debate with him or her to decrease the load, would it? That is also why I really hate being able to contact teachers online.

In contrast, when I asked friends from so-called neighbourhood schools what their holidays were like, they commented that they were almost entirely free for the whole month. They did not have exams immediately after the holidays and they did not need to do as much self-learning or homework as I did.

Let’s compare holidays with other countries then. In the USA and other western countries, summer vacation lasts for almost two months and students are actually able to do what they like for these months. Singapore is already one of the countries with the least number of days of holiday in the world. Even younger students are not spared from this “workaholic” environment, toiling away outside of school.