Ensuring social equality and mobility by building young leaders

Education. The dream for meritocratic education is to level the playing field. However, does it currently? One of Halogen’s dreams is to increase social mobility. Over the last 10 years, we have availed and made our leadership offerings accessible to all. On the same day, we can be in both a neighbourhood and elite school. Through the years, we have seen students we coach in leadership grow in confidence and competence.

A key area we have identified a strong need for leadership in is the field of digital media. Wise use of it can lead to better opportunities, growth and social good. Poor use of it can lead to degradation, defamation and degeneration. People have been both promoted and fired through the use of Digital Media.

If youths can learn how to use Digital Media wisely, the digital divide between individuals and groups of different socioeconomic levels can be lessened, thereby increasing social mobility. If youths can learn how to use Digital Media responsibly, social cohesion can be improved rather than compromised.

Read on for a perspective offered by Soon Sze-Meng, a Halogen board member, and regional director at Visa Inc. He writes about such excesses in our ethos and champions the need for social mobility and social cohesion in Singapore. His article was first published in The Straits Times on 23 January 2013:

Social Mobility and Social Cohesion in Singapore

Singapore has grown its gross domestic product per capita more than fivefold in 30 years from $11,947 to $63,050, one of the highest in the world.

However, our Gini coefficient as a measure of income inequality was at around 0.45 to 0.47 for the past decade, again one of the highest in the world—a zero reading indicates perfect equality and 1 suggests complete inequality.

The relentless focus on meritocracy, market-driven policies and economic growth have resulted in Singapore topping the charts in both GDP per capita and income inequality.

Much has been said recently about the limits of meritocracy in Singapore, with critics pointing to the way winners in an academic meritocracy become the new elite who pass on their advantages to their offspring, giving them an advantage over others with fewer resources or different talents.

And yet, as Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong reminded Singaporeans last week, meritocracy must remain a critical value. Meritocracy is, after all, the notion that performance should be the yardstick for rewards and advancement. Not many Singaporeans, I am sure, would want to argue that the alternative of promoting on the basis of birth and connections is superior.

In the next phase of Singapore’s development, however, the excesses of meritocracy can be ameliorated. We need to refocus the objective of public policy back on to the basics and put social mobility and social cohesion at the heart of policies.

If we value social mobility, we will work harder at making sure each generation enjoys equality of opportunity.

To be sure, promoting social mobility is no panacea. Wealthier Singaporeans will continue to pay for costly pre-schools, pricey properties near popular primary schools to gain priority in admission as well as steep tuition fees for their children to excel in examinations. All the angst over education and exams will not disappear.

But if we consciously put social mobility as a goal in education policy, right up there with meritocracy, then we can get more nuanced decisions.

“.., if we consciously put social mobility as a goal in education policy, right up there with meritocracy, then we can get more nuanced decisions.” – Soon Sze-Meng

A narrow economic view of early childhood education may lead us to conclude that it is best as a private good provided by the private sector, paid for by families. This creates diversity and choice.

Injecting social mobility into the equation as a desired outcome changes the calculus significantly. Then a society is more likely to say pre-school education deserves state subsidies to help level up children from families with lower levels of financial or social capital.

The recent move to provide more after-school care centres in schools, rather than direct students to private and costly tuition centres, is an excellent step towards raising social mobility. It gives poorer students access to a conducive and supervised study environment after classes. This helps level the playing field so they can compete in the meritocratic race on more equal terms.

Singapore can also make social cohesion an explicit outcome of policy goals in education and social services.

Up to now, the country has enjoyed high economic growth but also seen high income inequality that erodes social cohesion.

For example, the easy availability of foreign workers drives growth, but has an impact on social cohesion — in depressing wages of lower-income Singaporeans, and creating a gulf between locals and foreign workers.

Integrating the large surge of foreigners with their different value systems and language backgrounds has not been easy.

If growth is pursued without effort to narrow income inequality, social distances result. This refers to the difference in lifestyles and experiences between the haves and have-nots, evident in different strata cocooned in increasingly separate living environments with limited opportunities to interact, thus fraying social cohesion.

Making social cohesion an explicit goal can result in different policy choices.

For example, it may be more administratively convenient for some secondary schools to offer only Express streams. But for the sake of social cohesion, it would be better for all secondary schools to offer classes in the Normal stream as well so students mix with others of different academic abilities. This allows impressionable teens to form a healthier view of, and respect for, the varieties of human talent and skills.

“For example, it may be more administratively convenient for some secondary schools to offer only Express streams. But for the sake of social cohesion, it would be better for all secondary schools to offer classes in the Normal stream as well so students mix with others of different academic abilities. This allows impressionable teens to form a healthier view of, and respect for, the varieties of human talent and skills.” – Soon Sze-Meng

When students from the Express stream join Normal (Technical) students in a co-curricular activity in, say, the football club, the former

may come to value psychomotor skills and not just academic ability.

Similarly, a purely economic lens will compel policymakers to tender out food centres to the highest bidders. And admission to public attractions will be priced at the market value, with high ticket prices.

But if social cohesion is a value, we may want public places to be accessible to all. We may want tickets to spanking new tourist attractions priced lower for residents. We should continue to have hawker centres run as social enterprises so stallholders can continue to sell food at affordable prices.

This way, the poor and rich can have more shared experiences and rub shoulders while having fun, waiting in line or eating in these public places.

A commitment to social mobility and social cohesion entails more than lip service. True commitment to these ideals requires Singapore to draw different conclusions about what is good policy.

Singapore’s commitment to meritocracy as a way of life will be stronger — if it is tempered by the compassion and inclusivity that social mobility and social cohesion allow.

Article by Jael Chng, with Soon Sze-Meng. Sze-Meng is a regional director in Visa Inc focussing on the cross-border business for its Asia-Pacific, Central Europe, Middle East and Africa markets. He previously worked in McKinsey & Co. and Monitor Group. He has been a board member at Halogen Foundation Singapore since 2009.