Educated to work for Life. Happy working till 65.

[Arcachon]

SINGAPORE - The future of education is about the quest for skills, not the quest for paper qualifications. That, said Education Minister Heng Swee Keat on Sept 9, goes to the heart of a national report to improve the career prospects of Singapore's polytechnic and technical institute's students.

After two days of impassioned debate by MPs on the Applied Study in Polytechnics and Institute of Technical Education Review (ASPIRE) report, Mr Heng set out what he described as "limiting beliefs" that could inhibit people from achieving their full potential.

The first is the mistaken belief that qualifications are all that matters. But "the highest qualifications will do a person no good, if there are no good jobs available in the first place", as shown in Taiwan and parts of Europe, he noted.

Also, there are a variety of jobs that require people to learn in different ways and all their lives. "Some jobs require degrees; some jobs don't." Indeed, people need a whole package of attributes to succeed at the workplace.

At the other extreme is the second equally limiting belief that qualifications no longer matter.

"Qualifications matter but they must be the right qualifications and of the right standard for what we want to do," he pointed out.

"Aspire is not about dissuading Singaporeans from upgrading ourselves, or pursuing degrees or pursuing any form of qualifications."

The third limiting belief is that if polytechnic and ITE students learn better, the value of degrees would go down. The opposite is true because everyone gains when a team does well, he said.

The report, which received broad support from the MPs, including those of the Workers' Party, recommended multiple pathways to give everyone, regardless of qualifications, opportunities to succeed in a chosen career.

Mr Heng also identified three action areas to achieve the desired outcomes. These are: Integrate theoretical and applied learning; learn at every stage of your career and in every way; and respect everyone.

Summing up what ASPIRE aims to achieve, he put it thus: "It is not just about qualifications, not just about jobs, not just about economic growth… All of this is to create the conditions for Singaporeans to pursue lives of meaning, achievement and joy. Every one of us, regardless of our starting points."

- See more at: http://education.asiaone.com/content....X1oeLII1.dpuf

[Arcachon]

http://onemilliondiary.blogspot.fr/

Personal Finance Blog Of A Journey To Reach My Investible Net Worth Targets At Different Stages Of My Life

Me & My Goals
I recently graduated (May 2013) from one of the local universities in Singapore and was fortunate to be able to start work immediately after my last exam paper. I work in the finance industry and am on track to obtain the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and Financial Risk Manager (FRM) designations by year 2016/2017.

The function of this blog is to track my net worth on a monthly basis and chronicle my journey towards financial freedom. I have a long term approach to stock investing and my strategy is to buy shares of solid dividend paying companies at depressed prices.

The sources of my capital for wealth accumulation over the years were:
1) Salary from full time job
2) Savings from National Service(NS)
3) Income from giving private tuition
4) Bursaries
5) Parents allowance
6) Dividends
7) Ang Pow money
8) Yearly GST Vouchers
9) Paid surveys from school
10) Allowance/Salary from internships and part time jobs

[Arcachon]

You did not failed to change lazy Malay, you success in making them Lazy. 'malaysia boleh' Thank you Dr Mahathir.

PETALING JAYA - Malays do not feel ashamed of failures anymore, lamented Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

He admitted that he failed to change the mentality of the Malays in his 22 years as prime minister.

"I spend 22 years trying to change the Malays but I admit I failed. However, there are a few success stories," he said in his remarks after launching a book by Anas Zubedy on Thursday.

Dr Mahathir lamented at the laziness of the Malays saying "if anyone asks me today, I would have to say Malays are lazy."

He said the men would become Mat Rempit, referring to groups of youths road-racing on their motorcycles at night, when they failed. This is evident in the gender breakdown in public universities.

"During my school time, if we fail our examination we feel embarassed.

"Seventy per cent of the students in our higher learning institution are female and only 30 per cent are male.

"What happen to the male students? They are not stupid, perhaps they are lazy. If we no longer feel such embarassment, we might fail," he said in his speech.

He noted that he had put several initiatives to change the Malay mindset, including the Look East Policy in 1982, as he admired Japan's determination in rebuilding their country post-World War Two.

"We must learn from the Japan on how they rose from nothing to become one of the top economies in the world," he said.

"The Japanese feel ashamed if they fail. They take everything seriously," he said.

Anas' book "#Wahai Melayu" is an initiative to inspire and motivate young Malay entrepreneurs as well as to change the stereotype of Malay as "a lazy race".

Written both in Bahasa Malaysia and English, Anas echoed the view that "Allah will not change the fate of the Malays if we Malays do not want to change ourselves."

"The theme underpins the struggle of the community in ensuring the Malays continued existence in the modern day rat race in a globalised era," he said.

http://news.asiaone.com/news/malaysi...ge-lazy-malays