Our move towards developing clean energy and the attempt by investors to buy over and redevelop the Goodwood Park grounds. These two stories on the ST cover today tell me one thing: no one gets rich using their own money. The clean energy article says that applicants will get funding for their research amounting to millions of dollars. The Goodwood Park article says a little-known investment company will "work with property giants -- from Singapore and HK -- to fund [the project]."

To get rich, we have to convince other people that we know how to spend their money better than they can. So to those of you asking how to scrape up enough capital from your meagre savings to start your own company, the answer is, you don't. Leave your own money alone, go borrow from other people get others to invest in you instead.

Or you could just be satisfied with your "steady" income. That's what kids train for in school, isn't it? Do your job, get a grade. Do a lousy job, get a lousy grade and probably a scolding as well. Ahh... the life of a salaried worker.

The word "wireless" is a bit misleading. What it means is that the mass of intestines connecting devices to each other is hidden away, sometimes not very skillfully either. Anyway, I have successfully made my house into a wi-fi hot spot, and hopefully that will make my wi-fe think I'm a hot spot too.

As usual, my problems boiled down to something inconsequential that I either did or didn't do. In this case, it was because I was using the wrong passcode to log into my own system. Having to remember so many passwords will eventually addle the brain. Duh.

Glad I still had time to go cycling at ECP with Amy, Belinda, JY and HP. 1 hour of physical exercise clocked in for the week. Wayne joined us for dinner, a carnivore's delight, at the ECP food centre. As JY said, it was good to get out and be silly with people after so many days of being cooped up, considering this was a holiday week.

Don't be surprised if I go offline temporarily. I'm attempting to set up a wireless network at home, but so far the process has been driving me nuts! I'm following the manuals step by step, and so far I've been very successful at setting up the cable modem and apparently, the wireless router. The fact that I can use my laptop to make this entry shows how amazingly successful I've been so far.

Now, why won't my desktop work??? Gaaaaaa!!! (and before you ask, yes, I did get a wireless adapter for Mr L33t).

A new study shows that exercise and smarts, particularly memory, are closely linked. The Greeks and Romans already knew that: "mens sana in corpore sano," a healthy mind in a healthy body. This means mandatory PE lessons for KI students! Let me go talk to Head PE to make the arrangements... heh heh...

Amy's suggestion to catch a movie a day is wonderfully optimistic and deserves a big grin. It's great to aim high, though the reality of our situation is that we really are swamped with work that demands our attention this week -- either deadlines that must be met, or face the prospect of an insurmountable backlog when term begins again next week.

Nevertheless, today we put her audacious plan in action. HP had a coupon for a 1-for-1 deal on the mixed grill at Billy Bombers, Cathay. The meal plus a side of coleslaw fed 4 of us, Amy, HP, Josh and me, quite adequately. Cost effectively, too.

After lunch, we watched "The History Boys". It was somewhat lighthearted, though not quite the comedy that the promos promised. 3 teachers tutor 8 promising young lads in the Oxford/Cambridge entrance exam History paper. Each teacher provides a different perspective of History and the boys struggle to make sense of it all. Much of the time, the boys don't see the point of some of the learning activities -- including improvised role-playing in the French language (even though they don't require French on the exam), singing silly songs, memorizing copious amounts of recitation, and opening up in free-for-all debates with no resolution. But they engage in the activities anyway, motivated as they are because they really are bright kids.

The boys also hit the library often, borrowing armsful of dusty old books to write essay after essay which get critiqued not for their knowledge content, but rather for the banality of their presentation. After all, the kids know their stuff, but they need to use their knowledge to intrigue the top brains in the top colleges in the UK if they are to stand a chance of getting in.

It turns out that through all the work the boys put in, they do become smarter than their teachers, and accomplish that which their teachers could not do -- read History at Oxford/Cambridge.

Of course, there's a little more excitement in the plot, but all I could focus on was how much I want KI to run like this History class. Activities function to practice and apply the knowledge the kids bring into class with them, and not merely teach for content sake alone. The onus is on the kids to do their research and their readings, to come up with questions to ask and debate over, and to decide what the agenda for the class will be for the day.

The movie wasn't so inspirational as it was a glimpse into what things could be like. The boys aren't perfect, and neither are the teachers, but they believe in the big picture and find a way to work together for the same goal.

Not sure what the rest of the week is gonna be like, but today's programme was a much needed morale-boost in its novelty. Much appreciated!

How did a little old lady end up at the AMK-CTE turnoff knocking on car doors and asking for help to get home? It was quite surreal watching her and her umbrella practically wandering along the turning lane in the twilight, knowing that eventually it'll soon be my turn to be thus supplicated.

And so it was that I opened my driver's side window and asked her what was up. She had overshot her bus stop and had no idea where she was. Fortunately, she didn't live too far away. With my sis-in-law at a loss to interpret her strange dialect, the old biddy handed over her i/c to show us her address. Cross-referencing it with the street directory, we figured out she lived at AMK Ave 10, just a U-turn away from the big intersection where we were.

Thankfully, she recognized her block when we pulled up to it. It was quite a relief seeing her totter home. Better a short detour than to be left forever wondering whatever happened to the crazy old lady we left stranded on the side of the road, and feeling guilty if something untoward had happened to her.

In the local news, the practice of "dropping subjects" in schools these days has generated quite a bit of excitement. People are indignant that teachers have become so concerned about school rankings, or their rankings, that they are advising students to drop their weaker subjects and concentrate on their stronger subjects so that there will be fewer failures and more 'A' grades produced at the end-of-year exams.

While scoring 'A's seems to be a positive thing for a child's academic records, people are upset that dropping subjects at secondary level effectively closes off options in fields of study at tertiary level. A dropped subject means a prerequisite lost for certain uni courses. Because Little Ah Huat dropped A. Math, he'll never become an engineer, and Little Suzie will never become a doctor because she dropped Bio. So despite the fact that they scored multiple 'A's in their other subjects, it's all meaningless because they can never be the doctor, lawyer or engineer their parents always dreamed they would become one day.

Which has got me thinking about our KI selection process and wondering if we've been over-selective with our kids. Granted, at this point, there's little advantage taking KI other than for its prestige. KI certainly isn't a prerequisite course for anything at the uni, at least not for the moment. It really is a lot of pain -- not the subject itself, but the burden of requiring extra time on the timetable to accommodate the extra subject, the time spent on additional assignments, and all for the dubious distinction of being able to say, "I took KI instead of GP at JC." Wouldn't the kids find it more profitable to go out and play instead, like any other regular kid?

I have a lot of respect for those who are tenacious enough to still want to take KI though, and I welcome them with open arms. KI was not meant to be an elite subject. In fact, I'd like to believe that we're pioneering a subject that will eventually be open to all comers. It's no use to us having just a tiny core group of thinking Singaporeans when all Singaporeans need to learn how to think, and not just replicate.

Still, last year's experience scared us a little, when a third of our first KI group dropped out of college because they couldn't handle the stress. This year, we wanted to protect the kids, and perhaps ourselves as well, hence the stringent selectivity the applicants went through. But really, if they really, really want to take KI anyway, who are we to stop them before we've had a proper trial period -- within what our limited resources can provide, that is.

But after the trial, we do need the right to determine if the student is suitable or not to continue. No one questions the probation period as an HR policy, so I don't see why anyone should question this whole "dropping subject" thing. Like everyone else, kids need to prove themselves capable of taking and keeping a subject. Showing a lack of interest, not submitting work, not being prepared for discussions, little evidence of wanting to improve, all these symptoms show a lack of aptitude in a subject. It's a sad fact of life everywhere: Sorry, kid, you're the weakest link. Goodbye.

Once again we've reached another term break. One week in which to catch up on neglected administration, clear the marking backlog and plan for the next assault on our next educational objectives. Somewhere in there, there are plans for a little R&R time with the department folk and friends as well.

It certainly has been a busy first term, in the sense of working hours and output -- and it's just the beginning of the year. Much of the work has been quite fulfilling. Things needed to be done, and there's a great feeling of accomplishment on completion, and despite working longer hours this year, I feel the time hasn't gone to waste.

Still, I detect a darker tone underlying my entries since the year began. I seem to be writing less about my friends, and more about my peeves and things that stupid people say that tick me off. Or about work. There's little time these days to go explore new places or try out new experiences to write about. Our movie watching record has been pathetic so far. Or we're too tired and simply wanna go home 'cos we too frazzled to do anything else. This applies to June as well as myself (oh, btw, June worked things out with her management so she's still got her job after all).

This really does look like the year of hard labour. I need a vacation.

Finished finalizing the new batch of J1 KIds. We set the bar high this time (no offense, Taily & co.) and selected 6, about 50% of our applicant list. It's tough making such a painful decision, but we think in many cases we're being cruel to be kind. The demands of taking 4 H2 subjects are not to be underestimated, so having learned from last year's experience, we're choosing to be more conservative this year.

I admit the selection process isn't 100% infallible. But we had to make the best decision we could under the circumstances. We turned away kids who took KI in other colleges and I'm sure they're gonna be sore about that for a while to come. They need to understand that we lined everyone up at the same starting line again. We tried not to let any preconceived notions bias our decision, even if they had prior experience in the subject (and had a recommendation letter from their previous instructor).

There are no guarantees in a situation like this, but we'll have to live with our decision and make the best of it now that the die is cast.

Today's taping session turned out not to be a straight interview as I expected. I walked onto a makeshift set of a talkshow. Me, Mel and Linc on one side representing the Arts; KW, Pio and Mich on the other representing the Sciences. I certainly wasn't prepared to debate the merits of one over the other, considering my position on the value of both. Thankfully, although our hosts began the show by trying to drive a wedge between our faculties, cooler heads prevailed and both sides steered the argument towards affirming that both the arts and sciences need each other.

Glad we could use the opportunity to clear up some misconceptions people have about our respective faculties. We ended up advising our mostly year 2 audience not to get locked into their labels, to follow their hearts and their passions, and not rely on textbooks as the only guide to life. Pio offered a nice analogy: textbooks are like travel guides, useful for acquiring a rough idea of the place you are about to visit; but having read the guide alone, you can't say you've been there if you never actually went.

Does it matter if a person is educated in either the arts or science faculties? Campus TV news wants to interview me on this topic... not that I'm any authority on the matter. I just agreed to it out of professional courtesy to a fellow campus news organization. Indulge me while I think aloud in preparation for tomorrow's taping.

As a general overview, both disciplines are essential to a person's educational development. The sciences help us understand our environment thereby allowing us to harness natural phenomena and employ them for our benefit. The arts help us to understand ourselves as human beings, and give us the ability to express ourselves and organize our relationships with each other and the world around us. So in a sense, the sciences look at us from the outside in, while the arts look at us from the inside out.

Both disciplines are important because they function best in partnership with each other. The arts power the imagination from which science draws the inspiration to seek new knowledge. But the arts also remind us of our humanity, which puts a brake on science, preventing us from going too far too quickly for our own good.

It's unfortunate that Education has split the arts and the sciences into diverging learning paths. The impression on us is that the two are pretty much mutually exclusive. The arts appear to us as idealistic and impractical, while the sciences seem rigidly pragmatic and insanely boring. Who in their right minds would want to be educated if these were the only two possible choices?

Usually, the deciding factor for students (or their parents) is in determining which course of study will lead to the more lucrative outcome. So rather than acquiring knowledge for its own sake, these poor kids chase an elusive price tag that exists only as a promise somewhere in the distant future.

For some reason, there's the impression that there's more money to be made in the practical sciences than in the airy-fairy arts. Hence the gross imbalance in the numbers of science vs arts students. And this imbalance fuels its own myth: more people are lining up for science than arts, therefore science must be better. It's the bandwagon fallacy operating on a societal scale.

Going solely on the which-makes-more-money premise, I would say that the most successful (I mean wealthiest) self-made capitalist pig-dogs (self-made to eliminate inherited money) are usually those who have integrated their appreciation for both the arts and sciences. They are 'artsy' in that they know how to work relationships with other people and sell them on story-like promises, but they are also 'scientific' in that they've been able to develop products to sell. It helps when their products work well too.

Gates. Jobs. Spielberg. Beckham. Branson. Trump. Or look at any world-famous brand-name. Arts or science? Smart money will say arts AND science.

Sadly, at JC level, students are already segregated according to their faculty of study. But that doesn't mean that they're set for life as "arts" or "science" people. As long as they don't rely on their textbooks to tell them how to live life, but rather learn to live life by living, I think they'll do just fine.

Just as I was saying NYconneX needs a bit more recognition, campus comms has decided to explore the possibility of helping increase our print run to double what we were producing last year. It's reassuring that people are starting to take notice and see the potential in us. In that, my journos have been instrumental. Without them, I really wouldn't have the confidence to believe in what we're doing, and continue finding new ways for us to grow. 'nuff said about that for now.

Last night's clan outing took us to a $15 per head buffet at the All or Nothing Cafe in Geylang. I think it was more for curiosity that we chose the location. We wanted to see where my bro was working at, and what he actually did there. So 3 generations of family descended upon him, at his invitation, of course.

The cafe is mostly a front for an outreach programme catering to the lost and wayward in Geylang. It aims to befriend the people on the street and offer a beacon of hope in one of the darker areas in our city. The locals have already checked the place out, and have deemed it harmless. Some have even offered business advice and friendly intel about the neighbourhood.

The organization employs ex-cons, a la the Yellow Ribbon project. The cooking staff are also walk-ins, and before last night's dinner the night chef walked out, leaving a crisis in the kitchen that had to be resolved one way or another.

There's so much potential for clash and conflict in this real-life scenario that if they had a good scriptwriter observing their operations for a week, a new local sit-com will be making its way to prime-time TV very soon.

Not an ex-con himself, my bro takes his job there as a full-time CIP. His job-scope is to do whatever's necessary. Waiter, receptionist, dishwasher, cashier, stage-actor, whatever. He was also prepared to take over the kitchen in place of the departed night chef, but thankfully the day chef was persuaded to take the night duty as well.

Dinner isn't usually buffet style. The cafe is more used to a la carte zi-cha, but last night was a celebration in honour of Purim. During dinner, the staff dramatized the biblical story of Esther to explain how this Jewish festival came about. Let's just say they have very little experience with theatre, and leave it at that.

It's nice that the family could get together again so quickly after the chili crab incident. Gatherings of the paternal clan are always fun.

How significant is a teacher's contribution to a student's success? The following represents the equation I referred to in the last entry:

Let x be the effort of the student.
Let y be the effort of the teacher.
x(y) = Z, where Z = the result of the course of study.

So for increasing values of x and y > 0, Z increases exponentially.

No tricks, no secret techniques, no shortcuts. Teachers can only value-add to the effort students put into their studies. No value multiplied by 0 can increase the value of 0. Both have to work together to achieve a desirable Z.

I daresay success breeds success. The shock and awe of the 2006 results showed us that great results can be achievable. That should give 2007 the confidence that working our collective arses off will indeed bring considerable returns in the end.

College is celebrating 'cos our 2006 batch has done amazingly well in the As, pulling in one of the best results in our history. While we are all pleasantly surprised and are speculating about what we actually did right last year, I would say that the biggest contributor to our success was that the kids got serious and studied. It's such a simple equation, there's no other way to explain it.

Guess I should be happy with my students' results, though for them I really do subscribe to the idea that they worked hard for their own acheivements. Congrats to you all!

Of course, despite the success, there will always be casualties and I can't help thinking about and empathizing with them. The Career Guidance team organized a briefing session immediately after the release of the results for these students, but perhaps 'immediate' was a bit premature. Only a handful of students showed up, while the others couldn't bring themselves to attend it.

Usually, a period of self-reflection would be what the students need the most first, and once the initital emotional baggage has been dealt with, then they can start thinking about what their next step could possibly be. With a clear head, new options become easier to see.

A level results out tomorrow. As always, it's tense even for us teaching staff 'cos we hope and pray for the best results for our students too. Regardless of whether they were monkeys or angels last year, we do want them to be happy and move on in life. So, A6 and S6A, I'm holding my breath in anticipation for y'all!

To keep our spirits up today, Staff Welfare arranged for a mass lo-hei lunch. No raw fish (to avoid mass food poisoning), but the salad and condiments were piled high ready for tossing. Cynth catered a rather non-traditional variety of buffet food items including pizza, quiche, hotdog wieners and Swedish meatballs, but I doubt anyone will complain 'cos it was quite delish. The mini-eclairs were heavenly, if limited in supply.

But I must hand it to Management which really knows how to make staff happy. Many of us have been labouring with laptops that were getting slower and slower with each new upgrade to the campus network. Our laptops had actually passed their use-by dates in January this year, and, lo, the Israelites lamented and wailed, decrying the horrendous lag that was the curse of system obsolescence. But today, only after a mere month of expectant resignation, we who had the oldest laptops got issued spanking new ones that promise all sorts of droolsome bells and whistles begging to be played with and explored. There's no unhappiness that can't be solved with the right technology. Yes.

My new lappy.

I've taken charge of the Debate squad over and above the journos this year, in case people don't know it yet. These 2 aspects of my now consolidated CCA are a world of difference from each other. Even I, Master of Compromise, am somewhat at a loss as to how the 2 could possibly work together without me suffering some kind of schizophrenic damage to my psyche.

For the moment, I've got more journos than debaters, though the CCA is generally referred to as 'Debate'. The journos have been putting out more visible, tangible impact on campus due to our weekly updates of campus news in NYconneX, though I don't really know how wide the reach actually is among our student body. NYconneX isn't likely to win any awards 'cos there aren't any awards out there to be won for our product (are there?). God knows, we need some recognition.

On the other hand, Debate takes the lion's share of my annual budget because debate coaches don't come cheap. The coach we've taken on can't come on Wednesday, so a concurrent CCA day is not possible for both segments. We've taken on the coach by faith as currently we don't actually have a debate team yet, while the existing JC1s are in 1st term transition. I don't know what the appeal of Debate is for the new batch, so I have no guarantee that I will recruit a team once term 2 begins.

So, yeah, huge worries for my consolidated yet fractured CCA that I sometimes wonder if anyone else besides myself cares about.

Still, in attending Debate training sessions for the remnants of our JC2 debaters, I've found the debaters to be committed, self-reliant, motivated and organized. And they haven't given up yet. Without a coach today, they trained themselves, and I learned enough to see that debate training can actually be quite good even for the weaker GP students. Debating is systematic, logical and structured, mature and critical (in the critical thinking sense), everything we hope our GP kids to be. Could there be some way to turn this observation into something practical and useful...?

We finally got to watch Ghost Rider after a couple of aborted attempts in the last week. Marvel's supernatural heroes have a niche audience, and GR is no exception. This movie, however, isn't going to turn him mainstream anytime soon.

The dour Day-Walker, Blade, made quite a credible transition to the movies by focusing the trilogy on lots of hard-hitting, tightly choreographed fight sequences, giving the audience at least a visual treat even if we didn't buy the plot. Sadly, GR is one Marvel character that can't make the transition without the use of CGI, and even CGI can't help a character whose head is a skull and is therefore virtually expressionless regardless of his circumstance.

So what to do? Call in Nick Cage to play Johnny Blaze, GR's human side. But though Cage plays tortured souls quite well, his skeletal other-half behaves with too much kiddish glee that the 2 sides don't mesh believably. While Blaze has to live with the consequences of his choices, "forsak[ing] friends, family and love," the stuff of human drama, GR is so invincible, so powerful that there is little that can threaten him and keep us on the edge of our seats.

It's even less thrilling when GR's nemeses, Blackheart and gang, fall so easily as GR takes them out one by one. That Blackheart himself falls due to his own stupidity makes this plot more worthy of a Saturday morning cartoon than it has potential for. Of course, dealing with the ultimate baddie, Mephistopheles, is another story. Literally.

A safe, kid-friendly rendition of a classic conflicted hero. The image of a demon on the side of the angels, a flaming skeleton in black leather-and-chains astride his All-American chopper looks cool but, like GR himself, this movie needs more meat on its bones.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm being fair to the people who write in to the ST forum pages, in the way I select easy targets to pour my bile over. But some people's peeves are so badly argued, they really get my goat. Case in point:

Heng Cho Choon, who took the trouble to write in today in response to Roni Roberts, another forum writer from last week. This is truly a case of a knee-jerk reaction to a misreading of a phrase in Roberts' letter without any comprehension as to what Roberts was talking about in the first place:

I REFER to the letter, 'Important to take the time to understand a culture before making judgments' by Mr Roni Roberts (ST, Feb 16) in which he commented on whether HDB flat dwellers should or should not keep pets as 'an integral part of the family unit'.
If you read Roberts' letter, Roberts was simply relating survey data collected from HDB dwellers themselves about how they view their pets. He was not advocating anything of that nature either way.

Some people keep pets because they truly love them and care for them with utter devotion. They do not mind spending a fortune to take their pet to see the vet whenever it is sick. Some keep pets because they are childless and want to drive out the silence and monotony of the home.
Sounds supportive of pet owners at first, but attempts to be clever with sly digs at how pets are a waste of money and are no real substitute for children.

I once visited a friend who lives on the second level of a block of HDB flats. On the ground floor is a pet shop which sells birds and hamsters. Residents nearby have to put up with the noise, smell and mess 365 days of the year. With the spread of bird flu, I wonder if it is safe to live in such an environment.
Wow. He has a friend who actually lives in HDB housing, whom he took the trouble to visit once. I guess with the noise and smell and mess of the pet shop, he's never visited his poor friend again. This kind of prejudice has caused more animal deaths than bird flu has caused human deaths, if you think about it.

He goes on to talk about how people can be cruel to animals, and how we should have an animal cruelty police force to show that he is actually quite the humanitarian.

He then suggests that if we want our kids to have contact with animals, we should take them (the kids, not the animals) to the zoo or to the farms in Choa Chu Kang, anywhere as long as it's not in his own back yard....

How far off on a tangent can this guy get? If this was an Application Question response to Roberts' letter, it shows very poor comprehension skills, a high level of bias and prejudice, hijacking the question and running his own agenda, and little coherence in how his ideas flow from para to para. Fail, lor. And embarrass himself in public some more.

I'm worried for our GP kids because they constantly exhibit the same errors in their AQs. If we don't fix the problem quickly, the long-term effects could be devastating. The local papers might soon be filled with half-baked arguments like this one.

Just to be fair, Heng's letter is here.

ST's "Mind Your Body" section has a story on how a bed-ridden Mr Lu, who's suffering from ALS, is being helped through his ailment by the 6 cats who live in the house with the family. The cats keep his mind off his worries, and their tendency to snuggle up to whomever they like and trust also give him some relief from his physical pain as well.

The same cats have helped the younger Lu through an episode of depression, and cope with his O levels.

Despite there being 6 cats, there is no mess. They just require food and water, and a clean sandbox. Not bad for low cost, low maintenance family healthcare.

Only 1 thing I can say about this story: I bet they don't live in an HDB flat.