Tuesday, November 22, 2005
♥ 11:05 am
in the light of the huge 'GEP vs Mainstream' issue there has been another reply in TODAY (22 Nov).... this will interest sean lee i'm sure...In her zealous defence of Gifted Education Programme student, Michelle Qiu displays a sense of, at best, brash arrogance and, at worst, condescension and a superiority complex.While i do not want to believe she represents the typical GEP student, it would be worrying if many 'GEPers' (as they call themselves) had such an 'us-them' mentalityAside from proclaming 'mainstreamers' (what a patronising term!) to be immature, she is thrilled the programme allowed her to interact exclusively with 'people like us'.For a 'gifted' student, she is quick to make sweeping generalisations that 'everyone' in the mainstream follows trends, almost insinuating that 'ungifted' people have no minds of their own.It is fine if Michelle and her group of like-minded friends continue to live in their ivory towers, associating only with memebers of this chosen fraternity, kieeping out of their lives of the 'mainstream'. Unfortunately, many may end up with scholarships and eventually hold public office, where their policies will affect the 'mainstream' and the masses.I shudder to think what kind of empathy there can be when, from the onset, these young people display such an elitist 'us versus them' mentality.This is propbably an alarmist scenario, but picture this: A group of key decision makers decide that the general population is rather immature and cannot possibly have minds of their own.As such, everyone with and IQ below 150 should be systematically eradicated. Such a mentality would please Adolf Hitler.maybe the IQ part is paranoia, but i agree with the writer here. in fact, i feel that GEPers in ACS(I) are more immature than us. The GEP teachers have to handle them in a different way compared to us 'mainstream people'. They look as if the students are 10 year old kids, not the 16 year old people they are.it's not the heavy stuff they learn that we are criticizing, it's the elitist status that is unfairly given to them. Even some GEPers i know (won't mention names) also believe that they don't deserves such elitist status.I remember back in '98 when i didn't get into GEP, and i was quite disappointed. However, i found out that out of the top 10 boys in that year, the top 7 (includin me!!! lol) were non- GEPers. Some of them (like thang, lew, john b) are people that are doin well, maybe even better than most GEPers now. the people who went into GEP were actually those who weren't that bright, and i dun think they are still that bright now.Those in IB will know, our averages are far better than most GEPers. I know that some GEPers are fine, great guys to be with. but most of them stay in their shells, not willing to come out. next yr will be very interesting...i'm now molting at home... waiting for all the skin to drop out.... NYAA gold is so darn irritating....
