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Singapore schools should improve their election processes
The recent announcement of various education reforms, ranging from the thorough revamp of the A-levels to the corportization of local universities, are important steps towards creating a more dynamic and competitive environment for Singapore's institutions of higher learning. It is likely that these reforms would not only assist in creating a "thinking culture" in schools but also help in attracting talented students from all over the world to Singapore.
However, the next step of reforms should be one of improving student governance through reforming election process in schools. Does the rhetoric of free and fair elections in our institutions of learning diverge from reality?
A free and fair election should be determined by two basic factors. One factor is how secret the vote is. The other element is whether there are adequate choices to determine a meaningful election. For example, Presidential elections in Iraq under Saddam Hussein were considered neither free nor fair. This is because there were neither secrecy nor meaningful choices for candidates in the elections. Voters were intimidated by the Iraqi security forces to vote for Saddam Hussein, whose name was the only one on the ballot paper.
Such electoral problems manifested in elections for student representative bodies during my school days. During one student council election in my secondary school, I had only fourteen candidates from which I had to choose thirteen. This meant there was an absence of meaningful choices in the election as only one candidate out of the fourteen would fail to win a seat in the council.
In another scenario, problems of voting secrecy abounded during my junior college's student council elections. The students walked around notice boards of candidates' biographies before casting their votes. At the same time, there were discussions among students on which candidates to vote for and on the spot campaigning by various candidates. This meant that that students could knew how the other students voted and were unfairly swayed by candidates who chose to loiter around the notice boards to canvass for students' votes. What should have been done was to introduce secret voting booths as well as the banning of candidates from the election center during polling day itself.
Moreover, are accountability mechanisms in student governance weak in many Singaporean schools? In most schools, students can only either serve for one term or in the case for junior college elections, elected for two years till they graduate. It is also difficult for students to influence their elected representatives' actions or remove elected representatives in the absence of an institutional mechanism for the usage of referendum to decide on major decisions in student's governance or to impeach. This means that there are reduced incentives for student representatives to serve to their best of their abilities. This is because once elected, student representatives would not have to stand for reelections nor face possible impeachments in cases of incompetence or misdemeanor.
The fundamental question is, does my "democratic" experiences during my schooling days also represent the norms in other Singapore schools?
If such election process continue to persist in our schools in Singapore, would that increase political apathy, disillusionment with election processes in schools and correspondingly reduce a sense of identity towards our schools? Similarly, do our institutions of higher learning also face similar problems on top of problems of apathy and ignorance towards student unions' elections and its governance?
In contrast, my university's elections for the student senate were secret and had meaningful choices. In Carleton College, votes are done online with often multiple candidates for each position. To ensure secrecy and to prevent multiple voting, our unique college password was used to vote, elaborate online security procedures were maintained and students were encouraged to vote in secret. For those who prefer paper ballots to maximize secrecy, such a process is provided too. Referendum can be called on issues regarding student governance if enough signatures are collected. Thus, there is a high level of accountability and legitimacy in Carleton College's student elections.
Improving the election process in Singapore's institutions of learning will create a heightened sense of belonging to the institution. If candidates are elected more freely and fairly with accountability mechanisms in place, student representatives would become more legitimate representatives of the students. With the strengthening of the electoral system in schools, student representatives will feel obliged to serve the students better in knowledge they are fully accountable to students on an even playing field. In turn, students would benefit from better governance from the student union or council. Their educational experience would be enriched. Is it not likely that with better educational experiences, one would feel a greater sense of belonging to one's institution?
Local institutions' alums are less active in their alma maters as compared to their counterparts in Europe and America. Also, many secondary schools and junior college alumni associations seem to have less active members than their counterparts in the United States or even Sri Lanka. Could this have to do with a weak sense of belonging to the institution partly derived from the absence of a participatory democratic process during their schooling years?
