Today's library, tomorrow's 'googlary'?

In the past, not long ago, libraries were simply bursting with people either wanting to do research on a subject, or being interested in a particular storybook, or merely to browse at leisure as a recreation. However, with the digital age well and truly setting in, we cannot help but notice that our main source of information has become the internet, or more precisely, Google.com, which countless numbers of online users surf everyday to source for information from celebrities to sports news and from digitalised maps to recipes for ice-creams.

The author is quite right in saying that Google has indeed revolutionised and that it itself is now a verb that is widely used and accepted. How we can see for ourselves the success of Google include the fact that Google has been the website with the most traffic flow for quite some time now in the USA. Google does have the potential of taking over as the world’s library, being connected to millions and millions of sites which provide tons of information.

But Google has its problems. As with the internet, there is a veil of anonymity which the online user can hide himself or herself such that no responsibility will be taken should something go wrong. Therefore, as much as Google can link all these sites to us, it cannot ensure, nor can McAfee screening, that the information provided is correct and will help in our research. Therefore, researchers that use Google have to discern for themselves which of the sources are authentic and can be trusted, which therefore takes more time. Furthermore, there is the problem of contradicting sources that can happen, particularly when one site contradicts another, and we do not know which one to trust.

Therefore, just a Googlary alone may not be enough to fulfil the requirements that people all around the world need for research. For example, the internet will never be smart enough to provide the most adequate help in researching and finding sources, while when we go to proper libraries, there is always a helpful librarian to help us on our projects and stuff, and to guide us to the correct books that will help us in the research. Also, we can agree that those books in libraries can generally be trusted more than the sources online, as they go through editing and publishing.

I would recommend that while resources be made available online for those who want to access them, that the libraries should still be our main source of information when it comes to proper research that we want to be credible as future references. By doing this, we can prevent several important issues such as plagiarism and things like copyright and permission issues. Therefore, while online resources are definitely much easier to access, there are pros of using a library for research that a Googlary might not be able to give us.

While a Googlary sounds like a nice idea, it would be better for us to follow the traditional guide of using a library for our research.

Leader - A gift of a programme

The Gifted Education Programme, or GEP, has been the place to be for top students since its formation in 1984. While the GEP nurtures the top 1% of the cohort, it is by no means restricted to any child of any birth as long as he or she has the correct genes, being part of the meritocratic system of education in Singapore. Through rounds and rounds of selection tests, those who emerge at the end are given special education starting from Primary 4, and various statistics including President’s Scholars, Lee Kuan Yew Scholars, and that GEP students perform better in the O and A levels than other students, all show that the method of teaching in GEP is in fact effective and should be continued.

Having been a GEP-nurtured student, I personally find the GEP very effective and I fully support it to be carried on throughout the years as a means of nurturing the best of our country into future leaders and those who would manage how Singapore is run in the future. However, there have been many voiced-out concerns that the GEP is an elitist programme and that those in the programme are too pompous to discuss anything with those whom they perceive as “ungifted” and unable to enter the GEP.

As with any other programme which only selects the best, those who made it will definitely look down on those who did not make it, much like those who failed will surely be jealous of those who passed and try to pull them down to earth. This, in my opinion, is human nature, not elitism, and so, I feel that there is no problem of the GEP being only for that selected and chosen 1% while the rest of the student cohort remain behind and are only taught the bare essentials, both of which are not true. Also, teachers have encouraged diffusion and interaction between the GEP and non-GEP classes, for both batches of students to understand each other. This is also the reason why there has not been a school set up for only the GEP students where they can have no interaction with the rest of the students.

Statistics have also shown that GEP students are also more active in community service than non-GEP students, which further proves that while GEP students might be educated differently by a special set of materials, they are even more thankful than usual students because of the opportunities they have been given to pursue their interests and further develop their passion for studying to create more job opportunities.

Coming out of the GEP does not mean that everywhere we go, there is a GEP label stamped on our heads. GEP students should be mindful that there are students out there with much more potential than us, just that they might be put off from the selection tests by an unexpected nose-bleed or flu. This will help prevent the elitist feelings of those in the programme and will definitely help to facilitate to interaction between the batches.

Don't slay the goose that lays golden eggs

The Great Casino Debate has been a hot topic since the Prime Minister and the government first decided to build Integrated Resorts in Marina Bay and Sentosa. While there have been many social and economical gains and repercussions discussed and presented, one aspect we may have overlooked would be the degeneration of national psyche, as the author has rightly pointed out.

I agree with the author that despite the obvious gains in revenue the IRs might bring about, there are serious social and economical repercussions that come about with the building of a casino. Most obviously, having a casino and allowing locals to gamble means that more people will gamble and lose their money, and since low-income Singaporeans have strict restrictions on their gambling, it would therefore mean that middle- and high-income locals can gamble and lose all their money, thereby bringing economical destabilisation to Singapore. All sorts of crime ranging from robberies to blackmailing and even to murder can be linked to casinos, which will, without doubt, affect the socio-economical balance of the society in a magnitude that will definitely surpass the economical gains of having a casino.

As the author correctly states, Singapore has come through from third-world to first-world in a single generation by only the hard work and integrity and transparency of the people and their government. Singapore’s economy is essentially driven by people who work 80-hour work weeks and those who put in hard labour so that the government’s policies may be carried out. The presence of a casino in Singapore will undoubtedly unsettle some these bedrocks of society, just like addiction to gambling will cause corrosion to take place in the fundamental supports of the society, which is extremely vulnerable should even one corner of the supports collapse under the sheer weight of the casino, in metaphorical terms.

Therefore, as in Aesop’s fable of The Goose That Lays Golden Eggs, building a casino can be seen as a stupid move as it is equivalent to cutting open the goose just like cutting open the hard work that has seen our economy stabilise and become one of the best in Asia. The building of casinos in IRs would undoubtedly degrade the national psyche, which will cause people to believe that luck, not hard work and integrity, is the way for success and to strike it rich. As expected, this will have serious repercussions on the balance of our society and economy with workers all becoming addicted to gambling and unwilling to do anything else such as doing some proper work in terms of nation-building.

Therefore, while building casinos can provide lucrative job opportunities and certainly increase our revenue from tourism and make Singapore more attractive to foreigners, all the social and economical problems might make all of these backfire to cause Singapore to go backwards in terms of progress due to the transition from labour to luck. Not to mention, the final effect would be the degradation of national psyche which will severely affect the willingness of foreigners to even come to Singapore any more. Therefore, like the author, I urge the government to think thrice before they act, so as to not turn back 44 years of progress.