Singapore outperforms any country in terms of producing the best students in the world. However, the country’s educational system is seemingly putting much pressure on student to excel in school.
Recently, 12-year old Filipina studying in Singapore reportedly took away her own life on August 3 due to the stress of maintaining good grades.
According to China Press, Trisha Bautista, a secondary 1 student of Cedar Girls Secondary School, jumped out of their apartment window on Thursday after getting a near-failing grade in one of her school exams.
““She told me a few days ago that she had received the results of her mathematics test and she had barely passed the examination so she was upset. But I never thought that she would commit suicide,” her mother, May, said in an interview with China Press.
Other reports also mentioned that the teen had previously complained of being outcasted by her classmates.
Trisha’s father, Bong, was at home during the incident but failed to notice his daughter’s suicide attempt. It wasn’t until authorities told him of a child’s motionless body found on the grass below their flat was he informed of his daughter’s untimely death, Singapore’s Channel 8 news reported.
After topping the 2015 global educational ranking, Singapore encourages the youth to have an exceptional grade.
A year after (2016), an 11-year old primary 5 student also jumped out of a window after failing an exam for the first time in his life.
The school told reporters that Trisha was an active part of the school’s track and field team, a polite and hardworking student who gave her all in her studies and sports. School authorities will be providing support for the family of Trizha and all affected students and teachers.
According to an article on Stanford News, pressure by parents and schools to achieve excellences yields high stress levels among students—beginning as early as elementary school. The incidence is so high that some educators regard it as a health epidemic, said Denise Clark Pope, a lecturer in the School of Education and the author of Doing School: How We Are Creating a Generation of Stressed Out, Materialistic and Miseducated Students.
“The number one cause of visits to Vaden Health Center used to be relationships, but now is stress and anxiety,” she said.
