RafflesCritics and the Future

We sincerely regret that inspiration for RafflesCritics came to us only so late (last semester of our sec4 year) and therefore find it really hard to keep this as an enduring movement. We would have liked so much to do more within this capacity, but conditions allow us otherwise.

We are now doing well in RJC, where conditions are very much different (but imo, better because it is much more liberal). RI sadly still remains "policed", and all we can is hope that as individuals, students can continue in the fight against draconian and unjust rule.

Nevertheless, we are very happy for the massive support of fellow students throughout this stressful time. (It is amazing that even today, we still get quite a number of hits.) However, we are disappointed that our drive for political reform should meet with sceptics who choose to undermine the right and responsibility of students to have a genuine say in the way the school is run (which we all have a stake in).

We will keep this site as it is, as a monument and symbol of student activism, and hopefully it may serve as a good model for any enlightened individuals who choose to take on the mentel of fighting for the freedom of the oppressed.

Should anyone be game to take on this challenge to champion the rights of the students, please contact either of us, and we will be more than glad to help out, as grateful alumni of Raffles Institution, to make it a better place for all students of the future.

Finally, let us again thank all who have given us their support. We are sure that we have done something for the school, tangible or intangible, and we at least have shown that students can and will unite to challenge unjustice in the face of authority, and have strengthened the will, resolve and psychology of students as a body.

To all who are still under the system, fight on! It can be done, and it is worth it!

posted by gordie @ 6:54 PM 3 comments

SLG Proposal

Below is the first draft of our proposal, do feel free to read through and give us your suggestions. We will be expanding and modifying it as time progresses, after which we may carry out petitioning and finally submit the proposal to the school for consideration.

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Problem

Prefects are supposed to serve as model students, helping to enforce school rules. Yet, the Raffles Institution Prefectorial Board has to maintain a large size not just to achieve its primary aims, but to serve as human resource in its organisation of various schoolwide activities and programmes.

This may have compromised the quality of prefects in the school as those who contribute to programme organisation may not necessarily be model students who should have the power to enforce rules. The elections also has a certain quota, though not specifically fixed, of nominees that have to get through each year. All this has caused some students to feel that certain prefects may not be suitable to be entrusted with the responsibility and power to enforce rules.

The elections also seems to be rather meaningless as visibly, many nominees campaign solely for publicity. The student population is also likely to vote, not based on the merit of the nominees, but based mainly on their impression of the nominee. In addition, the fact that most nominees are strangers to a large proportion of the school population only adds on to growing uncertainty. This has caused the election system to lose its purpose.

There is also an inherent problem in the electoral process. As in the current system, prefect nominees undergo two stages of preliminary interviews, which are conducted primarily by teachers (i.e. year heads, CCA teachers, prefect master). This year, 38 candidates progressed to the final campaigns stage, where students finally get to decide who among this group of selected candidates should be elected into the RIPB. However, there has been an outcry because a whopping 30 out of these 38 candidates will enter the board, reason being that numbers are once again required to fuel the demands of event organisation. This system effectively suggests that students hardly have a say in electing the people they want to represent them, only being given the "power" to eliminate 8 out of 38 candidates which the teachers have chosen. This firmly contradicts the need for an elections.

This proposal works in the spirit of improvement, and aims to address the above problems that have been boggling many for some time.

Solution

1. Refocus RIPB

We propose that the RIPB focus solely on enforcing school rules. Relatively fewer people will be needed for such a job, and hence the quota of prefects per level can be reduced. This will allow RIPB to shrink in size to consist of only the "best", most "model" students.

2. Selection of Prefects

These prefects should be chosen by a panel of teachers based on nominations by teachers or CCALs. The number of prefects should be around 10 per level. In order to maintain this number, as well as to ensure quality, the 10 available slots should be reviewed each year. That is, the 10 prefects to fill in those slots should be re-chosen every year, and may consist of any prefects from the previous 10.

These prefects will enforce the school rules and serve as good examples for all other students to follow.

3. A New Student Organisation

We propose that a Students’ Council be established. This council will take over the role of organising programmes and activities from the current RIPB.

The council will consist of 1 representative from each class, elected by the class at the start of the year. This council will help to organise and run school activities and programmes.

Having a representative from each class allows for the easy collection of views and feedback, as well as efficient dissemination of information.

A class election for their representative in this council is more meaningful as the class would know their classmates better, and be in a better position to choose someone who is suitable to represent them. This is akin to residents of a constituency voting in someone whom they want to represent them in parliament.

If 20% of the class support the recall of the class representative (reflected in a petition), a recall vote shall be held in class. If a simple majority in the class give a vote of no-confidence, the representative is to be replaced by another person who has gained a majority vote in the following vote for a replacement. A recall process gives the class the mechanism and power to remove elected candidates to ensure sustained quality.

An executive committee comprising Secondary 3s should be elected within the council by the members of the council. The previous batch of the executive committee will stay on in their Secondary 4 year as advisors to the executive committee, regardless of whether they are elected by their respective class in their Secondary 4 year.

4. Repositioning of CEC/CEC Council

We recommend that the CEC be placed under the Students’ Council to provide additional human resource for major school activities. The CEC should still continue to be involved in their respective level programmes.

Additional Notes

The RIPB will now work as an external group with totally different purposes, i.e. the traditional role. Prefects may be in the Student’s Council or CEC if so chosen by the class. This is more possible now since the burden on a prefect is no longer that of time committed to the running of activities, responsibilities which are currently attached to the position of a prefect. Students will now have the space to exercise their freedom of choice effectively and meaningfully.

The RIPB, Students' Council and CEC shall be known as Student Leader Groups (SLG).

posted by hoho @ 8:14 PM 10 comments

Areas for Improvement

Voting for the elections was over today, we'll just await the results... With that, our elections campaigning phase is over and we are currently drafting up a proposal to reform the system. The first draft will be posted up here soon...

What else do you think could be improved in RI? Do post comments and tell us!

posted by gordie @ 6:23 PM 13 comments

Flyers and Forum

Today, for the first time, RafflesCritics gave out flyers and held a forum.

Flyers

We have given out flyers to all teachers, secondary 1-2 students, and some secondary 3-4 students today.

The contents of the flyers include:
a) Short introduction to RafflesCritics
b) Our list of nominees whom we support
c) Judging process
d) Judging criteria
e) A note asking them to vote for these nominees
f) Notice of the forum session
g) URL to the RafflesCritics blog

Besides showing our support for nominees we deem deserving, this also allows us to publicise the forum session and to let more people know of the RC blog.

A soft copy of the flyer can be found on our File Archive.

Forum

This was the first forum session that RafflesCritics held at the atrium during lunch today. We would like to thank Mr Teo Chai Yaw for graciously allowing us to hold it.

Attendance was not as good as we expected, being in the shape of a bellcurve over time. Many have kindly told us that the timing was bad (interclass soccer) and they were only just informed this morning (through our flyers). We sincerely apologise to all who could not attend, did not know of it or forgot about it due to the busy post-CT schedule. There were constraints on our part due to the CTs and the elections being held on Monday morning. We will provide earlier notification and choose a better time slot in future.

However, we do hope that this session has clarified certain issues and answered some questions. If there are still any questions or issues needing clarification, do feel free to post them on this blog or emailed to any of us.

Finally, we would like to thank all those who attended the session. Your attendance was greatly appreciated.

posted by gordie @ 5:35 PM 0 comments

Updates

Hi to all again, with CTs drawing to a close, we will be starting on our campaign to reform the elections system.

Nominee Bandings:

We have received much feedback and comments about our nominee banding, which was originally under 3 bands (Highly Recommended, Satisfactory and Highly Unsatisfactory). Most welcome our ideas, but are concerned about the HU band. RafflesCritics has thus reevaluated our stand, and as you can see from the edited post on the bandings, we have decided to just support a handful from all the nominees. The rest are just left under "Unbanded". This time however, we have evaluated all nominees, and "unbanded" does not mean we have not considered them, but that we do not want to make a public judgement of them.

Forum Session:

We have confirmed the time and location of our forum session. It will be held this Friday (21st Oct 2005) at the atrium during lunch time. More info can be found in an earlier post (which has been edited to include the above information). See you there!

posted by gordie @ 2:46 PM 1 comments

RC Report: Prefect Nominees

The elections have been deemed unsatisfactory by many (refer to current poll results), and it is due in part to the quality of the present batch of nominees. Some nominees have turned their entire campaigns into publicity stunts and decided to turn their speeches into entertainment pieces. They think that Rafflesians will vote nominees they find funny and entertaining, and hence have chosen not to take this elections seriously. Many nominees are also unclear as to what they want to achieve after being elected, nor even have any concrete plans. This perception may either be true or untrue, but the worse thing anyone can do at this stage is to let such a destructive scenario continue, year after year.

Whatever it is, we have to change this perception and perhaps the general lack of concern (if it does exist). RafflesCritics has publicly challenged nominees to take a stand on various issues and to present their vision, with concrete plans for the school. As part of our efforts to change the general apathetic mindset, and to allow the nominees to see that Rafflesians want nominees with substance, RafflesCritics hereby presents our report of all of this year's prefect nominees.

The RafflesCritics committee has requested, actively gone out to obtain, and received comments about the individual nominees from various members of the school community, including teachers, classmates, batchmates, CCA mates and seniors. We have also been keenly observing the nominees while they gave their election speeches and carefully analysed their responses to questions during forum sessions. We have also taken note of their campaign posters.

From our analyses and all feedback that we have received, we have decided to support some candidates who are "Highly Recommended".

The other nominees have been placed under an "unbanded" section. For these nominees, it just simply means that they are not "Highly Recommended". We have looked through all nominees, and all have been assessed by us.

Key criteria/reasons for placing the respective candidates into the extreme bands are stated below:
1. Sincerity and resolve
2. Clear mindedness, clear sense of direction
3. Respectability

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The following are our recommendations in no particular order.

Highly recommended

1. Titus Ting, 2K
Sincere and steady. Mature attitude. Seniors describe him to be of "head boy material". Mass recommendation by batchmates as well as other seniors, all based on merit.
2. Tom Yet Kai, 2L
Respectable figure, passionate and helpful. Stands up for what is right, connects well with peers.
3. Lim Zong Yi, 1Q
Peers single him out as possibly the most capable nominee from sec 1. Seniors strongly recommend him for his strong will and leadership skills. Similar to Titus, he has received mass recommendation from batchmates as well as seniors, based on merit.
4. Yeo Shang Xuan, 1H
Honest sincerity, exceptionally clear in his vision. Holds realistic plans and has exceptional resolve in what he sets our to achieve for fellow students and the betterment of the school. Believes in concrete reform, rather than blind conformity.
5. Tham Tuck Hong, 1F
Recommended strongly by batchmates and CCA mates who know him personally. Trustworthy and responsible, works hard for others, rather than by himself as an individual.
6. Lionel Lim, 2P
Recommended strongly by batchmates and CCA mates who know him personally. Fights for peers' rights in the midst of criticism from higher authorities. Has a heart for fellow schoolmates.


Unbanded (The Rest)

1. Tan Si Kai, 2B
2. Benjamin Lee, 2I
3. Kartik Aiyar, 2J
4. Gabriel Tong, 2L
5. Koo Zheng Xuan, 2M
6. Soh Yu Da, 1C
7. Yap Kim Wee, 1E
8. Thia Shan Zhi, 1I
9. Lim Jian Xiong, 1J
10. Kaushik Subramaniam, 1Q
11. Qiu Linan, 2A
12. Christopher Kwan, 2F
13. Koa Quan Wei, 2G
14. Dillion Tan, 2I
15. Kevin Mark Lee, 2J
16. Daryl Tan, 2K
17. Kristian Lee, 1C
18. Barry Tng, 1L
19. Daniel Tan, 1C
20. Ng Zhuo Yang, 1E
21. Theodore Tan, 1K
22. Huang Wen Jie, 1P
23. Tan Yan Liang, 2B
24. Ng Yu Hui, 2C
25. Joel Tan, 2D
26. Lee Tat Chern, 2D
27. Brian Chia, 2E
28. Jerome Ong, 2J
39. Victor Leong, 2K
30. Daniel Chew, 2L
31. Wang Zhemin, 2P
32. Yew Zhi Hao, 2P

The above list has been compiled as a guide to this year's nominees. We have compiled this list based on testimonials from teachers, classmates, batchmates, CCA mates and seniors. Our research and documentation was carried out to extensive lengths, and we believe this reflects the reality of current circumstance. On a sidenote, the RafflesCritics committee practically does not know any of the nominees personally, so it was important that substantial information on a nominee was gathered before carefully formulating objective analyses and recommendations.

We thank all who have kindly provided us with your honest and most valuable feedback/recommendations/comments, and for your continuous support.

posted by hoho @ 1:08 PM 84 comments

Blank Votes?

This post is a reply to Alex Ang's recent letter (on our Letters page) and also to state our stand on the issue.

The blank vote campaign was initiated by me (hoho). It was a personal idea before RC was formed.

For any blank vote campaign, the key purpose is to register a protest, and not so much to affect the outcome. Statistically, if a high number of votes are considered void, it speaks of people's discontent at the system or body, or of the quality nominees in general running for elections.

Let's look at a hypothetical scenario: a democratic election of 1 constituency with person A and B contesting. If 80% of the people cast blank votes, their votes will be considered null and void. And whoever wins will be dependent on who gains the majority of the remaining 20% votes. However, does it still mean that the person who is elected is truly supported by the majority of residents in that constituency?

By casting blank votes we are collectively sending out a message that we are unhappy with the current ineffective system, and would like changes to be made to it.

"Thus, if say there is a need for 7 new sec1 prefects, and the 7th candidate has 1000 votes, than he will get in. However, if he only has 500 votes, he will still get in, because the fact is that he is the 7th prefect with the highest support from the school population."

Let's say the 6th candidate receives 500 votes, the 7th receives 10 votes, the rest after the 7th receive 9 votes each. Going by your mentioned system the 7th will still go in. This is insensible. You are basing this idea on the need to make up numbers.

A blank vote is a protest, that you practically do not support any of the candidates. A high number of blank vote is similar to a group protest as opposed to 1 person protesting on the streets. This is the message it intends to put across. However, as we saw more nominees, it seemed that some are indeed worthy of our votes despite the inherent lack of quality in many others, and hence the blank vote campaign will no longer be carried out.

Once again we reiterate that the campaign was something done at an individual level prior to the initiation of RC. It has nothing to do with RC, and it has now been scrapped when we saw worthy candidates.

We know however that quite a significant number of people are advocating amongst themselves to cast blank votes. RC is against casting of blank votes in this elections. We urge everyone to vote, with your precious votes, for a select bunch of nominees who are of high quality to register a strong support for those who are deserving.

posted by hoho @ 10:05 PM 18 comments

Updates

Sincere apologies to everyone for our faulty tagboard, we will try our best to get it back up and running as soon as we can. (its repaired! 15/10/05)

Meanwhile, do keep your comments on the nominees/bandlist coming; we'll be updating our banding based on the new information we've gathered since the first release.

We would also like to announce that we will be organising a Forum Session on Friday (21st Oct 2005), during lunch at the atrium. The topic is "Nominees and Elections 2005". All are welcomed to attend and clarify any issues regarding our support of certain nominees and stand on the elections.

Thanks and all the best for CTs.

posted by hoho @ 11:02 PM 14 comments

Email from Alex Ang

Email from Alex Ang, dated 10/10/2005

Congrats on the successful site! I must say that you have many sincere and frank opinions on the site, and that is what draws readers. RI and Singapore as a whole need more people who are willing to say what they feel. I too personally share the same sentiments as you, and feel that this year's campaigns have gone a little off tangent, with songs on stage instead of candidates telling us what they would like to do as a prefect.

To make RafflesCritics a louder voice to be heard, and to make the posts up there more convincing, there is a need for a few factual corrections. The last thing you would want is to have wrong facts which will put readers off and cause your posts to be not convincing to your readers. Thus, here are a few factual details that should be noted:

1) Teachers do not have veto rights over nominees in the campaign stages, and thus teachers are not the ones who are ultimately deciding the nominees who become prefects

2) After the votes have been collated, the nominees with the highest votes will become prefects. Thus, your vote matters in deciding which nominees become prefects.

3) Votes from students and teachers alike count for 1 point, with the exception of votes from students of the same batch, which count for 1.5 points. For example, a secondary 2 vote for a secondary 2 nominee would count as 1.5 points.

Thus, ultimately, your vote matters. =) so do vote for the people whom you feel would be able to contribute to the school. As Rafflesians, all of us would want to see our school having good and capable student leaders, because this would ultimately affect the future of RI. Thus, you should vote for the people whom you feel would make good prefects

Hope that the above information will help to make RafflesCritics a credible and strong voice of the student's opinions on RI issues.

Do continue the good work!

Thanks
Alex

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RC responds:

Thanks for your support and encouragement. We do seek to maintain utmost credibility. However, I would like to question several points that you have brought up.

On point number 1), "Teachers do not have veto rights over nominees in the campaign stages, and thus teachers are not the ones who are ultimately deciding the nominees who become prefects".

I'm confused as to what the situation really is. Either that, or it seems that the prefects themselves are rather confused. A couple of weeks ago I asked Timothy to convey my queries on the voting system to Mr Lim, who responded by saying that when he took over as prefect master, he changed the voting system such that all members of the school (be it teachers or students) count as 1 vote, the only exception being that of batchmates (who count as 1.5). This was done because teachers "do get veto rights" after all. Previously, teachers' votes were of higher weightage.

On point number 2), please do clarify what you mean by "nominees with the highest votes". Where is the official cutoff point? Is there a minimum number of votes that a nominee has to garner in order to make it into the board? All I have derived from prefect sources is that the cutoff varies from year to year depending on voting outcomes. However, modifying cutoffs based on voting outcomes, to some extent, does equate a procedural flaw leading to skewed results.

Here, however, I have received credible information stating that Mr Lim provided some figures to the nominees. (out of 24 Sec 2 nominees, 16-20 will enter the board.) Can we please confirm this with an official statement from the RIPB? it is disturbing that information is selectively provided, yet voters are unaware of the facts.

Going by these preliminary and approximate figures, am I then not right to conclude that what we are voting for, is practically just to eliminate the bottom 25% of nominees? Am I then not right to say that students effectively have little power in deciding who they really want, because by this stage the school admin, prefect master and RIPB exco have already decided who they want?

Statements made by various prefect sources have so far been highly fragmented and contradictory. We seek OFFICIAL clarification, OFFICIAL statements that we can acknowledge for utter certainty and bear in mind when engaging in discussions.

Thank you once again for your interest and support.


(Note: All future emails and letters will be displayed on a separate page dedicated to submissions. Link can be found under the "Links" bar on the right column of the site.)

posted by hoho @ 4:45 PM 3 comments

Updates

If you have noticed, we've been graced with by visits from a distinguished guest in the form of Gabriel Seah from the class of 1999. He goes by the nick of agagooga, and has several blogs, all of which can be accessed from his profile page. I was fortunate to speak with him regarding several issues concerning the site, as well as gain some valuable perspectives and opinions. Very insightful indeed. I'll try to upload a transcript of our convo for everyone to read sometime soon.

Meanwhile, thanks for all your comments so far (: I think this is a good sign, everyone coming together in an open and transparent way to voice your opinions. Heated as they may be, these discussions only go to show how serious we all are about change and improvement.

As from today, we will be accepting articles to be posted on the Letters Page. In the spirit of free speech and expression, we welcome all submissions of letters and articles. Submissions can be made via email to rafflescritics@gmail.com. There is no topic restriction. Comments can still be posted under the "comments" section of each blog entry.

On a side note, we broke the 1000 visitor mark barely 80 hours into official operation, and visitorship stands at a current high of just over 1500, just four days after opening. We are encouraged by this, as well as by the number of comments we've been receiving. Do continue participating actively! Gordon and I will be collating your views and organising them for submission of a proposal to the school, as well as for a possible petition, as mentioned in the earlier entry.

Thanks once again!

posted by hoho @ 9:26 PM 24 comments