It isn't worth it.

Today, I read a bizarre piece of news...tragic news...that felt more like an American story, than a Singaporean one.

An Indonesian Chinese boy at NTU (Nanyang Technological University) stabbed a lecturer in the back and arm, before slitting his own wrists, and jumping off the five storey building. The lecturer survived, the boy died.

The boy is unnamed in the report I have seen, but the Professor is Chan Kap Luk.

Now, at this time, one cannot know the motivation of the attack and subsequent suicide, but I feel one can observe that, whatever it is, it isn't worth it. Life should not be thrown away over a matter of education. Education is important, in some ways, but never that important. Whatever the issue was, there must, assuredly, have been other ways of dealing with it, than an attempted murder-suicide (the latter part successful).

This sorry tale does show one thing, however: students in Singapore are under tremendous pressure. That pressure sometimes makes them do rash things. The number of suicides here is not inconsequential, though not widely broadcast. Indeed, suicide in higher education is alarmingly common the world over. When I was at Cambridge, the talk was of how high the suicide rate was, there. I am not surprised, having experienced it myself. I wouldn't accuse it of being a warm, human and humane place. Sometimes, that is too much for people and they decide to end it.

We may never know the full details of what went on with this Indonesian Chinese boy - but we do this: stress in schools and universities is a terrible problem. Perhaps we should ask ourselves whether the highly competitive, dog-eat-dog, systems in place are really wise or conducive to the health and well-being of the students. This particular case is no doubt unusual, simply because he tried to kill someone else first...but there are many low profile suicides, here, in Singapore every year. I have even heard of young children killing themselves - primary school kids. The pressures they face are horrendous.

Personally, I think a focus on education and not on competition would be healthy. Let them learn, but stop grading them, incessantly, stop making them compete against each other and the world...just let them grow, instead. They will be far happier and there will be far fewer tales like this one to be told.

I hope Professor Luk is lucky enough to recover fully from his wounds. My condolences to the boy's family. No doubt this will come as a great shock to them.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, a scientific child prodigy, aged eight years and seven months, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, five years exactly, and Tiarnan, twenty-eight months, please go to: http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html I also write of gifted education, IQ, intelligence, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, College, University, Chemistry, Science, genetics, left-handedness, precocity, child prodigy, child genius, baby genius, adult genius, savant, wunderkind, wonderkind, genio, гений ребенок prodigy, genie, μεγαλοφυία θαύμα παιδιών, bambino, kind.

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