Title: Negotiating Success by Two Generations of Vocational Students From Low-income Backgrounds in Singapore
Stream: Learning Experiences, Student Learning & Learner Diversity
Presentation Type: Oral Presentation
Authors:
Amanda Ong, National Institute of Education, Singapore
Heidi Layne, Jyväskylä University, Finland
Abstract:
This paper analyses how Institute for Education (ITE) students and graduates in Singapore define and reflect on their experiences of success. In August 2021, Education Minister Chan Chun Sing exhorted Singapore's educators and parents to broaden their definition of success beyond academic goals (Low, 2021; Wong, 2021). Vocational pathways provide more technical skill-oriented education and have carried considerable stigma of being “lesser” than academic driven careers and life choices. The data was organised in themes, (negotiating) success being one of them. Research participants were divided into different cohorts for comparative insights. This paper concentrates on data from those from lower-income family backgrounds graduated between 1992 to 2005, compared and contrasted with those who have graduated from 2016 to 2022 and those still studying. Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus and social stratification are utilised to unpack how success is negotiated amongst the research participants. The theory of social and cultural stratification (Bourdieu, 1984) provided an analysis framework to understand the (sometimes limited) options and opportunities in choosing pathways that may or may not lead to experiencing success in life. Singaporean society has traditionally valued efficiency, productivity, numerical performance, and material success, leaving - to some extent - a narrower space for individuals to negotiate their individual sense of success. The data indicated there to be a concerted attempt to succeed in family relationships and making life meaningful through academic and career experiences, and this is sometimes achieved after specific hardships.
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