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Education Innovation
Siao See Teng

Maria Manzon
Kenneth K. Poon Editors
Equity in
Excellence
Experiences of East Asian High-
Performing Education Systems
Education Innovation Series
Series Editor
Wing On Lee
School of Education
Zhengzhou University
China
Executive Editor
Dennis Kwek
National Institute of Education
Nanyang Technological University
Singapore
Aims and Scope – Springer Education Innovation
Book Series
Education holds the key to unlock human resources that a society needs to survive
and flourish. This is particularly salient in a borderless knowledge economy. For the
past decades, the sterling performance of economies such as Hong Kong, Finland,
Japan, Singapore and Taiwan in international studies (e.g., TIMSS, PIRLS and
PISA) has attracted much attention internationally.
Researchers, policy makers and practitioners all over the world wish to understand
how education innovations propel the emerging systems from good to great to
excellent, and how their trajectories will provide insights for reforms in the education
system, schooling innovation, and classroom practices. The Education Innovation
Book Series, published by Springer, will delve into education innovations enacted
by these emerging systems and situate them in both the local and the broader
international contexts. Primary focus will be given to pedagogy and classroom
practices; education policy formulation and implementation; school and instructional
leadership; and the context and interface between education research, policy and
practice. We believe that the latter is critical in making education innovations come
to bear. Each volume will document insights and lessons learned based on empirical
research (both quantitative and qualitative) and theoretical analyses. Implications to
research, policy and professional practice will be surfaced through comparing and
synthesizing their experience in the process of comparative studies on successful
reforms around the world.
The audience of the edited volumes and monographs published in this series
includes researchers, policy makers, practitioners and students in the fields of
education and teacher education, and public policies related to learning and human
resources.
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10092

Siao See Teng • Maria Manzon
Kenneth K. Poon
Editors
Equity in Excellence
Experiences of East Asian High-Performing
Education Systems
Editors
Siao See Teng Maria Manzon
National Institute of Education Department of International Education
Nanyang Technological University and Lifelong Learning
Singapore The Education University of Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Kenneth K. Poon
Nanyang Technological University
Singapore
ISSN 2211-4874 ISSN 2211-4882 (electronic)

Education Innovation Series
ISBN 978-981-13-2973-9 ISBN 978-981-13-2975-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2975-3
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018959841
© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of
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Singapore
Series Editor’s Foreword
The efforts to improve educational provision globally and across countries are all
based on the belief that education can function as a change driver for individuals to
strive for a better state of being, whether economically, socially, or culturally
speaking. From a macro perspective, we believe education is a means for the
eradication of illiteracy and poverty, equity promotion, and an overall improvement
of the economic productivity of the country, as stipulated in the Asian Development
Bank’s Framework and Criteria for the Appraisal and Socioeconomic Justification
of Education Projects (ADB, 1994, p. 5):
• Education can play a direct role in poverty reduction by enhancing the m arketable
skills of the economically disadvantaged and vulnerable groups and by
expanding their ability to take advantage of income generation possibilities and
available social services.
• Education plays a key role in promoting the interests of women and increasing
their diversified impact and contribution to national development goals. Women
must have equal access to and participation in educational activities.
• Through its impact on employment opportunities and earning potential, education
alters the value placed on children and the willingness of parents to invest more
in each child’s development.
• Education contributes directly and indirectly to a higher level of sociocultural
and economic development that provides sufficient resources to address
effectively environmental issues.
However, the promise of education has not been fulfilled. A number of evaluation
reports, such as the UNESCO Position Paper on Education Post-2015 (UNESCO
2014), the 2013 Priority Paper (UNESCO & UNICEF, 2013), and the Global
Education Monitoring Report 2017 (UNESCO, 2017), have provided similar
observations that the same problems persist, despite tremendous efforts expended
by governments and international agencies. As highlighted by the Priority Report
(UNESCO & UNICEF, 2013, p. 5) in regard to the EFA agenda, progress toward
getting all children into school is too slow. The 2017 Global Education Monitoring
Report (UNESCO, 2017, p. 118) highlights the following:
v
vi Series Editor’s Foreword
• In 2010–2015, completion rates were 83% for primary, 69% for lower secondary,
and 45% for upper secondary education.
• About 387 million children of primary school age, or 56%, did not reach the
minimum proficiency level in reading.
• Less than one in five countries guaranteed 12 years of free and compulsory
education.
The problem may be due to some fundamental presumptuous issues such as the
embeddedness of inequality and inequity in societies, which is hard to eradicate. As
reported widely, the income gap between the rich and poor is generally rising in
modern societies today, despite the increasing universalization of education across
the world. The Gini coefficient index in many countries continues to be high even
though their educational provision is basically universal. Furthermore, although
everyone can go to school, new pedagogical strategies that seem to liberate learners
are requiring better familial resources to support, such as the additional resources to
buy computer equipment, pay internet subscription, and finance all sorts of training
for cocurricular activities, such as music, sport, and art engagements, as well as
participation in all kinds of exchange, study abroad and immersion programs, plus
internships. The increased exposure to experiential learning in school requires quite
a lot of additional resources from home to support, in order for the engaged children
to benefit from all these new provisions in school. Unfortunately these new
educational goals and practices may lead to new forms of poverty (Lee, 2007). For
example, many development analysts have already identified the emergence of
urban poverty. The many educational reforms reviewed above suggest new
educational emphasis on middle-class culture and requirements for significantly
more resources for individuals to meet those new educational targets. The
disadvantages imposed upon relatively poor families will make it hard to break the
poverty cycle since the reforms and additional demands for academic performance
may perpetuate disadvantage in spite of the achievement of equal educational
opportunity in terms of access. Eradicating inequalities solely through education
may result in perpetuating poverty. Therefore, governments need to consider
measures to help the relatively poor meet the new demands in educational reforms
that require new resources to achieve.
The recent discourse on “equity and quality” seems to be one good solution to
create a turning point in resolving those issues. The analyses of factors of success in
OECD’s various PISA studies over the past 15 years appear to offer some insights
that can bring about a different perspective to resolve the issue. Their main major
finding is that if we study the high-performing countries in the various PISA
exercises, these countries have not resolved the income gap issue, as indicated by
their high Gini indices. However, what they have observed is that even under such
circumstances, if governments spend efforts to improve the quality of education
provided, such as elevating and standardizing the quality of teaching and school
environments, students coming from disadvantaged families, such as low-income
and immigrant families, will have equal chances to excel in the education system.
One illuminating finding from the PISA assessments is the identification of
Series Editor’s Foreword vii
“ resilience index.” It suggests that in high-performing countries, the percentage of

resilient students is also high. Despite coming from unfavorable socioeconomic
status (SES) backgrounds, these students can still attain high achievements in the
PISA tests. Both the Grattan Report (Jensen, 2012) and Asia Society Report (2012)
shared the same observation that high-performing education systems are those
countries which are able to manage both equity and quality in education, that is,
they achieve equity by raising the general quality of schooling.
In a paper discussing the directions for the post-2015 education agenda, Sayed
and Ahmed (2015, p. 335) point out that:
The analysis thus far suggests that the articulation of equitable and inclusive quality as a
goal cements the turn towards prioritization of quality and frames its pursuit within a social
justice perspective, consistent with the emphasis on education as a human right and as a
public good. This is potentially a huge quality agenda.
Indeed, the Priority Paper (UNESCO & UNICEF, 2013) has also picked up
“equity as quality” as a new thinking and direction toward the achievement of the
EFA goals toward 2030. It is hoped that the new target, with a focus on educational
quality, will be able to bring about a new phase that can enhance the achievement of
EFA for most of the countries in the world.
This book is a new attempt to analyze equity and quality issues in the context of
East Asia, particularly Singapore. The high performance of East Asian education
systems in international education tests conducted by IEA and OECD PISA has
attracted much international attention. For example, the Grattan Report (Jensen,
2012, p. 9) makes the following observations:
• High-performing education systems in East Asia have successfully increased
performance while maintaining, and often increasing, equity. Compared to
Australia and most OECD countries, a child from a poorer background in these
systems is less likely to drop out or fall behind.
• There is less of a gap between high- and low-performing students in Korea,
Shanghai, and Hong Kong compared to many other OECD education systems.
• Low-performing students are better prepared for their future. The bottom 10% of
math students in Shanghai perform at a level that is 21 months ahead of the
bottom 10% of students in Australia. This gap rises to 24 months in the UK,
25 months across the average of the OECD, and 28 months in the USA.
• Increasing performance and equity has been achieved with high and increasing
participation. For example, 30 years ago, about 40% of young Koreans (aged
25–34) finished secondary education. Now the figure is 98%, 10 percentage
points above the OECD average.
Despite international recognition, the “insiders” of the East Asian education
s ystems tend to focus on their own weaknesses, rather than the strengths that their
international peers accorded to them (see Lee, Lee, & Low, 2014). The value of this
book lies in the reflections provided mostly by Asian scholars who, far from
celebrating the perceived attainment of equity and quality (or excellence, as termed
in this book), lament the difficulties of removing inequities. Many of the reforms
viii Series Editor’s Foreword
introduced to tackle inequities, in practice, generate new inequities perhaps in part

because the education sector is a microcosm of society and complex social causes
of poverty cannot be resolved by school reforms alone. The expansion of
educational goals, such as experiential learning, requires additional resources from
families. Instead of improving educational performance through the promotion of
home-school collaboration, several authors in this book found reverse outcomes.
“Parentocracy” emerges with more resourceful middle-class parents taking
advantage of this opportunity to cultivate further forms of cultural capital for their
children, resulting in the continued disadvantage of students coming from
underprivileged families.
In addition to providing an insider’s critical review of their own education
systems from the lens of equity and excellence, authors of this book also provide
rich and valuable information on how education systems reform themselves toward
enhancing equity and quality/excellence through policy and pedagogical a djustments
that address issues such as differentiation with inclusive ideals and measures. The
chapters on classroom research are particularly valuable in informing how Asian
educators reform their pedagogies in order to make the learning process more
equitable for students, reducing the impacts of their SES backgrounds. One such
effort is to introduce “working memory” strategies, so that the learnable moments
of the students can be captured by both teachers and students, leading to more
effective learning in the classroom. This way, in addition to the macro policy reforms
toward equity, the micro pedagogical reforms will improve the learning process that
will benefit the majority of students in the classroom, regardless of their SES
backgrounds.
Distinguished Professor
Wing On Lee
Zhengzhou University
Zhengzhou, China
Formerly Dean of Educational Research
Singapore
References
Asia Society. (2012). Teaching and leadership for the twenty-first century: Report on the 2012
international summit on the teaching profession. Retrieved from http://asiasociety.org/
files/2012teachingsummit.pdf
Asian Development Bank (ADB). (1994). Framework and criteria for the appraisal and
socioeconomic justification of education projects. Manila, Philippines: Asian Development
Bank.
Jensen, B. (2012). Catching up: Learning from the best school systems in East Asia: summary
report. Melbourne, Australia: Grattan Institute.
Series Editor’s Foreword ix
Lee, S. K., Lee, W. O., & Low, E. L. (2014). Educational policy innovations: Levelling up and
sustaining educational achievement. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer.
Lee, W. O. (2007). Education policy and planning that empowers: Eradication of poverty and
inequalities in education. Journal of Education for International Understanding, 3, 93–105.
Sayed, Y., & Ahmed, R. (2015). Education quality, and teaching and learning in the post-2015
education agenda. International Journal of Educational Development, 40, 330–338.
UNESCO. (2014). Position paper on education post-2015. Paris: UNESCO.
UNESCO. (2017). Accountability in education: Meeting our commitments. Global education
monitoring report 2017/8. Paris: UNESCO.
UNESCO & UNICEF. (2013). Making education a priority in the post-2015 development agenda:
Report of the global thematic consultation on education in the post-2015 development agenda.
Paris: UNESCO & UNICEF.
Contents
1 Equity and Excellence in East Asian High-Performing

Education Systems – A Paradoxical Relationship?............................... 1
Siao See Teng, Maria Manzon, and Kenneth K. Poon
Part I The Pursuit of Equity in Excellence in East Asia

2 Towards East Asian Dialogue: Thinking Through the Policy
Contradictions of Equity and Excellence in East Asian
Education.................................................................................................. 13
Keita Takayama
3 Education Reform in Shanghai in the Era of Globalisation:
Towards a Balanced and Innovative System?....................................... 27
Zhiyong Zhu and Meng Deng
4 How Taiwan Education Pursues Equity in Excellence......................... 43
Chuing Prudence Chou
5 Hong Kong’s Journey Toward Equity in the Era of Appropriate
Education for All...................................................................................... 55
Kim Fong Poon-Mcbrayer
6 Rethinking Equality and Equity in Multicultural Education
in a Diversified Society: The Case of Language Education
for Newcomer Students in Japan............................................................ 71
Miki Sugimura
7 ‘Bridges and Ladders’: The Paradox of Equity in Excellence
in Singapore Schools................................................................................ 87
Dennis Kwek, Rifhan Miller, and Maria Manzon
xi
xii Contents
Part II Striving for Equity in Excellence: The Singapore Experience

8 Equity and Meritocracy in Singapore.................................................... 111
Jason Tan
9 Diversity and Equity in Singapore Education: Parental
Involvement in Low-Income Families with Migrant Mothers............. 127
Siao See Teng
10 Policies and Initiatives for Preschool Children from Disadvantaged
Environments and Preschool Children with Disabilities
in Singapore.............................................................................................. 149
Kenneth K. Poon
11 Helping Children with Mathematical Difficulties Level Up:
Evaluating the Efficacy of a Novel Updating
Training Programme............................................................................... 161
Su Yin Ang, Kerry Lee, Kenneth K. Poon, and Imelda Suryadarma
12 Early Intervention of Malay Preschool Teachers
in Promoting Children’s Mathematics Learning.................................. 183
Pamela Sharpe and Sirene Lim
Chapter 1
Equity and Excellence in East Asian High-
Performing Education Systems –
A Paradoxical Relationship?
Siao See Teng, Maria Manzon, and Kenneth K. Poon
A number of East Asian1 education systems (e.g. Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea,
Shanghai, Singapore and Taiwan) have gained international prominence over the
years, due to their rapid climbs to top positions in international tests such as the
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), Progress in International
Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) and Trends in International Mathematics and
Science Study (TIMSS). For example, Hong Kong was placed 17th in PIRLS
reading literacy, and Singapore ranked 15th in 2001, but within 5 years, they
garnered 2nd and 4th places in 2006, respectively. In the 2015 PISA results,
Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei, Japan and Beijing-Shanghai-Jiangsu-Guangzhou
(B-S-J-G), China, were top achievers (OECD, 2016).
The sterling report cards of these East Asian systems, combined with the
declining performance of western systems such as those of the United Kingdom and
the United States, have led the West to a “look East” drive for inspiration. Whether
it be scholarly publications or media articles, much literature has been generated on
the “success” of education in East Asia, which has become “the new ‘poster boy’ in
the global discourse of education policy borrowing” (You & Morris, 2016, p. 883).
Increasingly, a good education system is considered one that not only produces
high achievements but is also equitable in terms of the distribution of its success
1
Although we do not subscribe to a monolithic East Asian region, an extensive deliberation on the
concept of the region is beyond this book. It suffices to note that while Singapore is situated more
specifically in Southeast Asia, its inclusion in this volume is due to the fact that it has often been
linked with and discussed alongside high-performing East Asian systems. A chapter on South
Korea education was planned but the idea was dropped due to unforeseen circumstances.
S. S. Teng (*) · K. K. Poon
National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
e-mail: [email protected]
M. Manzon
Department of International Education and Lifelong Learning, The Education University
of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019 1

S. S. Teng et al. (eds.), Equity in Excellence, Education Innovation Series,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2975-3_1
2 S. S. Teng et al.
across the system and its student population. As stated in a 2012 OECD report on
equity and quality in education (p. 17):
An emerging viewpoint across OECD countries is that education systems must provide
successful educational outcomes for all students. Increasingly, it is no longer seen as
adequate to provide equal access to the same “one size fits all” educational opportunity.
More and more, the focus is shifting towards providing education that promotes equity by
recognising and meeting different educational needs.
Also reflected in the PISA reports over the years is the high ranking of these East
Asian education systems in equity. There is a tendency for admirers of the
high-performing East Asian systems to focus on its “successes”, while critics would
argue that not all is rosy, pointing out the existing inequities found in them (for
instance, differential means to provide quality private tutoring). Perhaps a more
nuanced understanding of these East Asian education systems could be facilitated
if we could examine them considering both equity and quality issues, since the
pursuit of each often affects the other. The chapters in this book illustrate that
excellence and equity are not independent and separate but can be paradoxically
intertwined.
Equity and Excellence
Traditionally, the notion of excellence refers to a fairly narrow definition of

achievement in terms of academic achievement and potential. Examinations form
the most definitive form of assessment for excellence in academic achievement.
This concept of excellence is, however, increasingly being challenged by the
competing values, styles and frames of intelligence as schools incorporate

increasingly diverse student populations. Instead, the excellence of an education
system is becoming associated with the level of equity manifested in the system.
According to the OECD, equity comprises two components: fairness and
inclusion. Fairness refers to how an individual, regardless of his or her personal
background and social circumstances (e.g. socio-economic status, ethnicity and
gender), is able to achieve his or her educational potential. Inclusion refers to a
minimum standard of education for all: everyone should be able to read, write and do
simple arithmetic (OECD, 2008). In contrast to equality, which has often been
measured in a quantitative manner (receiving equal/same amount or level of
assistance), equity refers to the quality of service afforded to each person. Thus to
ensure quality education for each individual student, this would mean being
“regardful” of his or her social background in order to provide for all “regardless”
of the social categorical group he or she belongs to. Understanding diversity and
differences is therefore a prerequisite for the execution of inclusion and fairness.
1 Equity and Excellence in East Asian High-Performing Education… 3
Educational Equity in East Asia
For most of the East Asian societies as we know them today, education after the
Second World War was very much a means through which the state forged citizenry
and d eveloped manpower for economic needs. They experienced the massification
of education and the rise of the middle class, which were often accompanied by the
growth of the private education sector and greater differentiation within the existing
education system (Altbach and Umakoshi 2004). This had substantial impact on the
educational landscape in these societies, providing more equal opportunities in
some areas while maintaining or creating new inequities in others. In response to
both global and national socio-political and economic developments, most of these
societies are also marked by a “centralised decentralisation” in which central
governance still played a key role in the education sector’s reforms in the last few
decades (Mok, 2006). This feature acts at times as both a condition and constraint
in the enforcement of equity measures. Certain observable phenomena such as
increased credentialism, examination-oriented education culture and supplementary
private tutoring culture form common challenges that many education systems in
East Asia have to contend with.
Efforts have traditionally been focused on closing the gaps premised on
differences relating to gender, socio-economic status and ethnicity. The forces of
globalisation and migration, however, have brought on similar challenges in terms
of greater demographic and student population diversification. Internal migration
has brought many mainland China migrants to Hong Kong, while external migration
saw significant numbers of migrant workers from far-flung countries such as Brazil,
in Japan. The demand for foreign brides particularly among local rural and
low-income men led to an increase in international marriages and the likes of
“multicultural children” (South Korea), “New Taiwanese” and “New Singaporeans”,
born to local fathers and their migrant wives. These diversifications added layers of
complexities to the existing discrepancies premised on gender, ethnicity and class
and have, over the years, gained greater currency in societal and educational
discourses and attention from policymakers. Apart from the attention to the

newcomers, students with disabilities and special needs have also increasingly
become part of the equity discourse in Asia. Discussions often meditate on the
meaning of inclusive education, such as whether putting students with disabilities
into special education schools or mainstream schools constitute inclusion.
Cross-referencing certainly has the potential to help each education system refine
and review its policy directions, measures and initiatives. Besides offering much
insight to international literature in terms of how both quality and equity in education
are navigated in these East Asian systems, commonalities in their societal contexts
provide relevant cross-references for one another in terms of anticipating emergent
issues and assessing strategies to tackle challenges. References to “elite groups”,
“elite schools” or “elite-oriented education system” when discussing concerns over
equity in many of the chapters of this book suggest that elitism remains very much
a challenge in East Asian education systems after the massification of education.
4 S. S. Teng et al.
With all the systems having to deal with a greater diversity of students, it would be
even more critical to deliberate on when and how differentiation (of curriculum,
instruction, programmes, schools, etc.) caters to diversity and when it leads to
stratification. In Keita Takayama’s words in the first chapter of this book: “We need
to ask which elements of standardised education systems contribute to overall
educational excellence and equity and which are more likely to produce suppressive
effects on standardisation, on teachers and children and thus are in need of more
differentiation and flexibility” (p. 18).
For effective cross-referencing to take place, the particularities of the societal
context of each education system needs to be factored in. These institutional,
social and cultural contexts, often overlooked in the literature on the successes of
the high-performing education systems (HPES), of which the East Asian top
performers in PISA are prominent features (Deng & Gopinathan, 2016; Lee &
Manzon, 2014), are nevertheless integral to the understanding of how equity
challenges emerge and are negotiated. While the East Asian HPES have often been
associated with Confucianism or Confucian heritage culture, many of them are
found in societies which have undergone major transformations in the last century;
most have experienced war, decolonisation and modernising industrialisation.
There were also the disruptive Cultural Revolution in China, for instance, and the
initial “desinicisation” in early independent Singapore, as the newly minted
country steered clear of the impression of a third China in the Cold War era (Tan,
2003). Thus, cultural continuities should not be assumed, and discontinuities need
to be taken into account before convenient attribution of any educational
phenomena to this cultural thesis takes place across East Asian systems. Key
political and societal developments would need to be considered in understanding
and analysing education in East Asia.
Equity in top-performing East Asian education systems is a relatively
under-researched area in the international literature. How each system in the Asian
region attempts to enhance equity in practice may differ intra-regionally and from
the West. Instead of seeking an overarching definition, the editors of this volume
attempt to capture the particularities of how each system interprets and approaches
equity, by getting authors to relate their discussions of policy and/or practice to the
meanings and forms of equity they see and research on. The editors of this volume
hope this book will make a modest contribution towards a cross-referencing d ialogue
on inter-Asian education systems.
Singapore: Striving for Equity in Excellence
As this volume was conceived as part of the Springer Education Innovation Series,
previously based at the National Institute of Education (Singapore), a more focused
commentary on the Singapore context is included here. With its increased concern
over social stratification and social mobility issues in recent years, and education
seen as a key domain to handle these challenges, Singapore is apt as a country case
to explore.
Singapore is no stranger to attempts at levelling up students who fall behind. One

of its earliest efforts in this area was systemic differentiation introduced in the late
1970s, in the form of between and within school differentiation premised on the
results of high-stake examinations. This aimed at the reduction of drop-out rates and
an increase in the literacy and education levels of the workforce. From the 1990s,
targeted efforts with financial assistance and learning support schemes were
introduced, and later more pathways were opened to enable more flexible student
movement from lower to higher streams and varied routes to higher education
institutions. Specialised schools for potential drop outs as well as those for the
vocational stream were also established (Wang, Teng, & Tan 2014).
In spite of the above developments, it has been pointed out that there may be
limitations to Singapore’s levelling-up efforts if its conception of equity as equality of
opportunities means a system “desensitised to persistent gaps in the learning outcomes
among students, to the extent that the society may not critically reflect about the
education policies and pedagogical practices and identify specific elements that may
contribute to these gaps” (Teh, 2014, p. 81). In face of greater diversification of the
student population as well as the increasing income gap, the positioning of Singapore’s
education system as the cradle of meritocracy has come under doubt (see, e.g. Chong,
2014; Koh, 2014; Lim, 2013). Even Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has
acknowledged stratifying effects in the country (Lee, 2011). Recently, a study by the
Institute of Policy Studies in Singapore on social capital published in late 2017 found
clear divides between social classes, with people from “elite schools” or who live in
private housing tending to have less ties with those who studied in “nonelite schools”
or lived in public housing (Chua, Tan, & Koh, 2017). Education Minister Ong Ye
Kung has also talked about the risks social stratification posed to Singapore and the
direction of education policies to deal with the challenge (Ong, 2018).
Although consistently appearing in the top ranks in PISA and TIMSS over the
years, Singapore is also the leading system that has a comparatively longer tail end
of the lowest percentile of achievers among its East Asian counterparts (Teh, 2014).
The 2015 PISA results revealed that Singapore had the highest social background
impact on performance, ahead of Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea.
Similarly, the same sets of results showed that Singapore has the highest social gap
between advantaged and disadvantaged students among the above-mentioned
societies (OECD, 2016).
Singapore also has other features that make it a distinctly interesting society that
has much to offer as a country case. For instance, its student population is one of the
most diverse among the top Asian education systems. It is also a system where the
medium of instruction is not the home language for a relatively high proportion of
its student population. Authors writing on Singapore education in this book have
mentioned language challenges relating to parental support and conducting
screening tests to identify at-risk students or carrying out intervention programmes
in English for students coming from non-English-speaking homes, of which
minority students form a significant group. These features contribute to the

complexity of catering to all students in Singapore schools.
6 S. S. Teng et al.
Layout of the Book
This book is divided into two parts, each with an opening chapter that offers a
general discussion on the theme of each section in reference to other chapters in the
section. Part I, “The Pursuit of Equity in Excellence in East Asia”, comprises
chapters focusing on selected top-performing East Asian systems2, while Part II,
“Striving for Equity in Excellence: the Singapore Experience”, presents Singapore
as a country case study.
Part I delineates the existing equity issues, policy direction and the challenges of
some of the most prominent East Asian education systems. It includes a c ommentary
on the existing discussions on equity in East Asian education systems, c omprehensive
macro-overviews of the equity policies and initiatives that have been introduced in
Shanghai and Taiwan and also inclusion deliberations pertaining to “newer” groups
such as migrant students with disabilities in Hong Kong and newcomer students in
Japan, as well as how institutional structures shape inclusion in Singapore.
Part I opens with Keita Takayama’s Chap. 2, “Towards East Asian Dialogue:
Thinking Through the Policy Contradictions of Equity and Excellence in East Asian
Education”. He identifies the common equity challenges facing East Asian education
systems, raises questions on the way knowledge and discourse on education
concerns in East Asia are formulated and advocates “Asia as method”, delineating
the value of cross-referencing among the East Asian systems in the midst of new
disparities.
In Chap. 3, “Education Reform in Shanghai in the Era of Globalisation: Towards
a Balanced and Innovative System?”, Zhiyong Zhu and Meng Deng offer a review
of the key policies and practices improving educational quality and equity, initiated
in Shanghai over recent decades. Efforts include those aimed at urban-rural schools,
“key” and neighbourhood schools, public-private schools and special education
schools. Attention is drawn to how educational developments in Shanghai should be
understood within both convergence and tensions between the global and local and
the local social structure under which the central government in Beijing retains
substantial control over policy-making and resource allocation.
Chapter 4, “How Taiwan Education Pursues Equity in Excellence”, reviews
initiatives and reforms Taiwan has embarked on to improve education equity amidst
significant political and societal changes in the territory. Prudence Chou notes how
policy directions since the 1990s attempted to support underprivileged students
from rural areas, provide equal education opportunity to aboriginal students,
safeguard gender equality in education and also cater to students with disabilities.
However, the disproportional inclusion of disadvantaged groups such as the
aboriginal students and the “New Taiwanese” in higher education illustrates the
2
The South Korean system is commonly known as a top-performing education system in East Asia.
Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, our planned chapter on South Korea education
did not materialise.
continual challenges faced by the Taiwanese system in achieving both quality and
equity in education.
In Chap. 5, “Hong Kong’s Journey Towards Equity in the Era of Appropriate
Education for All”, Kim Fong Poon-McBrayer traces the educational equity
trajectory of Hong Kong from post-war to postcolonial times with a focus on the
education for students with disabilities as well as minority students, particularly
non-Chinese speaking (NCS) migrants. While major advances have been achieved,
further work needs to be carried out in relation to minority students with disabilities
who possess double marginal identities in Hong Kong.
Miki Sugimura explores in Chap. 6, “Rethinking Equality and Equity in
Multicultural Education in a Diversified Society: The Case of Language Education
for Newcomer Students in Japan”, the developments of multicultural education in
Japan among “newcomers”—mainly Brazilian and Peruvian migrants, in what was
formerly regarded as a homogenous society. The distinction between equality and
equity in education is deliberated through the discussion of language education
provision for these migrants’ offspring. The author emphasises the need to consider
the context and projected needs of the “newcomers” who possess diverging views
on whether Japanese language or mother tongue education serves them better.
Chapter 7, “‘Bridges and Ladders’: The Paradox of Equity in Excellence in
Singapore Schools”, authored by Dennis Kwek, Rifhan Miller and Maria Manzon,
analyses the Singapore education system’s attempts to cater to the diverse abilities
and needs of students with multiple pathways using the metaphor of “bridges and
ladders”. The authors note the ironic “paradoxical ‘double effect’ of achieving
equity and excellence while reinforcing intractable pathologies of inequity”.
Highlighting the concept of “ecology of equity”, the chapter emphasises the
importance of taking into consideration the complex processes at work from

individuals to schools to the system in order to tackle equity issues in a c omprehensive
manner.
Part II focuses on Singapore as a country case study of a high-performing
education system with a relatively lower level of equity among its Asian

high-performing counterparts as reflected in the PISA findings. A broad discussion
on educational equity concerns and counteracting measures in Singapore is covered
here: from education and meritocracy in Singapore to parental involvement of
migrant mothers, to the policy and initiatives for preschool children with d isabilities,
to improving Mathematics education for Malay pre-schoolers and to primary school
intervention at the individual/classroom level.
Jason Tan’s Chap. 8, “Equity and Meritocracy in Singapore”, sets the broad
context within which educational equity could be understood in contemporary
Singapore. Particularly, the significance of family background and implications of
current trends relating to “parentocracy” on educational outcomes is highlighted.
Referencing other chapters on Singapore education in the book, the chapter raises
issues to consider with regard to the future direction of Singapore’s education
system and schools, as Singapore continues to strive for educational equity and
excellence.
8 S. S. Teng et al.
Siao See Teng’s Chap. 9, “Diversity and Equity in Singapore: Parental

Involvement in Low-Income Families with Migrant Mothers”, provides insights
into the parental involvement of rarely researched low-income families with migrant
mothers in Singapore. Through interviews with these migrant mothers supplemented
with ethnographic explorations, the chapter throws some light on the profiles of
these families and the kind of parental involvement they provide to their children in
the home and beyond. Their navigation around challenges as well as potential
efforts within and outside schools to provide support for the children in these
families are also discussed.
Kenneth Poon examines in Chap. 10, “Policies and Initiatives for Children from
Disadvantaged Environments and Children with Disabilities in Singapore”,
Singapore’s efforts in supporting disadvantaged students and students with
disabilities at the preschool education level. He anticipates developments in early
childhood intervention in the area of screening and assessment, building of a
centralised evaluation and monitoring system, greater coordination between

government bodies to facilitate children’s transitions between environments,

ensuring the access of resources and training manpower with the necessary

capabilities to effectively support the children.
Chapter 11, “Helping Children with Mathematical Difficulties Level Up:
Evaluating the Efficacy of a Novel Updating Training Programme”, authored by Su
Yin Ang, Kerry Lee, Kenneth Poon and Imelda Suryadarma, investigates the
cognitive functions of students who are underperformers in mathematics, as part of
the effort to identify assistance for them. Implementing an intervention study on
working memory involving computer games, the researchers explore the p ossibilities
of supporting underachievers.
In Chap. 12, “Early Intervention of Malay Preschool Teachers in Promoting
Children’s Mathematics Learning”, Pamela Sharpe and Sirene Lim identify
preschool as a vital intervention ground to address the underperformance of Malay
students in Singapore. The chapter documents and evaluates an intervention
programme aimed at informing stakeholders how preschool educators’ knowledge
could be improved with the redesigning of lesson plans, teacher training and
mentorship.
On the whole, this book takes into consideration the above discussions of
excellence and equity, broadening the scope of “achievement” and tackling issues of
inclusion within greater diversity. Adopting a more comprehensive approach, it also
contextualises conceptions and practices of equity in excellence amidst certain
phenomena in these Asian societies, such as the stress endured by students in these
high-pressure competitive systems and the high rates of private supplementary
education participation. Employing multidisciplinary perspectives in discussing
equity and excellence, this volume will contribute to understanding policies and
practices in East Asian education systems and address gaps in the literature on
equity. The editors hope that it will encourage more inter-Asia discussions and
research on an education topic the region is so deeply concerned with and have
much relevant experience to share. This book will cater to the interests of researchers,
policymakers and educators internationally.
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Chong, T. (2014). Vocational education in Singapore: Meritocracy and hidden narratives.
Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 35(5), 637–648.
Chua, V., Tan, E.S., & Koh, G. (2017). A study on social capital in Singapore. Singapore, Singapore:
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Part I
The Pursuit of Equity in Excellence
in East Asia
Chapter 2
Towards East Asian Dialogue: Thinking
Through the Policy Contradictions
of Equity and Excellence in East Asian
Education
Keita Takayama
Looking East
Hong Kong, Shanghai, Taiwan, Singapore and Japan, the cities and countries
featured in this section of the book, were some of the top performers in the last few
rounds of OECD’s PISA wherein they, along with Macao and South Korea,
dominated the top rankings of the global league tables. Their success stories in
demonstrating how both excellence and equity can be achieved together have swept
through the English-language media and policy discourse, prompting prominent
political figures in Australia, the UK and the USA to learn from ‘East’ (Sellar &
Lingard, 2013; Waldow, Takayama, & Sung, 2014), though much of the learning
from East call was based on a highly selective reference to East Asian education
policies to legitimize long preferred policy agendas (You & Morris, 2015) or on
reform advocates’ nostalgia for a more didactic approach to teaching, which was
presumed to be still alive in East Asia (Forestier & Crossley, 2015). Regardless of
whether this ‘learning from East’ trend is genuine or phony, the infatuation with
East Asia in the Anglo-American education policy circle is likely to stay for some
time particularly against the backdrop of Asia’s rising economic and political
influences. Part of the responsibilities of scholars researching East Asian education
today then is to provide more contextualised accounts of their success stories to
pre-empt any unintelligent form of policy learning and borrowing from East.
What is often overlooked in much of Programme for International Student
Assessment (PISA)-related reporting of East Asian educational success are the
educational challenges of minoritised students in these cities and countries. Unlike
countries such as Australia and New Zealand where PISA data about student ethnic
and language backgrounds are collected and correlated to student test scores, these
high-performing Asian ‘PISA stars’ do not collect such data (or do not publicise the
K. Takayama (*)
School of Education, University of New England, Armidale, Australia
e-mail: [email protected]
© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019 13

S. S. Teng et al. (eds.), Equity in Excellence, Education Innovation Series,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2975-3_2
14 K. Takayama
data), hence excluding the problem of educational disadvantages faced by migrant

and indigenous children from the international PISA success stories and the
domestic policy debates on PISA outcomes. This is particularly worrisome given
that these cities and countries accept a large number of both highly mobile transnational
professionals and inter- and intranational migrant workers with school-age children,
as detailed in Chou’s Chap. 4 on Taiwan, Zhu and Deng’s Chap. 3 on Shanghai (see
also Deng & Zhao, 2014) and Poon-Mcbrayer’s Chap. 5 on Hong Kong.
Furthermore, some of the countries have a history of institutionalised
discrimination in education and are faced with the consequent academic disparity of
particular ethnic and indigenous population, as detailed in Sugimura’s Chap. 6 on
Japan, Chou’s Chap. 4 on Taiwan and to some extent Kwek, Miller and Manzon’s
Chap. 7 on Singapore. The five chapters provide much needed detailed descriptions
of the state of educational disadvantages faced by minoritised children, which are
often glossed over by the aggregated data sets upon which PISA rankings are
assembled and the celebratory accounts of Asian Tigers’ PISA success rest.
This lack of attention to minoritised children contrasts with PISA’s focus on
socio-economic disadvantages in education. Historically, East Asian countries have
attempted to address socio-economic disadvantages in education by universalising
the standardised primary and early secondary education for all. This policy focus on
educational access is premised upon the belief that ‘SES (socio-economic status)
should count for little if the school is fair and effective’ (Gopinathan, 2007, p. 67).
Universal access to quality education, standardisation of curriculum, egalitarian
distribution of resources, pedagogic belief in effort and ‘objective’ and standardised
examinations have long served as the central pillars for the legitimacy of education
systems in East Asia. According to this logic, the universalisation of primary and
secondary education has already ‘solved’ any inequity issues in the system; the
consequent socio-economic gap in educational outcomes simply reflects individual
student’s merit (hard work and talent). Until recently, therefore, the East Asian
governments did not systematically collect socio-economic data about children and
their academic outcomes, and PISA, with its focus on socio-economic disparity in
learning outcomes, helped put this issue on policy agenda in some of these countries
(see Takayama, 2012).
In the following pages, I attempt to generate a set of insights and perspectives
about East Asian education and the commonly shared policy challenges around the
issue of educational inequalities. This will not only be undertaken through my
engagement with the nation-specific accounts provided by the five following
chapters but also on the basis of what I have written elsewhere and other studies that
examine educational policy issues pertaining to East Asia as a whole. Here the task
for me is to generate a regional dialogue about educational equity and excellence,
while keeping in mind how this attempt could omit important differences among the
countries and economies discussed by the chapters.
Having said that, I am also acutely aware of the possible epistemic violence that
my regional framing might generate. The problem of ‘methodological projection’
(Connell, 2007, p. 64) immediately comes to my mind. That is, I draw on concepts
developed by Japanese scholars (e.g. Takehiko Kariya and Yuki Honda) in order to
2 Towards East Asian Dialogue: Thinking Through the Policy Contradictions… 15
develop my understanding of the shared challenges of educational equity and

excellence in East Asia. I have to constantly ask myself; am I ‘projecting the traits
already recognised in metropolitan society’ (Japan) to fabricate a picture of East
Asia (Connell, 2007, p. 64); what has been made visible and invisible as a result of
my reliance on intellectual resource offered by Japanese scholars? I see this chapter,
therefore, as a necessarily imperfect attempt to open up space for a regional d ialogue
in East Asia.
To advance the agenda for East Asian dialogue further, this chapter not only
identifies the common educational inequality challenges faced by the select East
Asian countries and cities. But drawing on Kuan-Hsing Chen’s (2010) work on
‘Asia as method’, it also raises questions about the way in which education scholars
and policy makers in the region have related to each other in developing knowledge
about and for education policy concerns. I argue that this ‘knowledge question’ has
considerable implications for the extent to which East Asian countries and economies
can achieve the intricate balance of educational excellence and equity.
The End of East Asian Model (J-Model)
Historically, the governments in East Asian countries have relied on the highly
centralised and standardised provision of education or what Sugimura in her Chap. 6
on minority education in Japan refers to, after Manabu Sato, ‘the Japanese model’
or the J-Model (Cummings, 1997). William K. Cummings (1997) argues that the
Japanese model of human resource development has been taken up by other East
Asian societies, including Taiwan, Korea, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and
Indonesia. In particular, the universal provision of primary and early secondary
education was given the utmost importance in the overall human resource

development strategies. It was viewed as the key strategy to address the educational
quality and equality issues. Instead of recognising individual disadvantages on the
basis of students’ sociocultural backgrounds (social class, ethnicity, language and
‘race’) and allocating resources to compensate for them, the governments focused
on universalising the quality learning environment for all through the standardised
curriculum and the egalitarian distribution of funding and teaching workforce
(Kariya, 2009), though the extent to which this has been achieved varies among East
Asian countries.
Against the backdrop of steady economic growth in the last several decades, East
Asian countries achieved more equal distribution of educational resources at the
primary and junior secondary school level than other advanced economies of the
West while at the same time maintaining the highly selective secondary and
university systems. As rightly put in Zhu and Deng’s Chap. 3 on Shanghai, e ducation
is ‘a selective mechanism to achieve upward social mobility’, and the role of
government is to ‘provide an open opportunity for all to compete with each other’
(pp. 11–12). Hence, the universal provision of standardised primary and early
secondary education has been the cornerstone for the logic of meritocracy as enacted
16 K. Takayama
in East Asian education, or ‘a real source of upward mobility’ (Gopinathan, 2007,

p. 66; see also Kwek, Miller and Manzon’s Chap. 7). This belief in ‘fair’ distribution
of social goods through educational competition was the powerful ideology
mobilising the mass population towards intense educational competitions and as a
result enabling the East Asian developmentalist states to closely align education and
training systems with state-determined economic policies.
Central to the East Asian model of meritocracy is the prevalent use of high-stake
standardised testing as a means for a ‘fair’ distribution of social and material rewards
on the basis of students’ ‘merit’. In this model, the principle of meritocracy was
structured around the standardised assessments of a set of largely decontextualised
knowledge and skills. This was viewed as the most effective way to manage the
procedural fairness; the ‘objectivity’ of academic assessment and hence the ‘fairness’
of competition were to be achieved through artificial decontextualisation of knowledge
and skills that are tested in the paper and pencil format. It was accepted as a reliable
way of assessing student ‘merits’, which are expressed in terms of how well students
acquire valued knowledge and skills (Honda, 2005; Deng & Zhao, 2014).
For sure, the tested knowledge and skills were never completely decontextualised
and indeed inherently linked with unequal power relations in larger society that
defined whose knowledge and skills were to be of most worth (Lim, 2013). However,
it is also true that students’ hard work and dedication in internalising a set of
decontextualised knowledge and skills, coupled with universal provision of

standardised education, schools’ effective teaching and equitable resource a llocation
measures, could reduce the influence of socio-economic, cultural and ‘racial’ status
on students’ academic achievement, though the extent to which this was achieved in
East Asia should not be overstated (see Chou’s Chap. 4 detailing the persistent
educational disadvantages of Aboriginal children in Taiwan; also see Lim, 2013 in
the context of Singapore and Deng & Zhao, 2014 in Shanghai).
Over the last few decades, this East Asian approach to educational quality and
equality has been under scrutiny, partly due to the increasing number of children
who are ‘othered’ in terms of language, ethnicity and ability/disability differences.
These children and their parents demand their individual differences be recognised
and adequately catered for in education systems. Such children’s rights-based
discourse has been infused with the quasi-market discourse of education reform
whereby parents and children demand their specific interests and preferences to be
met. This often results in the demands for curricular relevance to children’s
individual interests and needs, which are often translated into individualised
instructions, parental choice (e.g. school choice) and increased autonomy of
teachers and schools.
Hence, standardisation and centralisation, which had been the twin pillars of
East Asian educational excellence and equity, are now increasingly questioned,
viewed to have suppressed children’s individual differences, creativity and joy of
learning. As Poon-Mcbrayer states in her Chap. 5 on Hong Kong, the accepted norm
today is that ‘every child should have an individualised educational programme
rather than a single curriculum and performance standard’ (p. 14). The ongoing
reforms in these East Asian countries and cities, driven by the child-centric,
c onstructivist theory of teaching and learning (see Zhu and Deng’s Chap. 3 on
Shanghai and Chou’s Chap. 4 on Taiwan) and the systemic shift towards more
flexibility, differentiation and parental choice (Poon-Mcbrayer on Hong Kong;
Kwek, Miller and Manzon on Singapore; also Gopinathan, 2007), all reflect the
governments’ attempt to ‘relieve the stress of intense entrance exam preparation and
allow students to pursue their own interests’ (see Chou’s Chap. 4, p. 51).
Underpinning this policy shift is the view that children in East Asian countries are
suffering from low self-esteem, low motivation for learning, lack of creativity,
problem-solving skills and entrepreneurship as a result of the competitive and
standardised education systems, and they are inadequately prepared for the reality
of knowledge-based economy. Out of such concerns has emerged, for instance, the
‘bridges and ladders’ model of Singapore’s education system, which is designed ‘to
cater to the varied strengths and needs of students, and provide[s] more options for
students at different stages of education’ (Kwek, Miller and Manzon’s Chap. 7, p. 94).
New Inequality Challenges in East Asia
The question of educational inequalities in East Asia must be examined in the context
of this larger systemic shift away from centralisation and standardisation towards
differentiation and individualisation. Indeed, studies have shown that this change
could have serious, unintended equity consequences. Based on his secondary
analysis of PISA and TIMSS data sets, Hyunjoon Park (2013), for instance, suggests
that the recent curricular and systemic reforms in Korea and Japan, characterised by
the shift away from standardisation towards differentiation and individualisation,
might have caused the widening disparities in educational outcomes. Though his
discussion fails to take into consideration the effect of increasing social class divide,
witnessed in these two countries during the last two decades, on socio-economic
educational achievement gap, his call to preserve the ‘core elements of standardised
education’ (p. 129), which he sees as fundamental to educational success of Korea
and Japan, seems warranted. Park warns that the ongoing education reform in these
two countries, which essentially undermines the core elements of standardised
education systems, might be driven by ‘the untested and oversimplified criticisms
against the standardised system’ (p. 6).
Though to what extent the reform initiatives described in the five chapters are
driven by ‘the untested and oversimplified criticisms against the standardised
system’ remains to be carefully examined, the remarkable similarity of the reform
measures undertaken in these countries to those in Korea and Japan suggests a
degree of applicability of his warning. Most of the chapters in this section seem to
leave unchallenged the ongoing curricular and systemic reforms in the East Asian
countries and the possible challenges they might create in addressing educational
inequality issues. Kwek, Miller and Manzon’s Chap. 7 on Singapore is the only
exception, as it points to the paradoxical effect on equity of Singapore’s d ifferentiated
‘bridges and ladders’ model.
18 K. Takayama
What needs to be explored in East Asian education are possible contradictions

generated in the pursuit of excellence and equity in the traditionally standardised
education systems. We need to ask which elements of standardised education
systems contribute to overall educational excellence and equity and which are more
likely to produce suppressive effects of standardisation on teachers and children and
thus are in need of more differentiation and flexibility. This careful discerning effort
is important because standardised education systems can have contradictory effects.
While standardised systems can make quality education universally available to all
students and thus help narrow the achievement gap, it can also erode teachers’
professional autonomy and schools’ initiatives and hinder the provision of education
that better meets specific needs of students and communities. Vice versa, while
highly decentralised and diversified systems are likely to better cater to different
student needs and interests, they could leave too much to local capacities of
municipalities, schools and individual teachers, which could result in more

differentiated quality of education provision, widening educational outcomes. This
concern is particularly relevant today in East Asian countries and cities where
economic disparities have been on steady increase for the last few decades.
Furthermore, the increasing curricular shift towards the generic capability
model—as in PISA’s ‘key competencies’ or the so-called twenty-first-century skills
and knowledge—in these East Asian countries could present a new kind of inequality
challenges in education (see Takayama, 2013, for more details). Leading Japanese
sociologist of education Yuki Honda (2005), noting the particular features of
‘generic capabilities’ and ‘key competencies’, characterises them as ‘postmodern
capacity’ (posuto kindaigata nouryoku): innovation, reflection, creativity,
self-motivation and communication and problem-solving skills. Honda contrasts
‘postmodern capacity’ with what she calls ‘modern-type ability’ (kindai gata
nouryoku): the efficient acquisition and demonstration of prescribed knowledge and
skills in an artificial, as opposed to real-life, circumstance. This shift in the nature of
what children are to develop/what schools are to assess marks a radical change in
the way meritocracy—one of the key organising principles of modern education
systems—is structured in East Asian education systems, according to Honda (2005).
As discussed earlier, under the modern conception of academic ability, the
principle of meritocracy was structured around the standardised assessments of a set
of prescribed knowledge and skills. The procedural fairness was maintained by
assessing students’ ‘merits’ on the basis of their acquisition of artificially
decontextualised knowledge and skills, hence rendering standardised testing

‘objective’. By contrast, the imbedding of the postmodern conception of capacity
such as key competencies in East Asian education systems can result in what Honda
(2005) calls ‘hyper meritocracy’, ‘a more purified and intensified’ and ‘more
predatory form of meritocracy’ (pp. 20–21). In the emerging late modern education
system, the principle of meritocracy is increasingly structured around the ‘functional
potentials’ of individuals; students are to be assessed in terms of their ability to
accomplish a given task in a concrete, real-life circumstance or what she calls
‘individual merit in the truer sense of the term’ (p. 21).
Honda (2005) further argues that the late modern education system no longer
preserves the procedural fairness of the modern education system. This is because
the assessment of students’ attitudes, motivations, values and dispositions is
considerably more implicit and subjective; it is likely that teachers’ assessment of
students’ use of these ‘psychosocial resources’ is influenced by the teacher–student
‘fit’ in their socio-economic-based ways of knowing and being, ‘habitus’ (Bourdieu,
1984). Furthermore, the opportunity to acquire the desired values, attitudes and
motivations can never be equally distributed to all students because those psychosocial
resources are ‘tacitly acquired in informal interactions’ in families and communities
(Bernstein, 2000, p. 42) and because they are more likely to be developed through the
‘quality’ parent–child interactions and communications in families of higher
socio-economic background (Bernstein, 2000, 2003; Honda, 2005; Lim, 2013).
This creates a serious policy predicament for East Asian governments striving to
achieve educational equity and excellence. For the extensive state intervention into
the private domain of children’s family and community life is the corollary of the
egalitarian policy intent in the late modern social context. To put it differently, as
East Asian education systems move towards the generic capability mode, it pushes
the locus of their policy intervention outside the sphere of their direct policy
influence—schools—into communities and families, the domains over which the
liberal-democratic states have traditionally exercised limited policy influence. As
Leonel Lim (2013) rightly points out, the similar change in the Singaporean e ducation
system will require lower social class parents to ‘be re-socialised or to be kept out of
the way’ (p. 11). Hence, it could ‘add to the educational advantages already afforded
to advantaged groups in society, leaving instead working-class families further
removed from the instrumental and moral orders of the school’ (Lim, 2013, p. 11).
To address this emerging equity challenge, the East Asian governments might
extend their locus of policy intervention to children’s family and community life.
Such an invasive policy initiative has been introduced in Japan, for instance, where
the national assessment, which collects extensive data on children’s home and
community life in addition to their academic performance data, has been used as a
lever to direct attention to the quality of children’s life outside schools (Takayama,
2013). The Japanese case epitomises the paradoxical consequence of equity-focused
policy intervention in the era of hyper meritocracy; what used to be considered
beyond state policy influence is now increasingly brought under the state regulatory
and monitoring gazes, and schools are mobilised to operationalise them. The
efficacy of this invasive intervention into family and community relations is highly
questionable, especially when socio-economic disparity is widening in East Asian
countries and economies. The narrow focus on improving family and community
relations without due regard to the structural causes of inequality is likely to p rivatise
the latter and naturalise the demonisation of poor families and communities.
However, if East Asian states still persist—despite these policy predicaments it
necessarily entails—with the notion of generic capabilities as the key strategy to
prepare children for emerging knowledge economy, then deeper understanding of
this new idea might help them devise alternative approaches to containing its
inequitable consequences. Little recognised by East Asian policy actors about
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“I’m sorry to keep my fellow citizens waiting,” Carroll replied. “Of
course there are always Miss Mills’s wishes to consider.”
“Oh, well, there is that! Bruce, with his known affection for the arts,
may prefer the lovely Millicent. He’s not worth troubling about as a
competitor. Well, I must skip back to Maybelle! Wait till I get
downstairs before you begin knocking me!”
“Don’t be in a rush,” said Bruce.
“Oh, I’ll go now!” said Bud as he lounged out. “I want you to have
plenty of time to skin me properly!”
“Bud’s a mighty good fellow,” said Carroll when they were alone. “He
and Maybelle give a real tang to our social affairs. I suppose we
have Bud to thank for bringing you here.”
“Oh, not altogether!” Bruce replied. “I was alone in the world and my
home town hadn’t much to offer an architect.”
“Your profession does need room. I was born right here and expect
to be buried among my ancestors. Let me see—did I hear that you’re
from the East?”
The question on its face was courteously perfunctory; Mills would
certainly not have done anything so clumsy, Bruce reflected, as to
send Carroll to probe into his history.
“I’m an Ohioan—born in Laconia,” he replied.
“Not really! I have an uncle and some cousins there. Just today we
had a letter at the office from Laconia, an inquiry about a snarl in the
title to some property. Mr. Mills’s father—of the same name—once
had some interests there—a stave factory, I think it was. Long before
your day, of course. He bought some land near the plant—the
Millses have always gone in strong for real estate—thinking he might
need it if the business developed. Mr. Mills was there for a while as a
young man. Suppose he didn’t like the business, and his father sold
out. I was there a year ago visiting my relations and I met some
Bruces—Miss Carolyn Bruce—awfully jolly girl—related to you?”
“My cousin. Bruce was my mother’s name.”
“The old saying about the smallness of the world! Splendid girl—not
married yet?”
“Not when I heard from her last week.”
“We might drive over there sometime next spring and see her.”
“Fine. Carolyn was always a great pal of mine. Laconia’s a sociable
town. Everybody knows everybody else; it’s like a big family. We
can’t laugh so gaily at the small towns; they’ve got a lot that’s mighty
fine. I sometimes think our social and political regeneration has got
to begin with the small units.”
“I say that sometimes to Mr. Mills,” Carroll continued. “But he’s of the
old ultra-conservative school; a pessimist as to the future, or
pretends to be. He really sees most things pretty straight. But men of
his sort hate the idea of change. They prefer things as they are.”
“I think we all want the changes to come slowly—gradual evolution
socially and politically,” Bruce ventured. “That’s the only safe way.
The great business of the world is to find happiness—get rid of
misery and violence and hatred. I’m for everything that moves
toward that end.”
“I’m with you there,” Carroll replied quickly.
Bruce’s liking for Carroll increased. Mills’s secretary was not only an
agreeable companion but he expressed views on many questions
that showed knowledge and sound reasoning. He referred to Mills
now and then, always with respect but never with any trace of
subserviency. Bruce, now that his fear had passed, was deriving a
degree of courage merely from talking with Carroll. Carroll, in daily
contact with Mills, evidently was not afraid of him. And what had he,
Bruce Storrs, to fear from Franklin Mills? There could not have been
any scandal about Mills’s affair with his mother or she herself would
probably have mentioned it; or more likely she would never have told
him her story. Carroll’s visit was reassuring every way that Bruce
considered it.
“I got a glimpse of you at Deer Trail the other day,” Carroll was
saying. “You were there about the superintendent’s house—Mr. Mills
spoke of you afterward—said you seemed to know your business.
He’s not so hard to please as many people think—only”—Carroll
smiled—“it’s always safer to do things his way.”
“I imagine it is!” Bruce assented.
Carroll remained until the clock on the mantel chimed twelve.
“I hope you’ve enjoyed this as much as I have!” he said. “If there’s
anything I can do for you, give me a ring. Mr. Mills is a regular client
of Freeman’s. We’ll doubtless meet in a business way from time to
time.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
I
On a Sunday afternoon a fortnight later Bruce, having been reproved
by Dale Freeman for his recent neglect of her, drove to the
architect’s house. He had hoped to see Millicent there and was
disappointed not to find her.
“You expected to see someone in particular!” said Dale. “I can tell by
the roving look in your eye.”
“I was merely resenting the presence of these other people. My eyes
are for you alone!”
“What a satisfactory boy you are! But it was Millicent, wasn’t it?”
“Lady, lady! You’re positively psychic! Do you also tell fortunes?”
“It’s easy to tell yours! I see a beautiful blonde in your life! Sorry I
can’t produce Millie today. She’s not crazy about my Sunday parties;
she hates a crowd. I must arrange something small for you two. You
must meet that girl who just came in alone—the one in the
enchanting black gown. She’s a Miss Abrams, a Jewess, very
cultivated—lovely voice.”
The rooms were soon crowded. Bruce was still talking to Miss
Abrams when he caught sight of Shepherd and Constance Mills,
who had drifted in with Fred Thomas. A young man with a flowing tie
and melancholy dark eyes claimed Miss Abrams’s attention and
Bruce turned to find Shepherd at his elbow.
“Just the man I wanted to see!” Shepherd exclaimed. “Let’s find a
place where we can talk.”
“Not so easy to find!” said Bruce. However, he led the way to
Freeman’s den, which had not been invaded, wondering what
Franklin Mills’s son could have to say to him.
“Do pardon me for cornering you this way,” Shepherd began. “I
looked for you several days at the club, but you didn’t show up.”
“I’ve been too busy to go up there for luncheon,” Bruce replied. “You
could always get track of me at the office.”
“Yes, but this was—is—rather confidential for the present.”
Shepherd, clasping and unclasping his hands in an attempt to gain
composure, now bent forward in his chair and addressed Bruce with
a businesslike air. “What I want to talk to you about is that clubhouse
for our workmen. You know I mentioned it some time ago?”
“Yes; I remember,” Bruce replied, surprised that Shepherd still had
the matter on his mind.
“It’s troubled me a good deal,” said Shepherd, with the earnestness
that always increased his stammering. “I’ve felt that there’s a duty—a
real duty and an opportunity there. You know how it is when you get
a thing in your head you can’t get rid of—can’t argue yourself out
of?”
“Those perplexities are annoying. I’d assumed that you’d given the
thing up.”
“Well, I thought I had! But I’m determined now to go on. There’s a
piece of land I can get that’s just the thing. That neighborhood is so
isolated—the people have no amusements unless they come to
town. I’d like to go ahead so they can have some use of the house
this winter.”
Bruce nodded his sympathy with the idea.
“Now since I talked with you I’ve found some pictures of such
houses. I’ve got ’em here.” He drew from his pocket some pages
torn from magazines. “I think we might spend a little more money
than I thought at first would be available. We might go thirty
thousand to get about what’s in this house I’ve marked with a pencil.”
Bruce scrutinized the pictures and glanced over the explanatory text.
“The idea seems to be well worked out. There are many such
clubhouses scattered over the country. You’d want the reading room
and the play room for children and all those features?”
“Yes; and I like the idea of a comfortable sitting-room where the
women can gather and do their sewing and that sort of thing. And I’d
like you to do this for me—begin getting up the plans right away.”
Shepherd’s tone was eager; his eyes were bright with excitement.
“But, Mr. Mills, I can hardly do that! I’m really only a subordinate in
Mr. Freeman’s office. It would be hardly square for me to take the
commission—at least not without his consent.”
Shepherd, who had not thought of this, frowned in his perplexity.
Since his talk with Constance he had been anxious to get the work
started before his father heard of it; and he had been hoping to run
into Bruce somewhere to avoid visiting Freeman’s office. He felt that
if he had an architect who sympathized with the idea everything
would be simplified. His father and Freeman met frequently, and
Freeman, blunt and direct, was not a man who would connive at the
construction of a building, in which presumably Franklin Mills was
interested, without Mills’s knowledge.
His sensitive face so clearly indicated his disappointment that Bruce,
not knowing what lay behind this unexpected revival of the
clubhouse plan, said, with every wish to be kind:
“Very likely Mr. Freeman would be glad to let me do the work—but I’d
rather you asked him. I’d hate to have him think I was going behind
his back to take a job. You can understand how I’d feel about it.”
“I hadn’t thought of that at all!” said Shepherd sincerely. “And of
course I respect your feeling.” Then with a little toss of the head and
a gesture that expressed his desire to be entirely frank, he added:
“You understand I’m doing this on my own hook. I think I told you my
father thought it unwise for the battery company to do it. But I’m
going ahead on my own responsibility—with my own money.”
“I see,” said Bruce. “It’s fine of you to want to do it.”
“I’ve got to do it!” said Shepherd, slapping his hand on his knee.
“And of course my father and the company being out of it, it’s no
one’s concern but my own!”
The door was open. Connie Mills’s laugh for a moment rose above
the blur of talk in the adjoining rooms. Shepherd’s head lifted and his
lips tightened as though he gained confidence from his wife’s
propinquity. Mrs. Freeman appeared at the door, demanding to know
if they wanted tea, and noting their absorption withdrew without
waiting for an answer.
It was clear enough that Shepherd meant to put the scheme through
without his father’s consent, even in defiance of his wishes. The idea
had become an obsession with the young man; but his sincere wish
to promote the comfort and happiness of his employees spoke for so
kind and generous a nature that Bruce shrank from wounding him.
Seeing Bruce hesitate, Shepherd began to explain the sale of his
trust stock to obtain the money, which only increased Bruce’s
determination to have nothing to do with the matter.
“Why don’t you take it up with Mr. Carroll?” Bruce suggested. “He
might win your father over to your side.”
“Oh, I couldn’t do that! Carroll, you know, is bound to take father’s
view of things. Father will be all right about it when it’s all done. Of
course after the work starts he’ll know, so it won’t be a secret long.
I’m going ahead as a little joke on him. I think he’ll be tickled to know
I’ve got so much initiative!”
He laughed in his quick, eager way, hoping that he had made this
convincing. Bruce, from his observation of Franklin Mills, was not so
sanguine as to the outcome. Mills would undoubtedly be very angry.
On the face of it he would have a right to be. And one instinctively
felt like shielding Shepherd Mills from his own folly.
“If you really want my advice,” said Bruce after a moment’s
deliberation, “I’d take a little more time to this. Before you could get
your plans we’ll be having rough weather. I’d wait till spring, when
you can develop your grounds and complete the whole thing at once.
And it would be just as well to look around a bit—visit other cities
and get the newest ideas.”
“You think that? I supposed there’d be time to get the foundations in
if I started right away.”
“I wouldn’t risk it; in fact I think it would be a serious mistake.”
“Well, you are probably right,” assented Shepherd, though
reluctantly, and there was a plaintive note in his voice. “Thanks ever
so much. I guess I’ll take your advice. I’ll let it go till spring.”
“Damon and Pythias couldn’t look more brotherly!” Constance Mills
stood at the doorway viewing them with her languid smile. “It peeves
me a good deal, Mr. Storrs, that you prefer my husband’s society to
mine.”
“This is business, Connie,” Shepherd said. “We’ve just finished.”
“Let’s say the party is just beginning,” said Bruce. “I was just coming
out to look you up.”
“I can’t believe it! But Leila just telephoned for us to come out to
Deer Trail and bring any of Dale’s crowd who look amusing. That
includes you, of course, Mr. Storrs. Everyone’s gone but Helen
Torrence and Fred Thomas and Arthur Carroll. Mr. Mills is at the
farm; it’s a fad of his to have Sunday supper in the country. Leila
hates it and sent out an S. O. S., so we can’t desert her. No, Mr.
Storrs, you can’t duck! Millicent is there—that may add to the
attractions!”
This with a meaningful glance at Bruce prompted him to say that
Miss Harden’s presence hardly diminished the attractions of the
farm. There was real comedy in his inability to extricate himself from
the net in which he constantly found himself enmeshed with the
members of the house of Mills.
In discussing who had a car and who hadn’t, Freeman said his
machine was working badly, to which Shepherd replied that there
was plenty of room in his limousine for the Freemans and any others
who were carless.
“Mr. Storrs will want to take his car,” said Constance. “He oughtn’t
really to drive out alone——”
“Not alone, certainly not!” Bruce replied. “I shall be honored if you will
drive with me!”
II
“You didn’t mind?” asked Constance when Bruce got his car under
way.
“You mean do I mind driving you out? Please don’t make me say
how great the pleasure is!”
“You’re poking fun at me; you always do!”
“Never! Why, if I followed my inclinations I’d come trotting up to your
house every day. But it wouldn’t do. You know that!”
“But I wouldn’t want you to do that—not unless you——”
There was a bridge to cross and the pressure of traffic at the
moment called for care in negotiating it.
“What were you saying?” he asked as they turned off the brilliantly
lighted boulevard. The town lay behind and they moved through
open country.
“You know,” she said, “I gave you the sign that I wanted to be
friends. I had a feeling you knew I needed——”
“What?” he demanded, curious as to the development of her technic.
“Oh, just a little attention! I’ve tried in every way to tell you that I’m
horribly lonely.”
“But you oughtn’t to be!” he said, vaguely conscious that they were
repeating themselves.
“Oh, I know what you think! You think I ought to be very content and
happy. But happiness isn’t so easy! We don’t get it just by wishing.”
“I suppose it’s the hardest thing in the world to find,” he assented.
It was now quite dark and the stars hung brilliant in the cloudless
heavens. In her fur coat, with a smart toque to match, Constance
had not before seemed so beguiling. His meeting with her in the
lonely road with George Whitford and her evident wish not to be
seen that day by Franklin Mills or the members of his riding party
had rather shaken his first assumption that she could be classified as
a harmless flirt. Tonight he didn’t care particularly. If Franklin Mills’s
daughter-in-law wanted to flirt with him he was ready to meet her
halfway.
“It’s strange, but you know I’m not a bit afraid of you. And the other
evening when the rest of us couldn’t do a thing with Leila she chose
you to take her home. You have a way of inspiring confidence. Shep
picks you out, when he hardly knows you, for confidential talks. I’ve
been trying to analyze your—fascinations.”
“Oh, come now! Your husband thought I might help him in a small
perplexity—purely professional. Nothing to that! And your young
sister-in-law was cross at the rest of you that day at Mrs. Torrence’s
and out of pique chose me to take her home.”
“But I trust you!”
“Maybe you shouldn’t!”
“Well, that afternoon you caught me out here with Mr. Whitford I
knew you wouldn’t tell on me. George was a trifle nervous about it. I
told him you were the soul of discretion.”
“But—I didn’t see you! I didn’t see you at all! I’m blind in both eyes
and I can be deaf and dumb when necessary!”
“Oh, I knew you wouldn’t rush over town telling on me! It’s really not
that! It’s because I knew you wouldn’t that I’m wondering what—what
—it is that makes even your acquaintances feel that they can rely on
you. You know you’re quite a wonderful person. Leila and Millicent
were talking about you only yesterday. Not schoolgirl twaddle, but
real appreciation!”
“That’s consoling! I’m glad of their good opinion. But you—what did
you say?”
“Oh, I said I thought you were disagreeable and conceited and
generally unpleasant!” She turned toward him with her indolent
laugh. “You know I wouldn’t say anything unkind of you.” This in so
low a tone that it was necessary for him to bend his head to hear. His
cheek touched the furry edge of her hat thrillingly.
“It seems strange, our being together this way,” she said. “I wish we
hadn’t a destination. I’d like to go right on—and on——”
“That would be all right as long as the gas held out!”
“You refuse to take me seriously!”
“I seem doomed to say the wrong thing to you! You’ll have to teach
me how to act and what to say.”
“But I’d rather be the pupil! There are many things you could teach
me!”
“Such as——”
“There’s always love!” she replied softly, lingering upon the word;
and again it was necessary to bend down to hear. She lifted her
face; he felt rather than saw her eyes meeting his. Her breath, for a
fleeting instant on his cheek, caused him to give hurried
consideration to the ancient question whether a woman who is
willing should be kissed or whether delicate ethical questions should
outweigh the desirability of the kiss prospective. He kissed her—first
tentatively on the cheek and then more ardently on the lips. She
made no protest; he offered no apology. Both were silent for some
time. When she spoke it was to say, with serene irrelevance:
“How smoothly your car runs! It increases my respect for the
Plantagenet.”
“Oh, it’s very satisfactory; some of Bud’s claims for it are really true!”
Bruce was relieved; but he was equally perplexed. It was an
ungallant assumption that any man might, in like circumstances, kiss
Constance Mills. On the other hand it eased his conscience to find
that she evidently thought so little of it. She had been quite willing to
be kissed.... She was a puzzling person, this young woman.
III
The Freemans and the others who had started with them had taken
short cuts and were already at the house. They passed through an
entry hall into a big square living-room. It was a fit residence for the
owner of the encompassing acres and Bruce felt the presence of
Franklin Mills before he saw him. This was the kind of thing Mills
would like. The house was in keeping with the fertile land, the prize
herds, the high-bred horses with which he amused himself.
Mills welcomed the newcomers with a bluff heartiness, as though
consciously or unconsciously he adopted a different tone in the
country and wished to appear the unobtrusive but hospitable lord of
the manor. Leila joined him as he talked a moment to Constance and
Bruce.
“You see you can’t dodge me! Awfully glad you came. Millie’s here
somewhere and I think old Bud Henderson will drop in later.”
“There’ll be supper pretty soon,” said Mills. “We’re just waiting for
everybody to get here. I think you know everyone. It’s a pleasure to
see you here, Mr. Storrs. Please make yourself at home. Constance,
see that Mr. Storrs has a cocktail.”
The members of the company gathered about the fire began twitting
Constance and Bruce about the length of time it had taken them to
drive out. They demanded to know what Connie had talked to him
about. He answered them in kind, appealing to Constance to confirm
his assertion that they had taken the most expeditious route. They
had discussed the political conditions in Poland, he declared.
“Come with me,” said Mrs. Torrence, drawing him away. “I want to
talk to you! I’m sorry things happened as they did on your first call. I
don’t want you to get the idea that my house is a place where I pull
nothing but rough parties! Please think better of me than that!”
“Heavens, woman! Such a thought never entered my head! I’ve been
thinking seriously of coming back! I need some more of your spiritual
uplift!”
“Good! There’s more of that Bourbon! But I wanted to say that I was
sorry Leila came to my house as she did. That is a problem—not a
serious problem, but the child needs a little curbing. She has one
good friend—Millicent Harden—that tall, lovely girl standing over
there. Do you know Millie?”
“Oh, yes; I’ve even played golf with her!”
“My! You really have an eye! Well, you might come to call on me! I’m
a trifle old to be a good playmate for you; but you might take me on
as a sort of aunt—not too old to be unsympathetic with youth. When
nothing better offers, look me up!”
“I’d been thinking seriously of falling in love with you! Nothing is
holding me back but my natural diffidence!”
She raised her hand warningly.
“Go no further! I can see that you’ve been well trained. But it isn’t
necessary to jolly me. I’m not half the fool I look. My self-respect
didn’t want you to get the idea that I’m a wild woman. I was worried
that evening about Leila—she has a heart of gold, but I don’t dare
take any special interest in her for the absurd reason—what do you
think?—I’ve been suspected of having designs on—our host!”
She laughed merrily. Her mirth was of the infectious sort; Bruce
laughed with her; one had to, even when the provocation was slight.
“One doesn’t talk of one’s host,” she said with a deep sigh, “but I was
talked about enough when I married Mr. Torrence; I’ll never try it
again. But why am I taking you into my confidence? Merely that I
want you to know my house isn’t a booze shop all the time! I’m going
to keep my eye on you. If I see you wandering too close to the rifle
pits, I’ll warn you! May I?”
“Of course you may!” said Bruce, conscious of an honest friendliness
in this proffer, but not at once finding words to express his
appreciation. “Tell me, do I look as though I might be gassed?”
“I don’t know whether you’re susceptible or not. But I like you! I’m
going to prove it by doing you a favor. Come with me!”
The supper was a buffet affair and the butler was distributing plates
and napkins. At one side of the room Franklin Mills was talking to
Millicent. Bruce had glanced at them occasionally, thinking with a
twinge how young Mills looked tonight, noting how easily he seemed
to be holding the girl’s interest, not as a man much older but as a
contemporary. And he had everything to offer—his unassailable
social position and the wealth to support it. As he crossed the room
beside Mrs. Torrence, accommodating his long stride to her pattering
step, he saw a frown write itself fleetingly on Mills’s brow. Millicent—
in a soft blue Jersey sport dress, with a felt hat of the same shade
adorned with a brilliant pheasant’s wing—kept her eyes upon Mills
until he had finished something he was saying.
“What’s it all about?” demanded Mrs. Torrence, laying her hand upon
Millicent’s arm. “We knew you two were talking of something
confidential and important; that’s why we’re interrupting you.”
“Oh, we’re discussing the horrors of Sunday—and whether it should
be abolished!” said Millicent. “And Mr. Mills won’t be serious!”
“Sunday’s always a hard day,” remarked Mrs. Torrence. “I’m always
worn out trying to decide whether to go to church or stay at home.”
“And today?” asked Mills.
“I went! The sermon was most disagreeable. Doctor Lindley told us
we all know our duty to God and can’t pretend that we don’t!”
“Is that what he preached?” asked Mills with a vague smile. “What do
you think of the proposition?”
“The man’s right! But it doesn’t make me any happier to know it,”
Mrs. Torrence replied. “Next Sunday I’ll stay in bed.”
She took Mills away for the avowed purpose of asking his private
counsel in spiritual matters.
“Isn’t she nice?” said Millicent.
“I’m bound to think so; she arranged this for me!”
“Did she?” asked Millicent with feigned innocence. “She did it neatly!”
“She promised to be my friend and then proved it,” Bruce said, and
then added, “I’m not so sure our host quite liked being taken away.”
“How foolish of you! He can always see me!” she replied indifferently.
“Don’t scorn your food! It is of an exceeding goodness. Bring me up
to date a little about yourself. Any more dark days?”
“No-o-o.”
She laughed at the prolongation of his denial.
“Come now! I’m beginning to think I’m of no use to you!”
“Right now I’m as happy as a little lark!” he declared.
She had begun to suspect that he had known unhappiness. A love
affair perhaps. Or it might have been the war that had taken
something of the buoyancy of youth out of him. She was happy in
the thought that she was able to help him. He was particularly
responsive to a kind of humor she herself enjoyed, and they vied
with each other in whimsical ridicule of the cubists in art and the
symbolists in literature.
... The guests were redistributing themselves and she suggested that
he single out Leila for a little attention.
“Don’t have prejudices! There’s nothing in that,” she said.
“I haven’t a prejudice against Miss Mills!”
“Not so formal! I’ll give you permission to call her Leila! She’ll like it!”
“But you haven’t told me I might call you——”
“Millicent let it be!”
“Well, little one, how’s your behavior!” demanded Leila when Bruce
found her.
“Bad!” Bruce replied in her own key.
“My example, I suppose. I’ve heard that I’m a bad influence in the
community. Let’s sit. You and I have got to have an understanding
some day; why not now?”
“All right, but don’t get too deep—Leila!”
“That’s good! I didn’t suppose you knew my name. Millie’s put you up
to that.”
“She did. I hope you like it.”
“Intensely! Are you falling in love with Millie?”
“That’s a secret. If I said I was, what would you say?”
“Atta boy! But—I don’t think she is in love with you.”
“Your penetration does you credit! I had thought of her as perishing
for the hour when I would again dawn upon her sight!”
“You’re going good! Really, though, she admits that she likes you
ever so much.”
“Is that the reason why you think she doesn’t love me?”
“Of course! I’m in love myself. I’m simply wild about Freddy Thomas!
But I’d die before I’d admit the awful fact to my dearest friend! That’s
love!”
“How about your Freddy? Is he aware of your infatuation?”
“That’s the wonderful part. You see, it’s a secret. No one knows it but
just Freddy and me!”
“Oh, I see! You pretend to hate Freddy but really you love him?”
“You’re a thinker! What would you say if I told you I had a cute little
flask upstairs and asked you to meet me in the pantry and have a
little nip just to celebrate this event? I had only one cocktail; my
dearest Dada saw to that!”
“I’d meet you in the pantry and confiscate the flask!”
She regarded him fixedly for a moment, and her tone and manner
changed abruptly.
“You know about life, people, things; I know you do! It’s in your eyes,
and I’d know it if Millie hadn’t said so. Do you really think it is
disgraceful for me to get—well, soused—as you’ve seen me several
times? Dada and my aunts lecture me to death—and I hate it—but,
well—what do you think?”
Her gravity demanded kindness. He felt infinitely older; she seemed
very like a child tonight—an impulsive, friendly child.
“I think I’d cut it out. There’s no good in it—for you or anyone else.”
“I’ll consider that,” she replied slowly; then suddenly restless, she
suggested that they go into the long enclosed veranda that
connected the house with the conservatories.
As they walked back and forth—Leila in frivolous humor now—Bruce
caught a glimpse of her father and Millicent just inside the
conservatory door. They were talking earnestly. Evidently they had
paused to conclude some matter they had been discussing before
returning to the house. Millicent held three roses in her hand and
lifted them occasionally to her face.
IV
Still beset by uncertainties as to whether he would increase his
chances of happiness by marrying again, Mills was wondering just
how a man of his years could initiate a courtship with a girl of
Millicent Harden’s age. It must be managed in such a way as to
preserve his dignity—that must be preserved at all hazards. They
had been walking through the conservatory aisles inspecting his
roses, which were cultivated by an expert whose salary was a large
item of the farm budget. Millicent was asking questions about the
development of new floral types and he was answering
painstakingly, pleased by her interest.
“It’s unfortunate that the human species can’t be improved as easily.
At least we don’t see our way to improving it,” he remarked.
He had never thought her so beautiful as now; her charm was rather
enhanced by her informal dress. It would be quite possible for him to
love her, love her even with a young man’s ardor.
“Oh, patience, sir!” she smiled. “Evolution is still going on.”
“Or going back! There’s our old quarrel!” he laughed. “We always
seem to get into it. But your idea that we’re not creatures of chance
—that there’s some unseen power back of everything we call life—
that’s too much for me. I can understand Darwin—but you!”
“Honestly, now, are you perfectly satisfied to go on thinking we’re all
creatures of chance?”
“Sometimes I am and then again I’m not!” he replied with a shrug. “I
can’t quite understand why it is that with everything we have, money
and the ability to amuse ourselves, we do at times inquire about that
Something that never shows itself or gives us a word.”
“Oh, but He does!” She held up the three perfect roses Mills had
plucked for her. “He shows Himself in all beautiful things. They’re all
trying to tell us that the Something we can’t see or touch has a great
deal to do with our lives.”
“Millie,” he said in a tone of mock despair, tapping her hand lightly,
“you’re an incorrigible mystic!”
They were interrupted by a knock on the glass door, which swung
open, disclosing Leila and Bruce.
“Mr. Storrs and I are dying of curiosity! You’ve been talking here for
ages!” cried Leila.
“Millie’s been amusing herself at my expense,” said Mills. “Mr. Storrs,
I wish you’d tell me sometime what Miss Harden means when she
reaches into the infinite and brings down——”
“Roses!” laughed Millicent.
V
His glimpse of Franklin Mills and Millicent at the conservatory door
affected Bruce disagreeably. The fact that the two had been
discussing impersonal matters did not lessen his resentment.
Millicent with Mills’s roses in her hand; Mills courteously attentive,
addressing the girl with what to Bruce was a lover-like air, had made
a picture that greatly disturbed him.
Very likely, with much this same air, with the same winning manner
and voice, Mills had wooed his mother! He saw in Mills a sinister
figure—a man who, having taken advantage of one woman, was not
to be trusted with another. The pity he had at times felt for Mills went
down before a wave of jealous anger and righteous indignation. The
man was incapable of any true appreciation of Millicent; he was
without wit or soul to penetrate to the pure depths of the girl’s nature.
“You two are always talking about things I don’t understand!” Leila
said to them; and led Bruce on through the conservatories, talking in
her inconsequential fashion.
When they returned to the house someone had begun playing old-
fashioned games—blindman’s buff, drop the handkerchief and
London Bridge. When these ceased to amuse, the rugs were cleared
away and they danced to the phonograph. Mills encouraged and
participated in all this as if anxious to show that he could be as
young as the youngest. And what occasion could be more fitting than
an evening in his handsome country house, with his children and
their friends about him!
With Millicent constantly before his eyes, entering zestfully into all
these pleasures, Bruce recovered his tranquillity. For the thousandth
time he convinced himself that he was not a weakling to suffer
specters of the past and forebodings of the future to mar his life. He
danced with Millicent; seized odd moments in which to talk to her;
tried to believe that she had a particular smile for him....
“I wonder if you’d drive me in?” asked Mrs. Torrence when the party
began to break up.
“I’d been counting on it!” said Bruce promptly.
Constance came along and waived her rights to his escort, as she
and Shepherd were taking the Freemans home.
“I believe we’re a little better acquainted than we were,” she said
meaningfully.
“It seemed to me we made a little headway,” Bruce replied.
“Come and see me soon! You never can tell when I’ll need a little
consoling.”
“That was a good party,” Mrs. Torrence began as Bruce got his car in
motion. “Mr. Mills is two or three different men. Sometimes I think he
consciously assumes a variety of rôles. He’s keen about this country
gentleman stuff—unassuming grandeur and all that! But meet him
out at dinner in town tomorrow night and you’d never think him
capable of playing drop the handkerchief! Makes you wonder just
which is the real Mills.”
“Maybe we all lead two or three existences without knowing it,”
Bruce remarked.
“We do! We do, indeed!” the little woman cheerfully agreed. “All
except me. I’m always just the same and too much of that!”
“Well, you always come up with a laugh and that helps. Please let
me into the secret.”
“My dear boy, I learned early in life to hide my tears. Nobody’s
interested in a cry-baby. And minding my own business saves a lot
of bother. I think I’ve acquired that noble trait!”
“That’s genius!” exclaimed Bruce.
“But—in your case I may not do it! I like you, you know.”
“Am I to believe that?” he asked seriously.
“I hope you’ll believe it. I offered at the beginning of the evening to
be your friend until death do us part; I’ve done some thinking since. I
do think occasionally, though you’d never guess it.”
“It’s an old trick of the world to be mistrustful of thinkers. I’ve suffered
from it myself.”
“Listen to me, young man! I’ve got my eye on you. I suggested to
Connie that it would be simpler for her to go in with Shep. I love
Connie; she’s always been nice to me. But Connie’s not just a safe
chum for you. Your fascinations might be a trifle too—too——”
“Too,” he supplied mockingly, “much for me?”

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Equity in Excellence: Experiences

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Systems Thinking for School Leaders Holistic Leadership

East Asian Pedagogies Education as Formation and

Primary Science Education in East Asia A Critical

Renegotiating Film Genres in East Asian Cinemas and

Field Based Learning in Family Life Education

Accelerate Building and Scaling High Performing

Innovative ICT Industrial Architecture in East Asia

Evaluating Collaboration Networks in Higher Education

Siao See Teng

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10092

ISSN 2211-4874 ISSN 2211-4882 (electronic)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018959841

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019

“­ resilience index.” It suggests that in high-performing countries, the percentage of

i­ntroduced to tackle inequities, in practice, generate new inequities perhaps in part

1 Equity and Excellence in East Asian High-Performing

Part I The Pursuit of Equity in Excellence in East Asia

Part II Striving for Equity in Excellence: The Singapore Experience

Siao See Teng, Maria Manzon, and Kenneth K. Poon

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019 1

Equity and Excellence

Traditionally, the notion of excellence refers to a fairly narrow definition of

Educational Equity in East Asia

Singapore: Striving for Equity in Excellence

Singapore is no stranger to attempts at levelling up students who fall behind. One

Layout of the Book

Siao See Teng’s Chap. 9, “Diversity and Equity in Singapore: Parental

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2019 13

data), hence excluding the problem of educational disadvantages faced by migrant

develop my understanding of the shared challenges of educational equity and

The End of East Asian Model (J-Model)

in East Asian education, or ‘a real source of upward mobility’ (Gopinathan, 2007,

New Inequality Challenges in East Asia

What needs to be explored in East Asian education are possible contradictions

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“ resilience index.” It suggests that in high-performing countries, the percentage of

introduced to tackle inequities, in practice, generate new inequities perhaps in part

1 Equity and Excellence in East Asian High-Performing

Part I The Pursuit of Equity in Excellence in East Asia

Part II Striving for Equity in Excellence: The Singapore Experience

Equity and Excellence

Educational Equity in East Asia

Singapore: Striving for Equity in Excellence

Layout of the Book

The End of East Asian Model (J-Model)

New Inequality Challenges in East Asia