Chengdu News

By Sandra Davie, Education Correspondent

WHEN Zhou Tian Tian arrived from China three years ago and joined Secondary 3 at CHIJ St Nicholas, she wondered if she would ever keep up with her Singaporean classmates.

She worried especially about her command of the English language, which was of primary school standard.

Yesterday she showed what sheer hard work and determination can do. Not only did she beat all her schoolmates, she was named one of Singapore's top 25 O-level students.

The 17-year-old from Chengdu scored A1 distinctions for all her nine subjects - including English.

A dozen of the 25 star performers on the Education Ministry's list yesterday were foreigners. Nine, including Tian Tian, were from China, two from Malaysia and one from South Korea.

This is not the first time that foreign students, in particular those from China, have come up tops for a national examination. Back in 2002, The Straits Times reported that six out of 17 top Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) scorers that year were from China.

Of the 70,000 foreigners studying here, about half are estimated to be in schools, from primary level to junior college. China national students are estimated to number about 10,000.

Mr Wang Yongli, education counsellor at the Chinese Embassy, is not surprised at the sterling results of his young compatriots.

'They feel that if they can master English and make it here, they will have a secure future. So they go all out.'

He added: 'They are used to having to compete with a lot more students back home, so they are used to working very hard, long hours.'

Teachers agreed with Mr Wang that foreign students excel because of the sheer hard work they put in.

Tian Tian's English Language teacher, MrsTian Cheen Ngee, 52, can attest to it.

She said that her Singapore students would hand in the required one essay a week, whereas foreign students like Tian Tian would go the extra mile and pass up four essays.

Mrs Tian, a veteran language teacher, makes no bones about broadcasting how hard the foreigners try. She makes a life lesson out of it, telling her girls that this is a foretaste of what it will be like when they go out to work and must compete against global talent.

Such methods seem to work, and not only at her school.

Several Singapore students said yesterday that the foreigners in their class push them to try harder.

Xinmin's Glenn Foo, one of the top 25 with nine A1s, had 15 foreign students in his class of 38 and they came from China, Vietnam, Malaysia and India.

'Not only are they good but they are also very hard-working. I found myself working hard to keep up,' he said.

Xinmin Secondary's Mrs Daphne Chow, who has 15 foreign students in her class, said: 'You regularly see the local students helping the foreign students with their English and the foreign students helping the local students with their maths and physics.'

Glen, who had help in physics and maths from Vietnamese classmate Le Thu Giang, agreed. 'I am sure my A1s for physics and maths were partly due to all the help she gave me,'' he said.

Tian Tian counts among her close friends Singaporean Amelia Koh and they go out together regularly.

Now at Raffles Junior College, Tian Tian said: 'Initially I was worried, probably because no one could understand my English. But thanks to the encouragement from my classmates, I now speak English, like a Singaporean lah.'