The Don of the National Institute of Education, Associate Professor Jason Tan, said that there is a worrying trend in Singapore where meritocracy has turned into a "parentocracy"
He explained that despite Singapore's focus on meritocracy, there is still unfair advantage given to children from wealthy or elite backgrounds.
Even the broader admission criteria such as the Direct School Admissions program, to allow the recognition of non-academic talents, has also been taken advantage of by parents.
He said that some tuition schools even give advice on building portfolios and writing admission essays so that parents who can afford to send their kids to tuition centres still benefit the most.
The biggest problem with this, Tan said, is that it reinforces the gap between rich and poor. "So, instead of merit and a child's hard work, parents and the social capital they command now wield greater influence over their offspring's future," he pointed out.
He was speaking at an education seminar organised by the Association of Muslim Professionals (AMP) and talking on how more can be done to help the Malay-Muslim Community do better academically.
One of the factors that lead to this rich-poor divide was the streaming programs introduced in 1979. Professor Tan said that streaming had "very serious" long term societal consequences.
He explained how it caused a divide in society, creating groups of students with very different education and income levels as well as social networks.
The lower stream students have grown up and are now raising their own children, but they still lag behind the rest of society.
Professor Tan explained that in the future, we still need more programs that can directly engage with the lower-income students as sometimes, their parents may not even be aware of the various education opportunities available to their children.