Adrianna Tan (skinnylatte@hachyderm.io)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Jul-2026 09:38:50 JST

Looks like it hasn’t changed much.

https://www.reddit.com/r/singapore/comments/o0f5kw/whats_the_academic_stress_situation_here_in_sg/

They’ve changed some of the worst bits of the system, but basically we had life-defining examinations since we were 10. Yep, 10.

When you were 10, you sat for a super important series of exams. If you weren’t academically inclined at that time, you got put on a less academically intensive track. It’s supposed to be more vocational, but

Who the fuck knows what you’re doing at 10? Doing poorly here (known as the primary 4 streaming exam) also puts people into a sorting hat. I got put into an academically intensive track but people who were in ‘EM3’ basically have a near impossible path to getting into good programs later in life. At 10.

WTF

There’s a whole movie about this called I Not Stupid. It’s about the kids who are deemed not academic (and therefore worthless in our society).

It’s not surprise that this society is full of untreated mental illness (we also don’t believe mental illness exists, or if it does you’re weak for not just ignoring it).

Things are changing but very slowly