<B>By Surendra BISSOONDOYAL</B>

In 1997 Singapore had the foresight to realize that the challenges of the 21st century would be met only by developing the thinking and learning skills of its students. The Prime Minister of Singapore laid stress on the concept of ?THINKING SCHOOLS, LEARNING NATION? as central to the ?vision for a total learning environment, including students, teachers, parents, workers, companies, community organizations and government?. This was a concept, not an empty slogan. Since then a whole gamut of measures has been taken by both the public and private sectors for the realization of this concept.

The recent ? and continuing ? increases in the prices of petrol and basic foodstuffs like rice and flour have come as a shock to many governments and populations alike. It is not by wishful thinking and not doing anything about it (in spite of signals to the contrary, we kept dreaming that the European Union would continue to buy our sugar at a price well above the world market price) that we can wish away the problems that the whole world is being faced with.

Our students are not being encouraged to think whilst learning. Today children do not read stories from which they can draw useful lessons. I have in mind two particular stories which we used to read and which at least gave us food for thought. These are «La cigale et la fourmi» and ?The pied piper of Hamelin?. The first one tells the story of the industrious ant which works hard during summer to build up its reserve of food for the winter whilst the cicada spends the summer humming. When winter comes and the cicada finds itself in a tight corner to feed itself the far-sighted ant tells it «Vous chantiez tout l?été, eh bien dansez maintenant». There is an obvious moral in this story. It is not only Mauritius but the whole world that has been taken aback by its unpreparedness to deal with the steep price increases. The scientifically and technologically more advanced nations failed to develop alternate sources of energy and the poorer ones gave up their rich experience in food production to invest in more profitable ventures.

The other story is about the pied piper of Hamelin who agreed to rid the town of Hamelin of the rats with which it was infested by playing a certain tune on his pipe. All the rats followed him to the river in which they got drowned. When the mayor reneged on his word concerning the payment to be made the piper played a different tune and all the children of the town followed him and got buried. The moral of this story is that we should neither renege on our word nor follow others blindly.

Such stories develop thinking and learning skills which stand us in good stead in times of crisis. Today both the young and the not-so-young are being bombarded by advertisements that tell them that a particular product is the only ?miracle product? on the market to improve their well-being. At the same time the public audiovisual media tell us that ?tout est pour le mieux dans le meilleur des mondes possibles? whilst some of the private media give pride of place to sensationalism with lurid details, in the absence of meaningful debates and discussions.

Singapore, like Mauritius, is a small country that has practically no natural resources. It has therefore been wisely investing in its human resources, realizing that what is critical is the ability to ?fire in its students a passion for learning, instead of studying for the sake of getting good grades in their examinations?. In 1997 its Prime Minister, when launching the concept of ?thinking schools, learning nation? said: ?We must get away from the idea that it is only the people at the top who should be thinking, and the job of every one else is to do as told?. Have we got the message? We are not even sure that the people at the top are thinking. In such circumstances it would not be easy to ask others not to be blind followers.