Not that I have a problem with this (nor any chinese friends/family that I know had problem with this as far as I know of):
Malay students indeed is able to have free education fully paid for by the government (yes, this subsidy is fully govt funded), all the way up to tertiary level. https://www.mendaki.org.sg/assistance_landing/tertiary-tuition-fee-subsidy-ttfs/
( Primary & Secondary school is free for all Singaporean races.)
I personally only know (as it was a “common knowledge”) Malays received free education – but it was only after someone claimed that this is not true in the CS’ post’s comment thread that I decided to finally do the research to fact check this.
(yeah, we Chinese really dont give a damn what special privileges the Malays receives via the special status within the Singapore constitution…)
Honestly, again, I dont feel any negativity towards this. I think its a good.
Statistically speaking, the Malay community is struggling behind both Indian and Chinese in term of finance and education. I think its a good aid to keep encouraging them to uplift themselves and their families (if they happened to be of the lower SES)
In contrast, from my understanding, financial aids are only given to low income families of the chinese community : you can refer here on the CDAC website: https://www.cdac.org.sg/developing-students/tuition-programme/
There is also no additional grants and subsidies for Chinese for tertiary level education. (no aid at all) – which is inline with what I remembered when I was pondering about the tuition fee issue when I entered poly.
Neither does the Eurasian Association offers something as awesome as what MENDAKI have – only bursary – but can be awards for tertiary studies.
SINDA is slightly better than EA and CDAC, as they provides Tertiary Bursary: https://www.sinda.org.sg/education/sinda-siet21/ and on top of that SINDA have a myriad of scholarships to register/choose from.
I dont think CDAC and EA offers any race-specific scholarship.
EA’s listed scholarships are not race specific; they are those high level scholarship like the Lee Kuan Yew Scholarship, SPH’s Lim Kim San Memorial Scholarship and Singapore Olympic Foundation-Peter Lim athlete-centric scholarship. https://www.eurasians.sg/bursaries-scholarships
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So, I can officially state here (whether myth is busted or not, depends on where you stand before you read this post): Malay and Indian community does indeed get more financial help for their kids education ; with the Malays getting outsized assistance (which is related to the special status conferred via the Singapore constitution.)
But again. Its not a race thing (to me); its just what it is.
Cover Photo: MENDAKI website
