It came as a surprise when I came across an article on how universities in the states refuse to hire their own graduates; a phenomenon I thought was exclusive to Singapore.

It is well known that there is a class distinction between universities in the states, but it seems that less than 2% of the universities hire their own graduates. In Singapore, the unspoken assumption was that intellectual inbreeding will bring about an entire campus of idiots.

Their belief is totally unfounded.

For as far as many are concerned, the campus are crawling with idiots as it is.

We got to be realistic. The output depends heavily on the input. No one has and probably no one will ever think of NUS, NTU or SMU as a value-added institutions. But I will keep my disparaging remarks on the education system to myself for the time being.

I quote the blog entry:

Schools on the lower end of the prestige scale seem to abhor their own graduates, which says a lot about what they think of their own training programs.

Universities should not be ashamed of their training or their own graduates. If you can't drink the water your own well pumps out, why serve it to your neighbors?