31/08/2026
The stress of studying in Singapore is well-known and as someone who has first-hand experience, I can only agree that I didn’t enjoy learning and studying during my primary and secondary school years due to the amount of pressure put on obtaining good academic results. The Ministry of Education (MOE) has made changes in recent years to reduce the emphasis of academic results such as removing mid-year examinations (Ang, 2022), revamping the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) points system (Ministry of Education, n.d.), and how students are grouped upon their entry to secondary school (Ministry of Education, 2023). This has been aimed at attempting a cultural shift within the school systems level. However I still encounter many clients within the Singapore education system who struggle with academic pressure and feel negatively about themselves for not being good at studying.
A large part of academic pressure still stems from parental expectations where parents hope for their children to strive and perform well but this adds on pressure for their children (Quah, 2019). Additionally, it is part of the Singapore academic culture for students to attend tuition lessons to supplement their learning in school and they also participate in co-curricular activities but trying to balance these demands can contribute to overexertion and stress (Tan, 2021).
Overall, managing school stress effectively in Singapore will require changes to be made at a macro level to see larger benefits. But this does not mean we can’t make changes at a micro level to help students cope with the stress more effectively.
