70 AMOY ST: THE FORMER ANGLO-CHINESE SCHOOL

While Singapore continued to grow economically under Colonial rule, education and other facilities failed to keep pace with this progress. Prior to the twentieth century, Singaporean authorities refused to consider the provision of education as a government responsibility and didn’t provide infrastructure or funding towards this goal. While they did assist with some funding to English private schools, the Chinese were left to educate their own community, while the Malay’s prior efforts at schooling had been considered a failure, causing their access to educational institutions to restrict even further. The opportunities for education were severely limited in early Singaporean society, as the community seemed to be left to its own devices for the most part, particularly concerning schooling.

The Anglo-Chinese school was founded on the 1st March, 1886 when Bishop William F Olkham began teaching classes in English and Chinese to 13 local Chinese boys. As the pupils were sons of wealthy businessmen, the school was morally and financially supported, not only by the parents, but also the wider community. The need for formal education became evident when the number of pupils grew to 104 the following year and following the academic success of its students in the Government examinations, the school became eligible for a regular government grant.  This alone illustrates the exclusive nature of education in early Singapore. Generally, only children of wealthy businessmen were educated, and in order to receive higher levels of funding, had to prove their worth in government examinations. In many cases, education began due to Christian missionaries in Singapore, who believed that universal education would significantly improve the quality of life for the children. Drawing the funding from overseas sponsors as well as local communities meant that the groups taught were quite small which continued to be the case until the government stepped in to increase the number of places available.