2021年经济学人 新加坡大学关闭,学生奋起反抗(2)（在线收听）

Another reason to close the college was its "financial unsustainability", says Ms Chan.

陈冯富珍表示，关闭该学院的另一个原因是其“财务无法运转”。

Yale-NUS had hoped eventually to secure as much private funding as do toptier American liberal-arts colleges, but by March had raised just a measly $320m.

耶鲁大学-新加坡国立大学曾希望获得和美国顶尖文理学院一样多的私人资助，但到3月份仅筹集了可怜的3.2亿美元。

Concern about the financial model "started the conversation" about what to do with the college, says Ms Chan.

陈冯富珍表示，对财务模式的担忧“引发了有关如何处理这所大学的讨论”。

But Pericles Lewis, the first president of Yale-NUS, who also sits on the board, notes that it had "a few years left" to achieve its fundraising targets, and could have doubled the number of students it admits.

但是耶鲁大学-新加坡国立大学的第一任校长，同时也是董事会成员的伯里克利·刘易斯指出，耶鲁大学还有“几年时间”来实现筹款目标，并且本可以将招收的学生数量增加一倍。

Some professors and students suspect there were other considerations at play.

一些教授和学生怀疑还有其他因素在起作用。

Political activism is frowned upon in Singapore, which has been ruled by the same party since 1959.

新加坡自1959年以来一直由同一个政党统治，政治激进主义在新加坡是不受欢迎的。

Yale-NUS students were more likely to express their political views and were better organised than their peers at other universities, says Cherian George, the author of a recent report on academic freedom in Singapore.

最近一份关于新加坡学术自由的报告的作者谢里安·乔治说，耶鲁-新加坡国立大学的学生比其他大学的学生更爱表达自己的政治观点，组织性也更强。

Ms Chan poohpoohs the notion that the government was keen to muzzle mouthy students. The government, she says, knew what it was signing up for when it launched the college.

然而陈女士对于“政府想要堵住多嘴学生的嘴”这一说法表示很不赞同。她说，政府在创办这所大学的时候就知道自己要做什么。

At the opening of the new campus in 2015 Lee Hsien Loong, Singapore's prime minister, said that the college would have "to adapt the Yale model to Asia".

在2015年新校区的开幕式上，新加坡总理李显龙表示，该学院将“对耶鲁模式进行调整以适应亚洲”。

Four years later the college appeared to do just that when it cancelled a course on dissent taught by a prominent playwright because, it said, it was not sufficiently rigorous.

四年后，学院似乎就这么做了，它取消了一门一位著名剧作家教授的关于“异议”的课程，称其不够严格。

Responding to allegations that the college had caved to political pressure, Mr Lewis conducted an investigation which yielded no evidence of government coercion.

刘易斯对于学院屈服于政治压力的指控进行了调查，但没有发现政府胁迫的证据。

Yet Ong Ye Kung, then the education minister, supported cancelling the course, declaring in Parliament that "political conscientisation"—when people become aware of how they are oppressed—"is not the taxpayer's idea of what education means".

然而，当时的教育部长王乙康支持取消这一课程，他在议会宣称，“政治的意识觉醒”(当人们意识到自己如何受到压迫时)“并不是纳税人所认为的教育的意义”。

News of the closure came as a shock to students and teachers, who were not consulted.

学校关闭的消息令学生和教师感到震惊，市政厅没有征求他们的意见，

Neither was the college president, Tan Tai Yong, who was reportedly "gobsmacked and flabbergasted" when informed in July.

也没有征求大学校长谭泰勇的意见。据报道，他在7月份被告知此事时“目瞪口呆”。

During the virtual town hall, microphones were muted; students had to send questions via a mediator.

在市政厅虚拟会议期间，麦克风被静音，学生必须通过调解人提出问题。

At the end of the meeting, students could be heard shouting with frustration, according to the college newspaper.

据校报报道，会议结束时可以听到学生们沮丧地大喊。

All they are likely to get in return for their"conscientisation" on this issue is silence.

他们在这个问题上的“意识觉醒”换来的可能是沉默。