Education, being one of the foundations of financial or status success, is regarded as the highest priority in the upbringing of future leaders in any modern societies. This is especially so in Singapore. Being a small nation which lacks natural resources, the government is spending 20% of the annual national budget on education to produce individuals with skill sets that allow them to prevail in the society. However, the knowledge which are supposed to guide students to success may be abused or even misused for malicious acts. In order to prevent this from happening, a set of values is necessary to guide the use of these knowledge. Values are principles or standards of behaviour, and one's judgement of what is important in life. Values, moral ones in particular, are essential in education to prevent students from developing into a manipulative individual.

Moral values are the standards of "good" and "evil", which govern an individual’s behaviour and choices. Individual’s morals may derive from society and government, or religion. These moral values are intrinsic, and cannot be override by harsh laws or rules. One example is Hwa Chong Institution's very own former MOE scholar, Jonathan Wong Wai Keong, being sentenced to five years' jail for having sex with a minor. This happened two months after being convicted for possession of child pornography in Britain in 2010. The incident resulted in his expulsion from the University of York and revocation of his student visa. The sequence of events caused Wong's parents to sell away their HDB flat in order to return a total of S$175,000 in bond fees Wong owed to the MOE. It is evident that laws and social norms could not restrict Wong from his desires. Wong was still unable to control himself when he went overseas and escapes the supervision of his parents due to the lack of moral values. This proves that the lack of