Nearer the Sky: Sincerity

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Sincerity In the world fixated on image and appearance, on achieving financial success or career success, sincerity has become a rare quality.

Sincerity is a quality we want in our loved ones, our friends, our colleagues, and our fellow citizens. When people are prompted by a genuine desire to help others, they are more likely to produce a deep and lasting impact.

That is certainly the case with the old girls of SCGS. A prime example is succesful hotelier, corporate leader and entrepreneur, Jennie Chua. Her desire to help the less fortunate springs from a sincere wish to make a difference.

This explains why Jennie chaired the Community Chest for 14 years and also accounts for how she was so successful in raising millions for those in need.

pioneered putting gardens on the rooftops of multi-storey carparks and piloted underground water tanks to reduce rainwater run-off in parks in order to reduce the risk of flooding and make Singapore a more pleasant place to live in.

Ang Bee Lian is another example of someone with a heart for the less fortunate. A veteran social worker with four decades of experience, she has helped to protect the weakest and most vulnerable in society. Today, she does so as Director of Social Welfare.

Jacqueline Poh’s career in the Administrative Service has taken her into the upper echelons of the civil service. She headed the Infocomm Development Authority and the Government Technology Agency and had senior roles in the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Manpower and the Prime Minister’s Office. This has allowed her to use her talents to craft policies that affect all citizens and residents of Singapore.

Sincerity of motives is not only found among those involved in social work.

Some contribute to society in different ways. Sonita Jeyapathy could have continued her lucrative career in law but she felt called to do more. As a result, she gave up being a partner in a renowned law firm to teach in university, choosing intangible rewards over material benefits.

Out of a desire to contribute to a greener Singapore, Tay Bee Choo’s career has seen highs and lows, literally. She

Vicky Wang and Arlene Pang were motivated to serve the nation by donning the Number 4 uniform, though in different ways. Vicky is a career soldier who has risen to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel while Arlene is a volunteer serving in the Navy.

What all these old girls have in common is that they are motivated by a genuine desire to help others and to serve. Their Sincerity animates and guides them, and thus armed, they have been able to make a real difference to society.

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Likewise, a sincere desire to help the poor is what drives former lawyer Lim Hui Min and explains why she has embraced the role of Director of the Legal Aid Bureau, which provides legal assistance to people who need it but who are in dire financial circumstances.

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26 Source: The Straits Times © Singapore Press Holdings Limited. Reprinted with permission

Jennie Chua

From History Buff to History Maker

Retired corporate titan Jennie Chua (SCGS: 1952 – 1961) has had a long and glittering career that includes many firsts — she was the first Singaporean to become General Manager of the iconic Raffles Hotel, and was the first woman to take on that position. In addition, she was the first woman in 172 years to head the Singapore International Chamber of Commerce.

Decades before she made history over and over again, however, Jennie Chua was just a history buff in SCGS who yearned to study the subject — which almost did not happen.

At that time, the school was so small that there were just two Secondary Four classes: the Science class and the Arts class. Jennie was in the Science class which offered Geography, in addition to science-related subjects. Jennie, however, was much more interested in History, which was only offered to students in the Arts class.

nobody; I was just a student who wanted to do History.”

Thanks to this change, when it was time for the girls in the Science class to learn about rainforests, limestone caves and mountains, Jennie was able to join the Arts class for History lessons, learning about trade routes, conquests and the reigns of rulers.

“A lot of places say that they care about every individual but at SCGS, they walked the talk,” says Jennie, who became Chairman of the SCGS Board in 2018, having been a member since 2010.

“I was the only student to do that and the school allowed me to do it,” marvels Jennie. “They did it for one person, me. And I was a

That incident taught her the importance of paying attention to the individual.

she was interested in the subject.

They were not trying to curry favour with anyone important; Jennie was not the daughter of a diplomat or a rich businessman.

She was, in her own words, a ‘nobody’.

That ‘nobody’ would later go on to have a highly successful career in the hospitality and the property sector. Jennie was the Chairman of Raffles International and then became Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of listed Raffles Holdings, which had 36 hotels in its portfolio and more than 9,000 employees altogether.

The incident was also an example of sincerity, part of the school motto, at work. The Principal, Miss Tan Sock Kern , and the History teacher had no reason for helping Following her term with Raffles Jennie other than the fact that Holdings, she became CEO of the Ascott Group, one of the largest serviced-residences owneroperators in the world.

Thereafter, she wanted to leave corporate life but was persuaded to join listed property giant Capitaland as its Chief Corporate Officer until she finally retired in 2012.

While all these corporate successes are significant, it is perhaps her role in the Community Chest that has touched the most number of Singaporeans. The Community

Courtesy of Community Chest

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When she approached the History teacher, the latter rearranged the schedule so that the History class and the Geography class would take place at the same time.

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Courtesy of Community Chest

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Chest raises funds for Singapore’s social service organisations and Jennie was its longestrunning Chairman. There is no doubting the sincerity of Jennie’s commitment to helping the needy: it is a thankless job to go around asking for money, but Jennie was wildly successful at it.

From 2000 to 2013, she worked with the Community Chest to raise millions of dollars annually which was then channeled to thousands According to Jennie, this desire to help others was sparked during of beneficiaries in Singapore via her time in SCGS. In secondary supported charities. school, she was a member of the school’s Red Cross group and She is especially proud about one of the activities she enjoyed how the Community Chest was going with the other girls was able to help special needs to Wesley Methodist Church on children. “These little boys and Fridays to serve tea to old folks little girls were able to reach from a home in Changi. their full potential because of the intervention of the over 60 “I enjoyed that part very much: charities we supported.” going there to serve Milo, jam biscuits and sweet potato soup.”

While she played a vital role in helping the less fortunate Jennie’s exposure to the plight of through the fundraising done the poor and the less privileged by the Community Chest, she did not merely come from serving prefers to focus on how the experience benefitted her instead. jam biscuits to old ladies living in senior citizen homes. She had “ComChest did a lot for me. I felt firsthand experience of what good about myself and it gave being poor and less privileged meaning to life.”

feels like. As a schoolgirl in SCGS, apart from paying attention in class, she would also pay close attention to the weather, for it would determine her path home after school.

On sunny days, she would buy a bowl of noodles for lunch and then walk home. If the weather looked threatening, she would use her allowance for the bus fare to get home instead. She could eat, or take the bus home. She did not have enough money to do both.

The experience of being poor would have been particularly painful because young Jennie had grown up living a life of privilege. Her childhood home was a Tanglin Road bungalow

these men woke me up and said, ‘Xiao mei mei (little girl), please stand up, I’m taking your bed away’.”

Everything she had — the bungalow, the chauffeur, the servants — evaporated overnight after her father’s business failed.

One minute, the 10-year-old was living in the lap of luxury; the next minute, strange men were taking away her bed — the family home had been foreclosed and the men were seizing all the assets inside.

That experience left her with a sense of insecurity, a feeling that things were transient and everything could disappear in an instant. At the same time, it also taught her that as you go through life, obstacles and challenges will be thrown in your way. But when that happens, you have to pluck up your courage, pick yourself up and move on.

She still remembers the incident vividly. “I was lying on the bed and

Jennie did exactly that. She refused to let her progress be permanently stalled. To earn money, she worked while she was in school. One memorable job involved typing out cables and sending them to Europe on behalf of the non-English speaking towkays running nutmeg factories in Singapore (her father and grandfather had been in the nutmeg business before the family firm failed).

Later, she obtained a bursary to study in the Arts faculty at the University of Singapore but had to give it up after a year because she had to work to contribute to the family’s finances. “It was not a question of whether I could afford to go to university but a question of whether I could afford not to work.”

Those types of sacrifices were expected in those days, especially if one was the eldest of 12 children. Jennie became a teacher instead and gave half of her first full pay packet of $199 to her mother so that her other siblings could be fed and clothed.

Courtesy of Community Chest

Nonetheless, she never gave up on her desire to get a degree.

After getting married, she left

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with a hall big enough for parties for ballroom dancing and where people could play tennis on the grass court in the garden.

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Courtesy of Community Chest

teaching and accompanied her then-husband to Cornell University in New York. While he did a Masters Degree in political science, she raced to complete a degree in hotel administration from Cornell in two and a half years instead of the usual four so the couple could return to Singapore together. During the summer holidays, she worked part-time but also took classes so that she could complete her course sooner.

On her return to Singapore, Jennie worked in various organisations, including the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board, where she helped make Singapore one of the top 10 convention destinations in the world. She then moved to the hotel industry and was eventually

tapped to be the General Manager of the Raffles Hotel.

programmes, regardless of their financial circumstances.

She was at the Raffles when she was asked to chair the Community Chest. Abdullah Tarmugi, the Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports, asked if she would take up the post for two years. Those two years stretched to 14.

Jennie is also the Deputy Chairman of Temasek Foundation International, a non-profit philanthropic organisation that funds and supports programmes that build human and social capital in Asia and beyond.

Jennie’s generosity extends Although she has stepped beyond the charity sector and down from the Community she serves on numerous boards Chest, she continues to help in various sectors. In 2019, she the underprivileged in other was appointed Pro-Chancellor ways. She is especially proud of of the Nanyang Technological her involvement with The Rice University. At the same time, Company Limited, which she she sits on the Board of Trustees chairs. This non-profit organisation of the Singapore University of offers arts programmes and Technology and Design. runs arts spaces for children and youths. It enrols children of In healthcare, she is the Chairman all backgrounds in its of Alexandra Health System,

Throughout her career, Jennie has been a firm supporter of the arts. She is the Chairman of the Singapore Film Commission’s Advisory Board, a role she has held since it was formed in 1998.

On the corporate front, she is a director of three listed companies – Guocoland Limited, GL Limited and Far East Orchard Limited.

On top of all these, she finds the time to be Singapore’s NonResident Ambassador to Mexico as well as a Justice of the Peace.

For her decades of public service to Singapore, she has received numerous awards including four National Day Awards, such as the Meritorious Service Medal in 2014 and the Public Service Medal in 2004.

While she holds many Board positions, that of chairing the SCGS Board is one that is very close to her heart. She feels that her main job is to work with the whole board to keep school on its upward trajectory and to help it stay relevant to the needs of the times.

With anything you want to know just a Google search away, merely acquiring knowledge is no longer enough to be successful. Jennie, however, believes that SCGS is well-placed to prepare its girls for a challenging future.

“Our foundation for what you call an ‘educated girl’ is not just an education you get from books but also extra curricular activities. We have always, and we will continue to focus on developing the whole person.

This is part of our DNA.” That DNA is more than evident in old girls such as Jennie who show what a career of embodying Sincerity, Courage, Generosity and Service looks like.

Courtesy of SCGS

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where she is busy overseeing the building of the Woodlands Health Campus, a 1,800-bed facility that will have acute and community hospitals, a nursing home and specialist clinics. It is scheduled to open in 2022. She is also on the Board of the Ministry of Health Holdings and chairs Vanguard Healthcare, which was set up by the Health Ministry and runs three nursing homes.

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Image credit to The Singapore Army

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Vicky Wang

They called her Mama Wolf

The term ‘Army battalion commander’ does not typically conjure up the mental picture of a mother of two young boys. But Lieutenant-Colonel Vicky Wang (SCGS: 1996 - 1999) is proof that you can be an Army officer, a leader of soldiers, and a mother, all ‘at’ the same time. While there is a common perception that soldiering is a man’s job, women, and indeed, mothers, can bring something extra to the table.

“You want to be tough with them, just as you are very strict with your son, to make sure they do well. At the same time, there’s this nurturing part of you; they open up to you more,” says Vicky.

“They come and talk to you after office hours — ‘Ma’am, I’ve got this issue.’ And you find out a lot more about them.”

For Vicky, being in the army gives her a sense of purpose. “You are what’s allowing Singaporeans to sleep peacefully at night.” When she was a unit commander, she made it a point to communicate this sense of purpose to the men doing their National Service, convincing them that they were important in the larger scheme of things. “Otherwise, it’s just marking time.”

Given the nature of the battalion’s work, giving them a sense of

purpose is not too difficult.

Her ability to create a sense of purpose in her unit was evident through her unit’s excellent showing at the Army’s Dragonboat Regatta; under her command, her battalion’s dragonboat team beat the famed Commandos two years in a row.

Leadership, however, also means making tough decisions, such as having to send one soldier to the detention barracks (military prison), for drug-related offences.

Despite this, he was not a bitter person and even contacted her for advice after he completed his National Service.

To achieve this, she did not rely on handpicking the fittest men in the battalion but instead chose those who were willing to work hard and be part of the team. She chose soldiers of various backgrounds, regardless of their sporting ability, and moulded them into a winning team.

In leading her unit, she says she wanted to be the kind of commander that her sons would deserve. She is aware of the responsibility she has in taking command of full-time National Servicemen and turning them, over two years, from civilians into operationally-ready soldiers.

According to Vicky, commanding her unit has been, so far, the highlight of her career in the SAF. During her stint, she has seen 18-year-olds grow and mature.

She has witnessed men innovate and contribute back to the SAF, like a platoon commander who was able to revamp the monitoring of networks in the battalion because of the knowledge he had garnered before enlistment. Another soldier in her battalion was awarded the prestigious National Serviceman (Full-time) of the Year award.

It was especially gratifying, she says, to have parents come up to her to thank her for what she has done for their children.

After three years at 10 C4I, she was appointed to a staff post, and today she is the Head of the Personnel Development Branch at the Ministry of Defence. As part of her current appointment, she deals with the career and professional development of Warrant Officers in the army, among other things. Even as she endeavours to excel in her current

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Between 2015 and 2018, Vicky commanded 700 men of the Wolf Battalion where she was known as ‘Mama Wolf’. The battalion is officially known as the 10th C4I Battalion, which stands for Command, Control, Communications, Computers and Intelligence. The battalion supports the army through operating the networks that give the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) the technological edge. It is involved in a wide spectrum of activities, from facilitating communications during the National Day Parade to the SAF’s deployments overseas, including for Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HADR) operations.

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Courtesy of Vicky Wang

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appointment, she misses the face-to-face connection with the men and the chance to make an immediate difference in their lives.

However, in her new position, she has an opportunity to make an army-wide impact through the policies she develops.

Vicky was set on the path of a military career thanks to her time in SCGS. She enjoyed her four years in the National Cadet Corps (NCC) so much that she decided to join the army after her A-Level.

When she joined SCGS in Secondary One, she, like most 13-year-olds, had no real idea what to choose for a co-curricular activity. On Co-Curricular Activity (CCA) day, Vicky wandered

around looking at the different options available. When she got to the NCC booth, she saw photos of girls going on adventures, armed with air rifles and clad in smart uniforms. She was immediately smitten.

to the peak. “It rained so hard the whole tent collapsed,” she recalls laughing. As a result, the girls had a cold, tired and miserable night.

The next morning, they still had to wake up early for the hike up to the summit.

Life in the NCC turned out to be everything she thought it would be and more, she says. “I loved the activities; I loved the shooting; I loved the outdoor adventures and pitching a tent on Mount Ophir.”

It is memories like this, and of the tight bonds formed with the other girls, that she remembers when she thinks of her NCC days.

While camping and hiking was fun, what was less enjoyable was having to spend Friday nights The Mount Ophir expedition was polishing her boots because, she particularly memorable. She was recalls, no matter how well you did 15 and it was her first time being it, you would still get a scolding for out in the field and having to pitch it on Saturday. “The teachers were a tent for real. That might have all nice but it was the NCOs (nonaccounted for what happened commissioned officers) who will on the night before the final push make your life hell.”

Her friend dropped out after Basic Military Training but Vicky persevered (thanks, in part, to her NCC experience). She qualified for Officer Cadet School and was offered the SAF Overseas Merit Scholarship in 2002.

After four years at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, she obtained a Degree in Liberal Arts and then began her career as a signals officer. In 2007, after another four months of training with the US Army Signals Corps in Fort Gordon, Georgia, she was given her first command appointment: as a platoon commander in an armour unit.

Vicky rose up the ranks and was made Lieutenant-Colonel in 2015.

Along the way, the army also sent her for a military course at the New Zealand Command and Staff College in Trentham, which gave her a chance to attain a Masters in International Relations from Massey University.

Vicky attributes part of her success in her military career to having a supportive husband. He is an American she met in university who gave up a chance to do his PhD in Stanford. Instead, he did it at the National University of Singapore so that they could be together.

A quantum physicist, he accompanied her to New Zealand when she was sent to the Command and Staff College in Trentham. One night, having accidentally burnt dinner, she turned to her husband in frustration and asked, ‘Do you ever think I’m a lousy wife and mother?’ Without even Image credit to The Singapore Army

thinking, he replied, ‘I married a professional soldier. I didn’t marry a professional chef.’ Vicky’s husband now a Permanent Resident in Singapore and even serves in the SAF Volunteer Corps.

Although she is a woman in a male-dominated environment, she has no regrets about her choice of career. “I feel, so far, the work I’ve been doing has been valued by the army. It’s not just another career, it’s not just another job.

“When I retire one day and hang up my uniform, I can say it’s been time well-spent.”

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After completing her A-Level at Raffles Junior College, a friend from SCGS suggested signing up. “She said: ‘Let’s join the army.’” The two young women proceeded to do so.

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Courtesy of Sonita Jeyapathy

Sonita Jeyapathy From Law Firm Partner to Law School Lecturer

No one was surprised when Sonita Jeyapathy (SCGS:1991 - 1996) made it to law school, was snapped up by one of Singapore’s top legal firms and swiftly made partner. Sonita joined SCGS in Primary Five, overcame the awkwardness of being the new girl, and eventually did so well in school that she became a prefect, and later, Head Prefect. This was an honour reserved for those with a sterling academic record, obvious leadership qualities and, just as crucially, the ability to get along with the other girls whose votes would be a significant factor in the decision.

From the outside, the decision seemed inexplicable. Sonita was leaving a career in a top firm just two years after being made partner. She was walking away from the stature and prestige associated with such a position.

In some ways, it would have been easy to continue in the corporate world. While the hours were long and the work intense, Sonita was good at her job and was remunerated handsomely for her efforts. But she increasingly found that the work was not a good fit for her personality and that at some point it just felt ‘a little bit soulless”. She wanted to be true to her inne’ self and to live a life that was congruent with her values and her personality.

“Was the money worth it? I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t. I wanted to do something where I wouldn’t be begrudging my day.”

In 2013, a position opened up at the law school at NUS and with some trepidation, she jumped ship. It was a difficult decision for her because she had spent nine years in practice and had known only that one kind of life. Apart from an inkling that the field of education might be something that resonated better with her, she had no clue if she would actually take to it or be any good at it. The deep disparity in salaries between practice and academia also made her hesitate.

Today, Sonita is the Deputy Director of the Legal Skills Programme at NUS. She runs modules to develop and hone foundational legal skills in first-year law students, and to introduce second-year law students to corporate transactions and the corollary foundational transaction-related skills. She also supervises third- and fourth-year law students in a clinical legal education programme where

students provide charities and institutions of public character with legal support on corporate matters.

Apart from formal teaching, she makes it a point to support activities which encourage the allround development of students, including coaching teams of students keen to take part in international mooting, mediation and negotiation competitions.

With the perspective gained

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Courtesy of Julie Kwong-Lee

SINGAPORE CHINESE GIRLS’ SCHOOL

After graduating from law school at the National University of Singapore (NUS), she joined Allen & Gledhill, honing her skills as a litigator first before moving on to mergers and acquisitions. She was with the firm for nine years, where she made partner. Then just as she seemed poised to scale even higher up the corporate ladder, she quit.

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career in practice to become a university lecturer. In SCGS, she was willing to do the right thing, even if it meant personal discomfort.

Image credit to NUS Law Mooting and Debating Club

from several years in the field of tertiary education, she has also had the opportunity to share her practice with an international audience. In 2017, as part of collaborative efforts to assist the launch of Jigme Singye Wangchuck Law School in Bhutan by building the pedagogical capacity of its faculty, she travelled with a few colleagues to Bhutan to conduct teaching workshops and discuss how to innovate teaching practices with Bhutanese educators.

She appreciates how life is no longer a Looney Tunes Tazinspired constant whirlwind of working on urgent deals for

multinational corporations. She not only enjoys the impact she has on her students and in the educational sphere, but also relishes the fact that she has time for passion projects. She is currently exploring painting in acrylic, something she would never have embarked on in her previous life because of the demands of her job.

In the same way that it was not a surprise to those who know her, that the smart and ambitious Sonita would quickly become a successful corporate lawyer, it was also not surprising to them that she would have the courage and conviction to leave a lucrative

A quite literal example in point — Sonita was a member of the Choir and in Secondary Four, she managed to win the plum role of Professor Henry Higgins in the year-end production of My Fair Lady. For this role, however, the pony-tailed 16-year-old needed short hair. Sonita proposed pinning her hair into a bun but Mrs Angela Goh, the Choir Director, did not think it would work. “Mrs Goh said, ‘People will know it’s a bun. Why don’t you just cut your hair?’” Reluctantly, Sonita agreed. “There might have been some tears,” she recalls laughing.

Losing the pony tail was not something she wanted to do but she did it because she had to look right for the role. On the bright side, she eventually learned to like her new look.

One was the exposure to a school leadership that did things for the right reasons — charting a holistic education for the girls. At the time, Literature was a subject every SCGS girl had to take in secondary school. You could not, unlike in some other schools, opt out of doing Literature so as to take an easier subject.

the characters in the book and are better able to empathise with others”. Students also indirectly imbibed the general school culture of doing things for the correct purpose.

There were certainly many character-moulding opportunities at SCGS. One quite memorable example occurred at a schoolorganised Outward Bound Singapore camp when she was stuck out at sea in heavy rain in a canoe for the very first time.

“Whether we realised this at the time or not, we benefited from this “We were cold and miserable”. If complaining and wishing things foresight”. Sonita fondly recalls could have magically extricated the positive impact of Literature them from the situation, she allowing her to experience life through the lives of the characters and her friends would certainly have done so. “But you realise she studied. “You learn through

Courtesy of Sonita Jeyapathy

very quickly there’s no point complaining. Complaining wasn’t going to get us anywhere and would only make things more unpleasant. No one was going to rescue us from the pathetic situation we were in, no matter how much we complained. We were just going to have to get on with it and do what we needed to do.” It was a plain but effective lesson in self-help and resilience.

The simplicity yet profundity of the school song, something reinforced every day at assembly, has also been, and continues to be, a useful north star to Sonita.

“‘All that we need to do be we low or high is to see that we grow nearer the sky’.

Whatever your situation is, you need to always keep learning and keep growing, whether in your perspective or in what you do. As long as there is upward movement, you are moving in the right direction.”

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Life in SCGS would be impactful to her in so many different ways.

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40 Courtesy of Lim Hui Min

Lim Hui Min

Providing Legal Aid to the Poor

Many people choose to help the less fortunate by becoming social workers. Lim Hui Min (SCGS: 1985 1990) decided to do it by pursuing a legal career.

Since 2015, Hui Min has been the Director of the Legal Aid Bureau (LAB) which provides legal help to people who cannot afford a lawyer.

To qualify for legal aid, a person needs to pass a means test and a merits test, which means that the person must be of limited means, and there must be reasonable grounds for taking up, continuing or defending the court action.

time to change that thinking and look at the applicant as a whole person, with his own history and issues, and to see if we can refer him to help that could address those issues.”

For example, the Bureau has set up a collaboration with Promoting Often, legal and social issues Alternative to Violence (PAVE), are intertwined. For example, an the family service centre that applicant (the Bureau’s term for specialises in helping victims of its clients) may come to the family violence. LAB can refer Bureau seeking help for a divorce, its applicants to PAVE, with their but she may also be struggling consent, if they are experiencing with issues such as family family violence. PAVE and LAB violence, depression, or not officers can also share information having stable housing. on their respective systems and processes with each other, The Bureau, under Hui Min’s and collaborate on cases with leadership, has established mutual applicants. collaborations with other organisations which can help the The Bureau has also collaborated applicants with their social service with the Ministry of Social and needs. The rationale for this is Family Development (MSF) to that, as she puts it, “the legal help applicants who might be issues are but a symptom of facing issues such as addiction deeper seated issues.” problems, caregiver stress or “Traditionally, the attitude has been that ‘we’re lawyers, we’ll do lawyers’ work’ but I think it’s

severe family dysfunction on top of their legal issues. LAB can refer the case to MSF, with the applicant’s consent. MSF will then

find a suitable Family Service Centre (FSC) to contact the applicant and offer help.

What is key is that someone from these organisations, whether it is PAVE or an FSC, will make the move to contact the applicant.

This is important because the Bureau has observed that if it just gives its applicants phone numbers to call to get help, the applicant often does not follow through.

On top of setting up new protocols, the change also involves a mindset shift on the part of the lawyers in the Bureau, who now have to be aware of the applicant’s social service needs.

Making these changes is part of Hui Min’s job as the Director of Legal Aid. She oversees the department of 56 people (20 lawyers and 36 support staff, including paralegals). She is in charge of giving it focus and motivating the team. “If you don’t feel cared for yourself, then it’s very hard to care for other people,” she notes.

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The Bureau only handles civil cases, with about half of them relating to issues like contractual and employment disputes. The rest of the cases are related to family issues such as divorce, guardianship, adoption, family violence and maintenance.

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Hui Min’s posting is, in a way, the fulfilment of a childhood dream.

In a book commemorating the Bureau’s 50th anniversary, she wrote about a TV show she watched when she was younger, about a law firm that helped the needy on a pro-bono basis. “I thought they had an ideal job — helping people, getting paid for it and having fun at the same time.

Thus I wished that someday, I too would be able to do something like that.”

In addition to her work at the Bureau, she is a prolific author and has written about the Bureau and its officers and volunteers, as well as legal matters, in platforms like the Singapore Law Gazette (the official publication of the Law Society), the Singapore Academy of Law Journal, and other publications. Unusually, she has also co-authored papers that have been published in a local medical journal and newsletter, contributing to papers related to an area where the law and the practice of medicine meet, namely the diagnosis and proof of mental incapacity.

She is also an author of children’s books. She co-wrote Kevin’s World (about a child with autism,

to explain to children what the condition is) and also penned Dear Mom and Dad, Don’t Make Me Feel Bad - A Child of Divorce Speaks Up, to explain to parents what a child goes through when his parents divorce.

Youth and Sports (later renamed the Ministry of Social and Family Development) on joint programmes such as counselling programmes for children involved in custody disputes and also provided training in legal issues to social workers. Wanting to Hui Min had no idea she would understand more about social be doing all this. When she policies and the social work world, graduated from Exeter College, she asked to be seconded to Oxford, in 1994, with a Bachelor in MCYS as a policy officer.

Jurisprudence and a Bachelor of Civil Law (a masters degree She was posted to the ComCare in law). She was called to the and Social Support Division in English Bar, returned to qualify MCYS, which was in charge of as a lawyer in Singapore, and did various programmes to help commercial litigation in a private low income families. Hui Min law firm for just over two years. was appointed as a Senior She then joined the Singapore Assistant Director, and later Legal Service.

Deputy Director.

After a year in the Civil Registry of the then Subordinate Courts (now the State Courts) as a magistrate, she was posted to the Family and Juvenile Court. She was there first as a magistrate, and was later appointed a district judge. Over the years there, her eyes were opened to the situations faced by the less fortunate in Singapore, as many of the litigants coming to the Court were of lower-income backgrounds. She worked closely with officers from the then Ministry of Community Development,

After a couple of years in that post, she requested to be sent to the Legal Aid Bureau, which was a logical move for a lawyer interested in helping the less fortunate. This was her first stint with the Bureau and she was, at the time, one of the lawyers working with applicants.

Here, she was able to help people directly. She was with the Bureau for close to four years and was promoted to Deputy Director.

After this, she was posted to

Courtesy of Julie Kwong-Lee

When the Legal Aid Bureau needed a new director in 2015, she was the perfect candidate: she had worked in the Bureau before, she was familiar with the type of applicants it had, and she

had a big place in her heart for the poor and underprivileged.

Hui Min fondly remembers her time in SCGS. The school’s emphasis on literature, reading and writing fitted her interests, and helped her hone her language skills, which were very useful for her later legal career.

One of her best memories is reading practically every book in the school’s library in the first two years she was there! Her love of the school can be summed up in this poem she wrote, many years ago, in her last year at school:

Memories of…

Friends that we made Games that we played Teachers who helped us each step of the way Though in the future, we school girls will roam We’ll never forget this, our second home, Singapore Chinese Girls’ School

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MSF, as the Director of the Legal Services Unit. She was a good fit for the job, having worked in MSF previously. In that role, she acted as MSF’s in-house counsel, providing MSF with legal advice on all matters under its purview, including advice on statutes relating to MSF’s work.

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Jacqueline Poh Jacq of All Trades

On June 8, 2016, Jacqueline Poh (SCGS: 1982 - 1991) managed to enrage almost every civil servant in Singapore. That was the day The Straits Times ran a story about a new government policy to cut off Internet surfing from all government computers within a year.

Jacqueline was then the Managing Director of the Infocommunications Development Authority (IDA) which had come up with the policy to limit Internet surfing from computers linked to the government internal networks.

Image credit to Prime Minister’s Office

Civil servants eventually accepted the change as those who needed Internet access for their work could still use dedicated Internet laptops or their own personal devices. Government agencies also boosted the Wi-Fi provisions in offices to allow civil servants to use their Internet devices, easing any lingering unhappiness.

More importantly, the move did indeed vastly improve

Internet security for government computer systems. “After we took Internet surfing off, cyber incidents dropped like a stone,” said Jacqueline. “During wellknown global cyberattacks like the Wannacry ransomware attack in 2017, the government systems were unaffected while many others were scrambling to protect their systems”.

and economics at Oxford University, and has a Masters in International Relations from Cambridge University and an MBA from INSEAD.

During her five years at IDA and subsequently, the Government Technology Agency of Singapore (GovTech), Jacqueline was instrumental in the building of key digital infrastructure like the Next Generation National Broadband Network, the National Digital Identity and the Smart Nation Sensor Platform, as well as rebuilding engineering capabilities in the public sector through the formation of Government Digital Services.

These are key building blocks for making Singapore a Smart Nation.

“The learning curve,” she recalled, “was extremely steep.”

When she was first asked to take on the role of Managing Director IDA, she was concerned, especially given that she did not have a technical background.

One of her first jobs at IDA was to lead the effort to rebuild and design the government’s ICT infrastructure and migrate everyone to the new system in just 18 months. As the telecoms regulator, she pushed for more competition in the telco space.

The increase in competition led to new operators like TPG but also virtual telcos like Circles.Life and MyRepublic coming into the picture. The increased competition led Given the nature of these projects, to lower rates and newer, one might think that Jacqueline more innovative services, thus has a computer science benefitting all users. background. Jacqueline, however, read politics, philosophy

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According to Jacqueline, the move aimed to make the government’s computer systems more secure in the face of a growing volume and sophistication of attacks. It was also undertaken in light of how a Smart Nation would result in heavier reliance on infocomm systems. Such systems have vulnerabilities that can be attacked by hackers, viruses, ransomware or unfriendly governments and can lead to crippled systems or stolen personal data. By limiting Internet access, hackers would find it much harder to take out data or exploit vulnerabilities to disrupt our system.

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all government initiatives need to be funded, everything has to first be approved by the Finance Ministry. While she was at MOF as the Director of Fiscal Policy, she was involved in the creation of the Workfare Income Supplement and ComCare, abolishing the estate duties and raising the Goods and Services Tax. Image credit to GovTech

Jacqueline’s success in a field where she had no previous expertise can be attributed to the fact that she is a quick learner.

In her career in the government service, she has not had one career, but many. Before joining the IDA and forming GovTech, she held key positions in the Ministry of Manpower (MOM), the Ministry of Finance (MOF) and the Ministry of Defence (MINDEF). Today, she is the Deputy Secretary of the Prime Minister’s Office Strategy Group.

The group leads and organises the Public Service to develop and implement the strategic priorities of the Government.

officer after returning from her studies in the United Kingdom.

This was in the late 1990s and while others were worried about the Y2K bug, she and the others in the Scenario Planning Office at the PMO were looking at things much further down the line. They were examining current trends and extrapolating them into the future. The job consisted of interviewing people and conducting research to get ideas about what the future of the world, and thus Singapore, could look like. With these plausible futures in place, the government could then prepare for them.

In taking on her role in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), she is returning to one of the places where she first cut her teeth as a young Administrative Service

During her five-year long posting with the MOF, Jacqueline was involved in strategic debates that would affect how Singapore would be run. Since

In her subsequent posting to the MOM as a Divisional Director, Jacqueline was involved in legislation to give a day off to foreign domestic workers and also helped older workers gained reemployment by working on what would become the Retirement and Re-employment Act, which came into force in 2012.

While she has undoubtedly achieved much in her career in the public service, she did not join it out of a desire for money or glory.

Jacqueline has always had a heart for public service. “My father was a policeman and my mother was a teacher; they did things for reasons other than money.”

Although she obviously excelled academically, she does not believe that school should be too competitive.

“The SCGS I remembered had very little homework and comparatively little stress. My mother was teaching in another school and she used to say that SCGS has less homework.”

“What is important is that you were valued in and of yourself, and you were valued in a holistic manner.”

Drawing from her own experience, Jacqueline urged the girls still in school to focus, not on how they can get ahead, but how they can contribute to society.

Source: The Straits Times © Singapore Press Holdings Limited.

Reprinted with permission

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“You all have something to contribute,” she said. “It’s not about how much you earn or how far you can go, but how you can be useful to society.”

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Tay Bee Choo Greening Singapore, One Carpark at a Time

The tops of most multi-storey carparks in Housing and Development Board (HDB) estates are sun-baked concrete deserts that drivers only reluctantly use because it is guaranteed to turn their cars into ovens.

However, the tops of multi-storey carparks in new HDB estates are hives of activity. They might have a playground or even a community space, all of which are augmented by a roof-top garden filled with shrubs and small trees that lend a leafy, green ambience to the place.

The transformation of carpark roof-top from grey desert to green garden is thanks to the effort of one SCGS alumna, Tay Bee Choo (SCGS: 1963 - 1972). As the Deputy Director of Landscape Implementation at the HDB, Bee Choo is responsible, not just for roof-top gardens but for greening Singapore’s public housing estates in new and innovative ways.

Courtesy of Tay Bee Choo

abroad to see which would work best in Singapore’s climate and conditions.

Her efforts to set up roof-top gardens got a boost when the Urban Redevelopment Authority introduced a programme in 2009 to encourage pervasive and accessible greenery in Singapore’s high-rise urban environment.

The URA was not merely interested in high-rise greenery for aesthetic purposes; green When Bee Choo joined the HDB roofs have practical uses as well.

While it might look obvious now as a landscape architect in 1992, They slow down run-off from the to turn the carpark roof-top into the greenery in public housing rains and reduce flooding while a garden with community activity estates was very basic — trees, plants act as a filter, removing spaces, it was not so obvious in turf and footpaths — which made the early 2000s. Then, it was a new environmental particulates. all the estates look similar. “I concept and there were concerns Plants also reduce the ambient wanted to make a difference. I temperature as well as the heat about how to implement it. The wanted to bring the condominium engineers did not want to do island effect. landscape to HDB. Otherwise, anything to damage the roof while everyone would just be living the town council did not have the The first extensive green roof was in an environment with trees tried out at a multi-storey carpark resources to maintain a garden. and turf.” in Punggol where she had four contractors try out four different From around 2002, Bee Choo As she rose up the ranks, she had began experimenting with systems. After three years of the ability to implement some of testing, she was able to determine different roof-top greening, her ideas, such as roof-gardens for importing different the best system for working with multi-storey carparks. the conditions in Singapore. techniques and materials from Image credit to Ms Marilyn Bergonia, Singapore Polytechnic

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Since 2012, every project that the HDB designs with a multi-storey carpark incorporates a roof-top garden. Thanks to Bee Choo’s experiments, other architects and developers here can leverage her experience to create successful sky-rise gardens.

Apart from roof-tops, Bee Choo has also helped to pioneer a new form of green area that is not only beautiful but also helps to clean rainwater before it enters the canal system.

Image credit to Challenge Magazine, Public Service Division

spaces and also improved the surrounding urban landscape.

a green space that was filled with trees, shade, a jogging path and cycling track and the PUB In 2007, the Land Transport The PUB devised the concept ended up with cleaner water Authority was planning to of an eco-friendly rain-garden, and reduced run-off. The overall reinstate the land affected by the a green space that was also winners were the residents of building of the Kallang-Paya designed to use soil as a filter.

Balam who could enjoy their Lebar Expressway in the Balam When it rains, the run-off is filtered attractive, improved garden.

HDB estate and consulted Bee through the soil before reaching Choo on what trees to replant underground pipes that eventually Another idea that Bee Choo in the area. channel the cleaned-up water into introduced was the concept of a the canal. This process of filtration bio-retention tank to retain water Instead of just restoring the land means that the water that enters for reuse. These are percolation to its original condition, Bee the canal needs less treatment and tanks that are wrapped in Choo worked with the national the reservoir does not get silted. permeable membranes and are water agency PUB to create a buried underground. better solution that did not merely It was a win-win situation for all These tanks collect rainwater reinstate but enhanced the green parties. The HDB ended up with

All these lessons came together in the Waterway Ridges housing estate in Punggol, a joint collaboration between the PUB and HDB. This was the first largeduring the wet season and release scale implementation of the ideas the water later. Bee Choo piloted pioneered in Balam estate and in the idea in a small park in Punggol Greenwood Sanctuary park. in the late-1990s but the idea was more fully fleshed out in the The estate features bio-retention 1.5ha Greenwood Sanctuary @ basins and swales that collect and Admiralty Park. treat stormwater runoff from roofs, roads, playgrounds and green Built by the HDB at the cost of areas in the precinct. $2.1 million and opened in 2010, it is the first eco-park in Singapore This allows the stormwater to that uses dry ponds and swales, infiltrate through plants and soil channels in the ground, to media slowly. Eventually, the handle rainwater. The park does not have concrete drains.

Instead, swales channel water into 11 dry ponds that are scattered

filtered clean water flows into the reservoir via the nearby Punggol Waterway. Bee Choo was able to experiment with these ideas thanks to her academic and professional background. She studied landscape architecture in Iowa State University and then worked in the private sector in Singapore for 11 years before deciding that she wanted to have a bigger impact by joining the HDB. While she has spent her career around greenery, this was something she fell into only after leaving SCGS. Back when Bee Choo was in school, it was located in Emerald Hill and there was not much space for a garden there.

Though her time in SCGS did not directly lead to her career in landscape architecture, she nonetheless has many happy memories of her time in school.

”My time in SCGS was one of the best years of my life,” she said.

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around the park. (They are called dry ponds because they are designed to be dry most of the time. They only fill up when it rains heavily.) The pooled rainwater then filters from the ponds into the underground tanks which store the water for release later.

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Ang Bee Lian

A Lifetime in Social Work If you were looking for someone to advise policymakers on laws to protect the poor and the needy in Singapore, you might want to look for someone with varied experience as a social worker, who has worked closely with voluntary welfare organisations, who has executive experience running an organisation protecting the vulnerable, and who perhaps has been chief executive of a major organisation in the sector. In short, you might be looking for someone like Ang Bee Lian (SCGS: 1962 - 1971).

Bee Lian has spent her life in the social work sector.

She became a social worker after graduating from university in 1977, and over the course of four decades, has, taken on many positions including that of Chief Image credit to Challenge Magazine, Public Service Division

Bee Lian first realised she wanted to be a social worker when she took up a holiday job before starting university. She had to conduct a readership survey for a magazine and while knocking on doors, she came across two children sitting in a dark, dirty and bare room, eating off newspapers on the floor. She had never seen such poverty before and that was when she decided that she could not simply ignore it.

She studied at the University of Singapore, majoring in social work and sociology and although she could have spent an extra year getting an honours degree in

sociology, she could not wait to start work. “I wanted to change the world,” she said.

government felt there was a need to create community spirit. RCs were seen as key to this effort.

Bee Lian had the chance to obtain a full-time job with a voluntary welfare organisation but instead decided to take up a two-year contract with the Social Welfare Department as a child protection officer because she wanted to do something that would be impactful.

The members of an RC are volunteers who live in the estate and as volunteer community leaders, it was their job to care for fellow residents. Bee Lian’s job was to train these volunteers, and this was a task close to her heart.

That two-year contract eventually turned into a permanent job and Bee Lian had the opportunity to rotate through many different posts. Her duties included training those who had volunteered to join the then newly-set up Residents’ Committees (RCs).

Residents’ Committees (RCs) are grassroots organisations that are based in public housing estates and were first set up in 1978. They were created because Singapore’s building of public housing estates in the 1960s, was accompanied by the resettling of the rural population into these estates.

These new housing estates lacked the kampung spirit of old, and the

“I believe in developing these volunteers because they are a human resource and we had a clear vision for the volunteers to be leaders.”

Bee Lian subsequently had the opportunity to contribute to the voluntary sector when she moved to the Community Development Support Division and was able to push for the setting up of what would become the National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre.

In her vision, the place would be the central hub for volunteers.

“If you have any interest in volunteering, you have this as a mothership, a focal point.”

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Executive of the National Council of Social Service from 2007 to 2013. That was her last posting before she was tapped to become Director of Social Welfare at the Ministry of Social and Family Development, her current role.

The office of the Director of Social Welfare provides advice on new laws or proposed amendments to laws relating to social welfare, specifically in relation to the protection of vulnerable groups such as children, women, the elderly and the destitute.

Image credit to Ministry of Social and Family Development

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It would help interested people find causes to volunteer with, but it would also do training and volunteer management.

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Bee Lian’s career also included a stint as the Director of the Rehabilitation and Protection Division which covers child protection and welfare, family protection and welfare, and the rehabilitation of young offenders.

Among other things, she had oversight of the Girls’ Home and the Boys’ Home.

Unlike her previous jobs, she was on-call around-the-clock. “The job was the equivalent of the director of operations in the police force,” she said. “The phone was beside me all the time.“

that when he grows up, despite his early circumstances, he would be emotionally well-adjusted so he would no longer need services from the system.

This penchant for taking the long view is undoubtedly part of the reason Bee Lian was tapped to As part of her job, she pushed become the chief executive of the the department to take a longNational Council of Social Service term perspective when handling clients. It was important to her that (NCSS) in 2007. the staff, handling child protection cases, did not merely remove the The NCSS is the national coordinating body for voluntary child from immediate danger. welfare organisations and when Instead, their aim should be to she joined, she had a vision to protect the child in such a way

“grow the voluntary sector, to help it blossom.”

Her philosophy was encapsulated in the phrase, “engage and enable”. She wanted her staff to engage with Volunteer Welfare Organisations (VWOs) in Singapore, to truly understand what they wanted to do and find out what resources they needed to achieve their goals.

After they truly understood the needs of that VWO, NCSS could then play an enabling role.

“We said, ‘If you are going to fundraise, why don’t you get IPC status?’ And we facilitated their efforts to get IPC status.”

Courtesy of National Youth Council

She is proud of the fact that on her watch, the number of VWOs that joined the NCSS doubled from 200 to 400. This is significant because it meant more opportunities for collaboration, both with the government and with each other.

that social workers get adequate training and supervision, and fosters closer working relationships among social service agencies.

The focus on training is something close to Bee Lian’s heart. She played a role in the setting up of At NCSS, she also had the chance the Social Service Institute which to work with SCGS old girl Jennie trains social workers. As such, Chua, who was Chairman of NCSS she welcomes being involved in the professional development of from 1999 to 2013, and whose social workers. term thus overlapped with Bee Lian’s. Bee Lian described the experience as a privilege and one Bee Lian looks back on her time in SCGS with fondness. that taught her many things.

Today, as Director of Social Welfare, Bee Lian leads the Office of the Director of Social Welfare which provides advice related to new laws and amendments to existing legislation such as the Children and Young Persons Act, the Destitute Persons Act, the Maintenance of Parents Act, the Prevention of Human Trafficking Act and the Women’s Charter.

It also sets the benchmarks for professional education and practice in social work, ensures

“They were happy days.”

She especially enjoyed being a Girl Guide, where she was given the award for best Girl Guide for two consecutive years.

No one enters social work expecting great financial reward; in fact, the opposite is true. Bee Lian’s ability to stay the course over more than four decades is ample evidence of her sincere desire to help those in need.

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Bee Lian recalled helping one VWO to carry out its fundraising more effectively. HealthServe was set up by doctors who wanted to help migrant workers by providing them with medical services.

It was raising funds but did not have Institution of Public Character (IPC) status. With an IPC status, it could issue tax-deductible receipts for donations which would have made it more attractive to potential donors.

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Arlene Pang

All at Sea, for a Good Cause

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Image credit to SAF Volunteer Corps

The only thing that suggests that Arlene Pang (SCGS: 1990 - 1999) is not your run-of-the-mill biology teacher is the slim black digital watch on her wrist. The humble Casio F-91 has been the timepiece of choice for generations of National Servicemen because the $15 watch is cheap, reliable and water resistant.

A water-resistant watch is particularly useful to Arlene because she spends a week at sea each year serving in the Republic of Singapore Navy as a Bridge Watchkeeper.

Image credit to SAF Volunteer Corps

Between 2012 to 2013, she was in Cambridge, Massachusetts, doing her Masters in Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. In that year in New England, she missed Singapore, and not just her friends and the food. She realised that she had taken the safety and security she enjoyed in Singapore for granted.

She was also grateful for the good education she received in Singapore while growing up and for the opportunity to realise her dream of studying overseas when she was awarded the post-graduate scholarship.

“After receiving so much, I had to find a way to give back.”

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She is one of more than 700 people who have joined the Singapore Armed Forces Volunteer Corps (SAFVC), serving the SAF in various vocations.

Arlene’s job involves scanning the seas and picking out vessels nearby. She needs to identify the vessels within visual range and report their relative bearing and course (whether port or starboard, near or far away, and whether On the surface, the soft-spoken moving towards or away from the teacher who joined SCGS in 2018 ship) to the Officer Of The Watch. would appear to be an unlikely person to volunteer to don the Arlene has been with the Navy’s Number 4 uniform. She Volunteer Corps since its was not even a member of the inception and has been through National Cadet Corps in her five deployments thus for. Apart school days. In fact, whenever from annual sailing deployments people raised the possibility of on large vessels known as Landing girls doing National Service, she Ship Tanks (LST), she has also got scared. “All the time, I was very been involved in crowd control worried I would be made to do NS at the National Day Parade and when I was young,” she recalls. engaged with the public during the Navy’s open house at Vivocity. So how did she end up in a She also supported training at camouflage uniform, with the first Women’s Boot Camp, binoculars around her neck, a weekend-long event held in serving on the bridge of an LST? September 2018 where 103 girls Well, while others join the Navy to and women signed up to get a see the world, Arlene joined the taste of what military life is like.

Navy because she missed home.

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While she was away, she kept in touch with what was going on back home and heard talk of a volunteer corps being set up. “I told myself, if there’s this scheme, I will sign up immediately.”

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Arlene was true to her word.

In 2014, while back home in Singapore, she saw the news on television that the SAF Volunteer Corps was taking in candidates.

“The next day, I sent in my form!” Less than a year later, she qualified to be a full-fledged volunteer serving in the Navy.

Going to sea was, in some ways, a natural choice for Arlene. Her father served in the Navy as a reservist, working in the engine room, and from him, she learned what shipboard life was like. She also developed an interest in sailing during her time in New England from watching sailboats glide down the Charles River.

The idea of sailing intrigued her so much that on her return to Singapore, she went out of her way to get Dinghy Sailing Proficiency Certification (Level 1) as well as a Powered Pleasure Craft Driving Licence. This was before she signed up to serve with the SAF Volunteer Corps.

The ability to pilot small boats is not a necessity for serving in the Navy as a member of the Volunteer Corps, however. All volunteers are trained in the particular vocation they get assigned to. The training schedule begins with two weeks of basic training followed by qualification and advanced training to learn specialised vocational skills.

Arlene spent two weeks of in-camp training in Maju Camp where she learned to strip and assemble a rifle, went for live

firings and learned basic first aid.

She also participated in a threeday field camp on Pulau Tekong.

This was followed by basic qualification, and then advanced training in being a Bridge Watchkeeper, which was held over six weekends. Training completed, her first deployment was on the RSS Endurance in November 2015.

Bridge Watchkeepers are on watch for four hours, after which they take an eight-hour break.

Adding to the challenge is the fact that the waters around Singapore are among the busiest in the world. “When out at sea, one has to be on a constant alert because the situation at sea is Image credit to SAF Volunteer Corps

dynamic and can change very quickly, be it in terms of traffic or weather conditions.”

advertised on the school website, she jumped at the chance.

Being an old girl who has returned to teach has its advantages. “It feels very, very familiar,” she says.

“Some of my teachers are still here and I get flashbacks of events and conversations that took place during my time here as a student.

On the first day of school, my form class was using the classroom that my class was using when I was in Secondary One!”

While instructors can teach you how to identify ships in a classroom, there are some things you only learn while on board a vessel. One of the things Arlene learned while at sea involved figuring out how to share a small cabin with three other people.

“You have to learn how to move around within a confined space so that you don’t constantly get in each other’s way.”

While many things have remained the same, there are differences.

Arlene enjoys her time in uniform “The girls now have more very much. “It’s a break from the opportunities to explore their normal routine; it’s something interests and to pursue them, different,” she says. “I get to use a whether in school or outside.” different set of skills and engage my brain in a different way.”

One thing that has not changed is the focus on developing a The normal routine for her is well-rounded individual, she says. teaching Biology in her alma mater. She has been teaching “While the academics are since 2007, after getting a important, we are still very degree in Biological Sciences much focussed on the holistic from the Nanyang Technological development of each child.”

University. Before joining SCGS, she taught Biology at a number of Fortunately, if the girls in SCGS other secondary schools around want to see what a well-rounded Singapore. However, when she individual looks like, they need spotted an opening at SCGS only to pop their head into the Biology lab to see one in action.

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They play a crucial role on the ship because by keeping a lookout, they ensure safe navigation. This is particularly important if you are on a big ship that takes time to change its course. The LSTs that Arlene has served on are 141m long and are the biggest ships in Singapore’s Navy.