Alumni of the Year 2021

Alumni

OF THE YEAR 20 21

Congratulations to Finn Elliot (2020 cohort), Yin Noe (2013 cohort) and Josh Basham (2017 cohort) for winning Tanglin’s Alumni of the Year 2021! Having carved out a niche in their respective fields, these alumni truly embody our school’s values and aspirations. Here’s why they deserve their award.

The Alumni of the Year 2021 Awards is a celebration of Tanglin alumni who have made significant contributions or attained high levels of success in their industry - be it as a professional, sports person, arts extraordinaire or an avid contributor to the society. The criteria: they should be a living alumni who is at least 18 years old and attended minimally two years of schooling at Tanglin Trust School (including Raeburn Park, Tanglin Preparatory School, Winchester School, Weyhill Preparatory School, Alexandra Park, Tanglin Infant & Junior School). Nominations are made by fellow alumni and members of the school community, and they are reviewed by the Tanglin Alumni Committee as well as our CEO, Mr Craig Considine. Here are our three 2021 winners.

Finn Elliot (2020 cohort) •

Excellence in Arts

Attended Tanglin from Nursery to Year 4 • Studying Politics, Philosophy and Economics at the University of Exeter •

Nominated by Tanglin Community – James Rushworth

Finn (The Voice, Issue 36) is a talented actor who has acted in several shows including Netflix’s The Crown where he played young Prince Philip and The Last Kingdom where he was young Uhtred, son of the main character. The talented young man is not only an active member of the Chichester Festival Youth Theatre, he also acted in films such as The Mercy with Colin Firth and Rachel Weisz.

James Rushworth, who nominated the talented young man, said: “Finn managed to carve out a successful acting career across multiple stages/ platforms (more recently during the pandemic and therefore on his own overseas) while remaining focused on his studies and exams (he has done very well). He remains extremely humble and grounded in what he has already achieved so far in his short acting career. He’s a fantastic example to children and the broader Tanglin community, showing that with hard work (and talent), grit, a supportive family and friendship circle (and a little bit of luck) that one can make dreams come true. He’s a remarkable, decent young man that the school should rightly celebrate.”

Yin Noe (2013 cohort) • Professional Excellence

Attended Tanglin Year 9 to 13 • Entrepreneur Nominated by Faculty – Mhairi Aluthge-Donna

Yin Noe is an award-winning entrepreneur who has founded several successful ventures. In 2021, AccelerateHER & Google named Yin as one of the UK’s Top Inspiring 50 Tech Leaders in the Financial Times. In this list, she is one of the youngest winners and the first winner in history from Myanmar. She is also the founder of Coillection, a sustainability startup that generates clean energy (biodiesel) from used cooking oil. The startup received funding and recognition as the number one start up from Imperial College London and Shell.

Outside of her day-to-day activities, Yin takes an active role as an Associate for the Gandhi Centre for Inclusive Innovation, helping to mentor startups and organise funding events for mission-driven companies that create social impact. She also partakes in coding competitions and was named ‘Best Student Hacker’ at FinTech.

Mhairi Aluthge-Donna (Head of Business Studies & Economics), who has been nominating worthy candidates for the Alumni of the Year award since it was first launched, told us, “I was motivated to nominate Yin for Alumni of the Year after she was named as one of the UK’s Top Inspiring 50 Tech Leaders. She is not only the CEO of her own startup business, she also gives back as part of her mentorship role at the Gandhi Centre. Yin is a true embodiment of the Tanglin ethos, and a worthy and inspirational role model to current students.”

Josh Basham (2017 cohort) •

Excellence in Sports

Attended Tanglin from Year 6 to 8 • Professional rugby player (Newcastle Falcons) • Nominated by Staff – Sarah Le Grice

Josh left Tanglin to pursue his rugby career at Wellington College in the UK and quickly made his way into the first XV as captain, where he helped win three Daily Mail Trophy finals. He went on to play for England Under-18s as captain and then for England Under-20s in the 2018 Junior World Championship final against France. He followed this with a place at the World Rugby U20 Championship in Argentina in the summer of 2019.

Josh made his professional debut for London Irish during the 2017-18 season. On starting Durham University, Josh was able to link up with the Newcastle Falcons where he made his Premiership debut during the 2020-21 season. He scored his first Falcons try during that campaign in the European Challenge Cup victory away to Castres, earning his promotion into the first team squad where you can see him regularly playing in the back row. Sounds like Josh is heading for a bright future!

Sarah Le Grice, Josh’s nominator and Tanglin’s Lead Nurse, has nothing but praises for the accomplished sportsman. “Josh is a fantastic role model for our students, on and off the rugby pitch. He thoroughly deserves the Alumni of the Year Award 2021, and I am thrilled that his achievements have been recognised.” ■ If you have someone in mind for next year’s awards, then don’t forget to keep a lookout on the Tanglin Alumni website at alumni.tts.edu.sg. In the meantime, let’s pop the celebratory drinks and toast to our Alumni of 2021. Congratulations, everyone!