Speech by Minister for Education and Second Minister for Defence RAdm Teo Chee Hean at the Teachers Investiture Ceremony (4 Jul 2001)

SPEECH BY RADM (NS) TEO CHEE HEAN, MINISTER FOR EDUCATION AND SECOND MINISTER FOR DEFENCE AT THE NIE TEACHERS INVESTITURE CEREMONY ON WEDNESDAY, 4 JULY 2001 2.30 PM AT THE SINGAPORE INDOOR STADIUM

1. Today marks the entry of another group of 1800 trained teaching professionals into the Singapore Education Service. Some 1000 of you will be receiving your diplomas this afternoon. The rest, comprising mainly those who have undergone the BA/BSc degree courses and the Diploma in Education programmes have already received their degrees and diplomas in the morning.

2. I want to congratulate all of you for completing your initial teacher training. You are now standing at the threshold of an exciting, rewarding and meaningful career. On behalf of my colleagues in MOE, I want to welcome you into the teaching fraternity. It is a fraternity of professionals who are committed to the education of our young, the future of our nation.

3. Teachers lie at the heart of all we do in Education. This is why we need to ensure that teaching remains an attractive career choice. In order to build a world class professional teaching force, we have put in place a new Pay and Career structure called Edu-Pac or Education Service Professional Development and Career Plan. This plan offers you opportunities to grow and develop according to your interests, abilities and aspirations. The Edu-Pac has 3 main components: a new career structure, recognition structure, and enhancements to the performance management system.

4. We want to make teaching a choice career. With the new career structure, teachers can choose a career path that best suits them. You can aspire to be a Master Teacher, a School Leader or an Education Specialist. Each of these 3 tracks of progression is challenging and rewarding. Edu-Pac also strengthens the link between pay and performance. It aligns learning and development opportunities more closely with the career and recognition structures. You can look forward to enjoying the benefits of the Edu-Pac and an exciting career in Education.

5. Today, as you start on your journey, there are two important guiding principles that I would like to share with you.

6. Firstly, as a teaching professional, you must always bear in mind your mission. This provides you with a compass, so that in the midst of the changing landscape, you can navigate your way towards the destination. Secondly, as professionals, we must expect and demand high standards of ourselves. We have to constantly increase our capacity so that we can do the best for ourselves and the students in our care. I will elaborate on each of these guiding principles in turn.

7. Our mission is to mould the future of the nation, by moulding the students in our care, who will determine the future of the nation. This is a high calling and one that we cannot take lightly. Education goes far beyond the transmission of knowledge or preparing our students for examinations. Education is about developing people.

8. Our mission translates into two main roles that we must carry out. One of these roles is to develop in our students the capacity to learn and the love for learning. The other is to mould the character, values and attitudes of our students. Our students need to imbibe sound moral values; cultivate strength of character, healthy habits and team spirit. We want them to be aware of and appreciate the world around them. The future of our nation lies in the hands of the next generation of Singaporeans. They are the students we teach today. You will play an important role in shaping our students' values and national instincts. It is critical that schools provide our students with a total education. National Education is an important component of this learning experience.

9. The term National Education is comparatively new to our education system. It was launched in 1997. But the concept of National Education has never been far from our minds and hearts. Our schools have always been teaching our young about Singapore and imparting our shared values to them. National Education is a step-up in our efforts to systematically prepare our young for responsible citizenship.

10. Why do we have National Education? It is very easy to take for granted the comforts and successes we have achieved. Until we consider how exceptional this is, against the backdrop of political and economic uncertainty around the region, we may never seek to question why Singapore is able to distinguish herself from others. Until we understand the circumstances in which Singapore became a nation, we may never understand why we so jealously guard racial and religious harmony. Until we reflect on how we were able to ride out the Asian financial crisis, we may never see the importance of non-corruptibility, meritocracy, hard work and thrift.

11. We cannot leave it to another recession, a racial riot or sheer chance to educate the next generation of Singaporeans to learn about what makes Singapore tick. We have to play our part in ensuring that the values and instincts that are necessary for the survival of Singapore are passed on to them.

12. National Education is an important part of the education process. It provides the knowledge, experiences and tools for our young to know and understand Singapore, to acquire a well-founded confidence about the Singaporean way of life, and to critically think about how they can shape Singapore's future.

13. As citizens, each of us should learn the facts about our own country - what is our history, what is our geography and what is the relationship we have with the region and the rest of the world. Understand the facts and the context.

14. Most of you will be joining secondary schools. As secondary school teachers, you have the challenge of working with our students as they go through their difficult, and sometimes turbulent teenage years. Students of that age will not accept facts and statements without questioning them. This is especially so, in this day and age, when they can turn to the Internet for alternative views and answers. These are crucial years in their development and we have to find a way to engage them and steer them in the right direction. How can this be done?

15. In the traditional classroom setting, teachers have been viewed as the final authority on all things. This model is less relevant in this era of knowledge explosion. You will have to think of yourselves as guides and facilitators. To do this, you will need to be more open to alternative solutions and teaching methods. You may need to tolerate some ambiguity and chaos so that you can engage the students and lead them to quest and think. However, this does not mean that we will sway with the wind and the mood of the day, you will have to think critically and be anchored to a core set of good values.

16. The National Education programmes such as Learning Journeys and the Community Involvement Programme are menus that you can draw from, but you have to stretch your imagination to find out how best to reach your students and inspire them. More so than what you teach them formally, they will be influenced by your values and attitudes. Transmit to them your enthusiasm and energy. Equally important is your standing among the teenagers you will be teaching. Your credibility, and the trust and respect they have for you, will increase their motivation to learn from and with you.

17. I am very heartened by the enthusiastic way in which our schools have embraced NE. Schools have been trying out different ideas and sharing them at the cluster and national levels. Many schools have made special efforts to design, implement and refine their programmes to make them more effective. These schools deserve to be recognised.

18. The importance of the National Education effort was underlined when Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew, with the concurrence of Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, decided to set aside part of the proceeds from the sale of his Memoirs to set up an endowment fund to establish the Lee Kuan Yew National Education Award.

19. The Lee Kuan Yew National Education Award will be given out for the first time in 2002. It recognises schools that have excelled in their National Education efforts. It is to encourage all schools to continue putting in their best efforts in imbuing our students with a strong sense of national identity and social responsibility.

20. The task of nation-building is a never-ending one. Everything that we have achieved and what we enjoy today is due to the hard work and sacrifices of the generations of Singaporeans before us. Each generation of Singaporeans has to re-dedicate itself to this effort and plant the seeds for the benefit of the next generation. As teachers, you hold in your hands the power to inspire our young to plant new trees, so that their children may enjoy the fruits.

21. Let me move on to the second guiding principle, which is professionalism. In completing the initial teacher training, you have embarked on your journey of professional development. Your pre-service training at NIE has provided you with a repertoire of skills and a conceptual framework to understand and organise these skills. Treat this training as a basic tool-kit. To become a confident professional and a competent teacher, you cannot stop at the starter kit. You will need to acquire on-the-job training, by observing more experienced colleagues, by sharing with friends and by actually working and interacting with students in and outside the classroom. You will also benefit from reading and contributing to education journals, participating in forums and conferences.

22. Knowledge becomes obsolete very quickly. The half-life of knowledge is getting shorter and shorter. This half-life is defined as "the time after completion of training that professionals become half as competent as they were upon graduation, because of new developments." The half-life of knowledge for software is down to 18 months, electrical engineering five years, management knowledge is 24 months and declining. This means that what you learnt five years ago may already be irrelevant now. What are the implications for us?

23. Seize every opportunity to learn. The world we live in is changing at a breathtaking speed. If you do not make a conscious effort to stay in tune, you will not be able to prepare yourself and your students for the challenges ahead. This spirit of learning and upgrading of one's skills is one of the hallmarks of being a professional. Students model our behaviour and I am confident that your love for learning and zeal for knowledge will have a positive influence on the students.

24. Every so often, you will need to refresh your knowledge and skills by attending more formal courses, including those leading to formal qualifications at the Advanced Diploma, Advanced Postgraduate Diploma, Bachelor, Masters or PhD levels. NIE can be your "mothership" to which you regularly return for new ideas, new ways of looking at issues and doing things.

25. From January this year, NIE has established a set of Advanced Diploma and Advanced Postgraduate Diploma in Education programmes. In some cases, these advanced diplomas will enable teachers to upgrade and keep up-to-date in their content knowledge of school subjects. In others, they will impart new or additional skills like counselling, which help teachers in their daily school tasks.

26. In addition, these advanced diplomas will also provide a route for admission into NIE's bachelor's and master's degree programmes. Some of the modules will qualify for credits for the degree programmes.

27. Teachers also do not have to sign on to the whole advanced diploma programme to take individual modules. They can opt to study individual modules of the programmes and accumulate them at their own time and pace. Teachers can therefore have more choices of in-service continuing education in addition to a whole range of other in-service training courses that NIE will continue to offer.

28. NIE is also the place to return to for milestone training. As you move up the ladder in the profession, you will need to acquire new skills, knowledge and networks to perform your new tasks. NIE has recently re-positioned the former Diploma in Educational Administration course into the new Leaders in Education Programme (LEP). This is a highly intensive, executive-type programme to produce school leaders who can demonstrate extraordinary performance operating in an ability-driven paradigm.

29. Good leaders are key to achieving our vision of Thinking Schools, Learning Nation. I am therefore pleased to announce that Senior Minister Lee has also decided to set aside part of the proceeds from his Memoirs to establish a Lee Kuan Yew Leaders in Education Programme Award to be given to the best all-round LEP graduand.

30. On behalf of the Ministry of Education and the teaching profession, I would like to thank Senior Minister Lee for recognising the important role that leaders in the teaching profession play in shaping the future of our nation.

31. Finally, I want to welcome each one of you to the teaching fraternity and I wish you many rewarding years ahead in this time-honoured profession.