Undergraduate Degree/Diploma in Social Work

Name and Constituency of Member of Parliament

Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang, Nee Soon GRC

Question

To ask the Minister for Education (a) for each year in the past five years, broken down by the degrees awarded, how many students respectively applied for, were accepted into, were enrolled in or graduated with (i) an NUS undergraduate major in Social Work (ii) an NUS graduate diploma in Social Work (iii) an SUSS undergraduate degree in Social Work or (iv) an SUSS graduate diploma in social work; and (b) if such data is not being collected, whether the Ministry will start collecting it.

Response

1. Between 2016 and 2020, around 100 undergraduate students in NUS declared and graduated with a Major in Social Work each year. SUSS launched its full-time undergraduate degree programme in Social Work in 2016 with an intake of 52, which has increased to over 80 in recent years. The first cohort graduated in 2020.

2. Besides full-time undergraduate degrees, CET programmes such as part-time undergraduate degrees, graduate diplomas, and master's by coursework programmes from NUS and SUSS also contribute to the pipeline of social workers. The number of graduates from such programmes is around 300 a year since AY2017.