Mr Soh Wai Wah, Principal and CEO, Singapore Polytechnic
Principals and Deputy Principals
Faculty and Students
Delegates
1. Good morning. I am glad to join you for Polytechnic Forum 2025.
- You have a week ahead of you, lots of activity, and I'm told even a residential component for you to talk about issues, dream about your ideals, exchange ideas, debate – but more importantly spend time together, have fun, enjoy and create memories for the future.
- I want to start off by thanking Singapore Polytechnic for organising this year's forum, which brings together our student leaders from all our polytechnics.
- It is also a key milestone programme for students from the Singapore Young Leaders Programme, or SYLP. I hope that through this week, you will learn more about Singapore, this island city home, and discover how you can contribute to causes that you care deeply for, find like-minded people or people with different mindsets who can add value to your understanding of the issues that you care about, and help shape the future of this city.
- At the same time, I would also like to thank our polytechnic faculty for guiding our student leaders on this journey of empowerment and self-discovery. For the next 5 days, we count on you to empower and mould, while giving free play, around the theme of this year's Polytechnic Forum, which is 'Our Singapore, our Home'. A very broad canvas for you to paint your ideas on.
2. This is a special year. SG60 recognises 60 years of efforts by early generations including our pioneers, who had to overcome tremendous challenges to make today's Singapore even possible. We may take Singapore for granted and assume we will continue to excel. Not so – the older ones amongst us, including myself, know what Singapore was like in the 70s, 80s, 90s, and early part of this millennia. Ask our generation's parents and grandparents, who saw a different side of Singapore – war, confrontation, rioting, uncertainty, turmoil and so on.
- But looking ahead just 40 years from today, to SG100 and beyond, the mantle of responsibility and leadership will be thrust upon you. It will be your generation's turn to lead Singapore sooner than you think.
- So, at this Polytechnic Forum, I would encourage you to work together, have fun together, and dream together. Think about your vision for Singapore when it's your turn to persuade, to lead, and to go out of Singapore to fight for Singapore's place.
- I remember when I graduated and I started work in the Attorney General's Chambers, I was sent overseas and my first assignment was to Stockholm, Sweden – and that was to represent Singapore for the Financial Action Taskforce (FATF). It's a circuit that talks about money laundering, counter terrorism and so on. I was stuck between large countries who didn't quite pay attention to us until they saw Team Singapore: myself, my fellow delegates from the Monetary Authority of Singapore, Police Commercial Affairs Department, and so on, work together to punch above the weight of tiny Singapore, by having many small discussions with others that led to the final outcome document. And they said, 'Wow, your delegation is so young, all black hair, from a small, tiny country we've never even heard about. But you guys are really something.' They said that to us in diplomatic language.
- So, you can shape not just Singapore's future but play a part in the future of this world in a small way.
3. Let me highlight four important issues that you might want to think about over the next week, which present both tremendous challenges for us, but also opportunities.
- First, some of you study history, and you know that whilst you live in the present, we are making history and living it. And if you look back, you see different epochs. You see post-World War II, you see the Cold War epoch, you see the post-Cold War era, where you have a unipolar world revolving around largely the US. Now we're moving into a new epoch where geopolitics is in flux. And so, think about the impact of geopolitical and economic pressures on Singapore and our way of life. When you read the papers and look at social media talking about what's happening around the world, and things that are changing – consider how these changes are already affecting us and will shape life here in our island because we are a small and open city-state. We rely on the free flow of international trade, goods, people and ideas and therefore are very much affected by global developments – maybe more so than larger countries around the world. The ongoing economic tariffs, and rising tensions between two of our largest partners, the US and China, affect our supply chains, and maybe even affect your parents, neighbours, and friends who are working in these supply chains' corporations. They also affect our investments globally. Indeed, this is part of a broader shift towards protectionism, and a retreat from multilateral trade norms – the rules that govern trade amongst different countries. All that is fast unravelling and changing. But at the same time, that you think about the impact, think about the opportunities for our businesses to develop innovative solutions to optimise processes and reduce costs too. Don't just think about surviving in this new environment, think about how all of us in Singapore can thrive. This really provides the potential for businesses to transform the way they operate. So how should we pivot, and what should our new economic blueprint look like, so that Singapore can thrive and survive in this new epoch that is unfolding as we speak? So that is the first question - the world is changing. How is it going to affect us, what should we do, and how can we operate in the future?
- Second, our ageing population. Ageing is a blessing, and we are very privileged to have seniors with lots of experience who have contributed a lot in our midst as part of society. But Singapore has one of the fastest-ageing societies in the world. By 2030, around 1 in 4 of us will be aged 65 and above and eventually all of us will be in this category. So, what this means is that the workforce is shrinking. The shrinking of our working-age population means that Singapore's core labour force may decline, which may undermine our economic growth trajectory. At the same time, this demographic shift means that pressures on our healthcare, on our eldercare, on our built environment sector, and retirement adequacy will continue to grow, to meet the needs of our seniors. The question we want to think about is how should we, as a whole-of-society, prepare for this? To turn this from a challenge, into an opportunity: not just managing but also thriving.
- Third, rapid advancements in AI and technology. We use these tools on the phone, we embrace these apps, they come fast and furious. But they are not just limited to helping us come up with ideas to help us with our assignments and projects. They are really beginning to make major changes in our lives and can be both incredibly transformative and at the same time extremely disruptive. In many dialogues, we have young people who talk about the amazing opportunities that they think these tools can present, but who are also concerned about the impact on jobs and our way of life. AI tools such as ChatGPT have brought us great convenience, from being able to generate human-like text to performing complex tasks such as coding. Most, if not all of you would have used ChatGPT or other tools for your coursework at some point in time. At the same time, repetitive jobs are being automated or assisted by AI, and this pushes us humans towards higher-order tasks like judgement, cross-disciplinary thinking, and creativity and ideas. New jobs have also been created in the AI value chain, including prompt engineers, AI ethics-and-bias auditors, and human-AI interaction designers. When I went to SUTD, I was told that they teach not just design and architecture, but design and architecture with AI. If you do architecture the traditional way, you will spend many hours coming up with the design. But the architects they are training can use AI to come up with 100 designs, which may be AI generated but have a very significant individual imprint. And that means our young students who go through SUTD are in control of the tools that help them to perform many of the tasks that architects currently do. And so, what does all this mean? This means that the demand for new skills will grow every day, and we have to keep upskilling and reskilling ourselves to keep up with these changes. So, the question is what do we need to do, to disrupt ourselves so that we do not get disrupted by others? Often, we are very comfortable with the way we are doing things and aim to just graduate well and gun for jobs. But we have to think about how to disrupt ourselves, and deliberately make ourselves uncomfortable, by bringing in technology that will shuffle the deck and put stressors on the way we do things, so that we are in control of the changes. Because if not, change will come and disrupt us from outside and we are left scrambling and reacting.
- Fourth, climate change. Singapore is particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. It is existential. Our survival as Singapore depends on our ability to marshal and work with partners to tackle climate change, and to adapt to the fast-changing climate. Rising sea levels, for one, are a threat to our low-lying island state. Some 30% of Singapore, if we don't do anything, is at threat of rising seas. And most of us have felt the effects of the hotter temperatures in recent years. Unpredictable weather conditions will affect our water and food security too, because we import a lot of our food, in fact most of it. While we diversify by importing from many sources, if all these sources can't produce enough food because climate has affected their harvest, we will be in trouble. So, the question to think of over the next five days is, what should we do to minimise the effects of climate change and ensure a liveable environment for generations to come?
4. In a time of change and flux, there is an opportunity for you as future leaders of this island to reimagine what Singapore will look like in the years ahead. The organising committee has lined up exciting activities over the course of the next five days: there are speaker sessions, learning journeys for you to visit places, games for you to pick up ideas through gamification, and even a residential component to make friends and exchange ideas. You will have plenty of opportunities to broaden your perspectives, deepen your insights on national issues, test your ideas with your friends, with the speakers, facilitators, lecturers and faculty, and think about how you can contribute not just to your own future and your families, but to the community around you.
5. To kick start this off, let me share a few tips with you as you immerse yourself in this forum:
- First, keep learning through life: never stop learning. Our education will not end when we graduate from polytechnic, ITE, university and so on. Your polytechnic education will equip you with industry-ready skills. But the ability to build on that strong base, and keep learning and picking up new skills, is what will set you up for success in this fast-changing world. Whether it is taking a new course outside your field of study, learning a new digital tool, or picking up soft skills, the future belongs to those who embrace lifelong learning to seize opportunities.
- Second, is to use these formative years to build strong set of values and mould your character to contribute to the wider society. While our skills and your academic qualifications may get you through the door, it is our attitude, our interpersonal skills and our values, such as your integrity, compassion, and work ethic, that will determine how far you will go. This extends to how we treat those around us – our family, friends, neighbours, classmates, superiors, peers, juniors, subordinates, and people in the community that you may walk past. When PM spoke about building a "We First" society – he was talking about one where everyone looks out for one another, and in so doing, enables us as individuals to thrive. That is to be contrasted with a society that believes that by empowering all of us through education and skills, people can each just race ahead as fast as they can. Some people believe in such a society, some people racing ahead will create wealth, value, and employment, and there will be a trickle-down effect. But that has been shown to not always be the case – some people may be left behind, or some people racing ahead may step on others. Whereas in a "We First" society, we believe that we individually thrive when the collective is strong. So, start by thinking of how we can do our part to contribute to our community and to Singapore, even as we pursue our own individual goals.
- Third, in envisioning Singapore's future, be bold and innovative, but have our feet firmly planted on the ground. During this forum, you will explore various sub-themes, such as how we can build a harmonious and inclusive society, how to reimagine education, and how to redesign life in our city. There will also be opportunities for you to wrestle with the trade-offs as you try to solve complex national issues, so you can discuss fresh insights and perspectives of what can be done and think about the part each of us can play in improving our city.
6. I encourage you to keep these thoughts in mind and some of the issues that I've just mentioned as you participate in the exciting activities planned for you over the next five days. This Polytechnic Forum is an important first step in your journey of shaping Singapore's future. As you embark on this journey, I invite you to be bold in envisioning the Singapore that you want to create. I wish you a fruitful and exciting Polytechnic Forum experience. Bring those friendships and networks along with you: they will hold you well throughout life. Thank you, and I look forward to engaging all of you further at the dialogue session.