Donovan Liew receives Lee Hsien Loong Award for Outstanding All-Round Achievement 2021

CAPT alumnus, Donovan Liew Yi Heng, was presented the Lee Hsien Loong Award for Outstanding All-Round Achievement (LHL-OAA) by Minister for Education, Mr Chan Chun Sing at an online award ceremony held on 24 August 2021.

Established in 2009, the LHL-OAA recognises outstanding academic and non-academic achievements of post-secondary students, particularly those who have made outstanding contributions to the community and demonstrated the spirit of innovation and enterprise. The award is presented to one university graduate each year. The College nominated Donovan for his outstanding contribution to the College Students’ Committee and his various community engagement initiatives like HawkerJio, Migrant Workers Dependent Varsity Bursary and assisting in the coordination of online programmes for migrant workers in the NUS Community Recovery Facility (CRF) at Prince George’s Park Residences during the early stages of the pandemic.

Majoring in Geography, Donovan spent three and a half years of his undergraduate life in CAPT, with a semester abroad in his third year at King’s College London. In his second year, he served as the President of the 7th College Students’ Committee. Together with his team, Donovan implemented and coordinated student-centric initiatives within the College and at the University level.

After completing his term, he participated actively in various activities around the College and often sought to mentor his juniors. On top of student activities, Donovan was also active in academic activities. He co-convened a Reading Group on Hawker Culture with Dr Toh Tai Chong and assisted in many modules as an informal Teaching Assistant. His contributions and presence in the classes have been invaluable.

Donovan feels very honoured to receive the LHL-OAA Award. It is a way of acknowledging his contributions to the society, CAPT and NUS. Also extremely grateful and humbled, he hopes to acknowledge the support, inspiration and guidance of the community around him, moulding him into a better person, leader and friend.

Donovan is also a recipient of the MOE Teaching Scholarship and will be embarking on his next phase of his learning journey as a teacher, where he will continue to contribute to the society at large in teaching and learning, and inspiring the next generation of leaders with a heart and the spirit of innovation and enterprise. He has been teaching at a secondary school since his graduation and is currently looking forward to continuing his studies at the National Institute of Education at the Nanyang Technological University come January.

In the immediate term, Donovan is excited to keep on learning from the new experiences that he is exposed to in the course of his work at the Ministry and subsequently in NIE. He also hopes to continue giving back to the society in a variety of ways including that of inspiring and moulding the next generation of students which he will undoubtedly come across.

Looking back upon his CAPT journey, Donovan is thankful.

“I will never forget the faith and trust that CAPTains and the Fellows had in me, supporting and rooting for me all the way. I am immensely appreciative of the opportunities and doors that were opened along the way and will always treasure the relationships and friendships built.”

To all CAPTains, Donovan hopes that you will treasure each learning opportunity that comes your way. For till today, he holds the belief that education is a privilege and being able to live, learn, work and play in a community such as CAPT has been a great experience for him. And in serving and learning from the community around us, he reminds us that we do not actually have to, but instead, get to do it, and, hence, we should seize each moment along the way.