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RECTOR
Rector
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Our newly appointed Rector, Mr Keith Chua, is Executive Chairman of ABR Holdings Limited, which operates Food and Beverage companies such as Swensens, Chilli Padi and Chilli Api.
Mr Chua also serves on the boards of a number of private companies and non-profit organisations including: Vice President – Restaurant Association of Singapore (RAS), Chairman – Caring for Life (CFL), Advisory Board Chairman – National Museum of Singapore (NMS), Board member – Woodbridge Hospital Charity Fund (WHCF), Board member – National Heritage Board (NHB), and Trustee of Mrs Lee Choon Guan Trust Fund.
As Trustee of Mrs Lee Choon Guan Trust Fund, he supports our College and NUS in areas of Education, Healthcare, and Community Engagement. One example is The Centre for Computing for Social Good & Philanthropy (CCSGP), set up with the vision to cultivate future technology leaders who have the ethos of service and giving back to society.
Mr Chua is also the Vice President of Singapore Anglican Community Services (SACS), a key service provider in both health and social sectors that runs a wide range of services, such as senior activity centres, nursing homes, temporary shelter for women and children, and psychiatric services such as residential rehabilitation and community intervention.
In July 2023, Mr Chua took up another calling and was appointed Nominated MP.
MASTER
Master
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: rc3head@nus.edu.sg
Associate Professor
Vice Dean, Student Life
School of Computing
Assoc Prof Gary Tan was a pioneer in the Direct Honours Programme of the National University of Singapore and received his B.Sc (1st class Honours) from NUS. He received his M.Sc and Ph.D from the University of Manchester , U.K.
He has been lecturing at the School of Computing , National University of Singapore since 1990, and has been the recipient of several teaching awards (NUS Annual Teaching Excellence Award for 03/04, 04/05 and 06/07). He is also on the ATEA Honour roll for 2008.
His research interests include parallel and distributed computing, scheduling and load balancing, declarative multiprocessors, parallel and distributed (interactive) simulation and High Level Architecture. He is currently working on Symbiotic Simulation for Traffic and Crisis Management.
He has served as Chair of the NUS PROSE committee, a cross-faculty agency tasked with promoting the use of good English in the University. He was also a Resident Fellow of Kent Ridge Hall (1993 – 2003) and was Master of Sheares Hall(2003-2013). He is now Vice Dean of Student Life at the school.
He serves on the program committee of Distributed Simulation and Real-time Systems Symposium, and is on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Modelling, Simulation, and Scientific Computing (World Scientific) and Journal of Simulation Modelling Practice and Theory (Elsevier). He is a member of ASIASIMfederation, and is President of the Society of Simulation and Gaming of Singapore(SSAGsg).
DIRECTORS
Senior Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Department of History, Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
Email: danieljew@nus.edu.sg
Dr Daniel Jew received his BA in Classical studies, and MPhil and doctorate in Ancient History, from Trinity College, Cambridge University. He became fascinated there with investigating the impact of Greek culture on critical thought, ideas of citizenship, subordinated classes (“subalterns”), and the ancient economy. Daniel has taught in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences and the University Scholars Programme at NUS, and at Monash University. He was formerly the Moses and Mary Finley Research Fellow at Darwin College Cambridge, and is excited to draw on his experience of rich college life overseas to serve as a CAPT Fellow. Outside of teaching and research, Daniel is an avid board game player, and hopes that his young twins might one day play with him.
Associate Professor
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science
Email: teckeong@nus.edu.sg
Throughout his NUS career, Teck Keong has been coordinating and teaching large classes (200-800 students per semester). The challenge of effectively managing the teaching and learning needs of not only a large but also diverse student cohort every semester motivated Teck Keong to explore using technology in his practice. His previous appointments as Resident Fellow of King Edward VII Hall and as Director for Residential Life and Resident Fellow at CAPT have also motivated him to desire to leave a lasting and positive impact on students. As a Deputy Director of the Centre for Development of Teaching and Learning, Teck Keong looks forward to expanding his network of colleagues to share ideas and deepen his understanding about teaching and learning in higher education. Teck Keong looks forward to continuing serving at CAPT as a College Fellow and the Co-Director of Studies.
Senior Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: lavanyab@nus.edu.sg
Dr Lavanya Balachandran is a sociologist working on issues of social mobility and social inequality in Singapore. Her broader research and teaching interests include family, education, race and ethnicity, social capital, ethnography, cultural studies and South Asian diaspora. Lavanya received a B.Acc in Accountancy (NTU), and thereafter worked in media and banking industries before completing her MA in Southeast Asian Studies (NUS) and Phd in Sociology (NUS), following which she joined as postdoctoral fellow with Asia Research Institute (NUS) and Centre for Family and Population Research. Her doctoral research examined the intersections of race and class through social capital in producing academic marginalization amongst ethnic Tamil youths in Singapore while her postdoctoral work explored the topic of remarriage and stepfamilies in Singapore. Lavanya credits her first job as a current affairs producer/journalist for overturning her own worldviews and assumptions about society and stimulating a sociological interest in understanding processes of marginalization through her direct engagement with disadvantaged communities. While at NUS, she taught various introductory and advanced courses in Sociology and South Asian Studies Programme. At CAPT, she hopes to draw from her diverse educational and teaching trajectory to promote experiential learning with the view of helping students not only develop empathy and reflexivity, but also find their own ‘voice’ and personal meaning in their academic pursuit. Besides teaching and research, Lavanya enjoys being neither ‘tiger mum’ nor ‘loving lion’ but rather her 6-year old daughter’s playmate and is also an ardent practitioner of Indian classical music and dance.
Senior Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Tropical Marine Science Institute
Email: rc3ttc@nus.edu.sg
Dr Toh Tai Chong is a marine biologist and he has worked on tropical coral reef systems since 2010. He received his BSc in Biological Sciences from Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and completed his PhD in Life Sciences from National University of Singapore (NUS). His research centres on coral reef conservation and restoration by utilizing a multi-disciplinary approach. To date, he has authored over 18 scientific publications and he hopes his academic contributions will facilitate the implementation of conservation projects worldwide. He is currently a lecturer in CAPT and holds a joint position as a post-doctoral research fellow with the Tropical Marine Science Institute (TMSI), NUS. Through his appointment in TMSI, he has worked extensively with local and overseas high school students to promote environmental education and he has taught undergraduates from various departments in NUS, including Department of Biological Sciences and Bachelor of Environmental Studies. Tai Chong is an advocate for lifelong learning and environmental education, and through his appointment in CAPT, he hopes to share his passion for marine science and Singapore’s natural heritage with the student community. His teaching approach focuses on game- and field-based learning, and he will be incorporating some of these pedagogies in his lessons in CAPT.
Senior Lecturer
Centre for English Language Communication
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: elcmsw@nus.edu.sg
Dr Misty Cook received her Bachelor of Arts & Science (Hons) degree with majors in Linguistics and Psychology from the Australian National University (Australia), and PhD in Applied Linguistics at the Victoria University (New Zealand). Misty has extensive experience in teaching oral and written communication skills in tertiary education. What makes Misty smile when she teaches? Working closely with students, seeing students ‘click’ once they grasp a taught concept, and applying the taught knowledge/skills beyond the classroom! Misty is also a strong advocate in teaching 21st-century competencies, providing feedback to further promote student learning, and leveraging on technology to enhance students’ learning experience inside and outside the classroom. Misty was with the SM2 Programme for 6 years before joining CAPT. She is very excited to have an opportunity to contribute to student life at CAPT, and engage in community outreach activities.
Misty’s portfolio link: http://www.nus.edu.sg/celc/staff/mistycook.html
FELLOWS
Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: atheljhu@nus.edu.sg
Engaging in the practice of social science and social research in bettering the lives of individuals and inspiring the next generation of individuals who have the heart for people and community, has been from the beginning and will always be Athel’s motivation as an educator. Athel’s training was primarily in Sociology, where she started to take an interest in mental health as well as in health and social behaviour. Thereafter, she went on to pursue her Master’s degree in Counselling and is currently reading her PhD in Public Health, with a focus on community mental health and mental health stigma prevention and intervention. Her passion in the area of mental health has taken her to places, which includes starting a social enterprise for mental health education and advocating for mental health literacy and stigma prevention in the community. In her decade-long experience teaching in higher institutions, she aims to develop students who are not only scholars who possess the intellect but also individuals with the character and heart to serve the people, especially those in need, on the ground. She practices “deep-learning” technique in her classes where she encourages her students to think deeper and find their answers and develop a deeper interest for the subject matter, through the questions posed in class. In her free time, Athel loves spending quality time with her favourite people, taking long walks in nature and “flying without wings” on her road-bike, which she named “Ironman”.
Associate Professor
Department of History, Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: hisbl@nus.edu.sg
Assoc Prof Bruce Lockhart‘s teaching and research focuses on the countries of mainland Southeast Asia, particularly Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos – the three places he lived in before moving to Singapore. He has been especially interested in the topic of kings and monarchy, but he is now spending more and more time thinking about how these countries perceive and write their own history as well. His current research project is a history of the modern Thai monarchy, and once that is completed he plans to go back to writing on Vietnam. Dr Lockhart’s teaching interests focus on Southeast Asia, as well as a module on the history of Christianity. He particularly enjoys teaching the history of culture and religion, including lots of myths and stories to make history come alive. He also spends a lot of time talking to students, and both mentoring and pastoral care are very important in his life at NUS.
Senior Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: kankana.m@nus.edu.sg
Dr Kankana Mukhopadhyay completed her PhD in Education & Human Development from the Warner School at the University of Rochester. The multidisciplinary approach of the Human Development program at Warner School greatly benefitted her in pursuing her research in understanding the social construction of identity by women, who play multiple roles everyday in the work place, family and community. Prior to her graduate studies she worked as a researcher in an UNESCO educational project for women conducted in a rural village in India. She was intrigued to observe how community involvement could be both empowering and disempowering for women who are challenged with complex negotiations of everyday roles, and was thus motivated to pursue these issues in her own research.Apart from identity theories, her research interests also lie in social research methodologies and different modes of inquiry. As Adjunct Instructor at Warner School she taught several research methods courses, enabling students to gain a firm understanding of different research paradigms and how to determine research designs and choice of methodologies – quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods. During her graduate program she also completed a certificate in program evaluation and has taught courses on both program evaluation theory and practice.
Senior Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum
Email: chiuyun@nus.edu.sg
Dr Joelle Lai Chiu Yun (赖秋云) received her doctoral degree from the National University of Singapore, specialising in the population genetics of the blue flower crab. She is a museum officer with the Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum where she is responsible for public outreach and education, and volunteer engagement, amongst other things. Her research interests revolves around crabs – cryptic species, sibling species, crab phylogeny, crab taxonomy and systematics, and marine biogeography using crustacean models. Joelle previously taught Environmental Biology (GEK1515) and took students on field trips to understand Singapore’s green and brown footprint, as well as the impact of marine debris on Singapore’s coastline. The nicest place she visited in the last year was Luang Prabang (Laos DPR) and she hopes kick back with a book and coffee by the Mekong River again soon.
Associate Professor
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: polwongr@nus.edu.sg
Assoc Prof Reuben Wong is Jean Monnet Professor in European Integration and Foreign Policy. He was First Secretary in the Singapore Embassy in Paris (1995-98), earned an M.Phil from Oxford University, then a Ph.D in International Relations from the LSE in 2003. He has written widely on the EU’s foreign policy and relations with ASEAN and China, including “The Europeanization of French Foreign Policy” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), and “National and European Foreign Policies” (Routledge, 2011). He has held visiting positions at Cambridge University, the LSE, the Stimson Center (Washington DC), and the East Asia Institute (Singapore). He is also the Liaison Officer for Antonians (St Antony’s College Oxford alumni) in Singapore and Malaysia. Dr Wong speaks French, Chinese and some Spanish. A Fulbright scholar (2009), he serves on the Council of the Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA), is an Associate Fellow at the EU Centre and was a Resident Fellow at Temasek Hall NUS (2005 -2010). He is an active media commentator on politics, and raises four children to help stem the falling Singaporean birth rate.
Associate Professor
NUS Business School
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: rc3tsk@nus.edu.sg
Assoc Prof Siok Kuan Tambyah (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison) is an Associate Professor in Marketing at the NUS Business School, National University of Singapore. As a child, Siok thought she would grow up to be a/an actress, entrepreneur, teacher or writer. Being an academic has enabled her to realize all these dreams and more. Siok’s research and teaching interests are consumption and identity (e.g., ethnicity and gender), consumer culture, happiness, values and lifestyles, luxury consumption, and cross-cultural consumer behavior. Siok is most happy when exploring new ideas, and new places in Singapore and around the world. She enjoys organizing get-togethers and helping to connect like-minded people. Her other interests include singing, doing consumer research through shopping, attending cultural events and watching sports.
Associate Professor
Department of Biochemistry, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: bchtant @nus.edu.sg
Assoc Prof Theresa Tan is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Biochemistry, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine. She had worked as a post-doctoral research fellow in the University of Dundee (Scotland) and the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (Singapore) before joining NUS as a faculty member in 1998. She has a strong interest in fuel metabolism and nutrition which constitutes a considerable part of her undergraduate teaching to the medical, dental and science students.Her research interest is on liver diseases. Past and current work includes hepatitis B infections, fatty liver and non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. To date she has co-authored more than 40 research papers in international journals. The long-term goal of her research is to understand the role of small regulatory RNA molecules called microRNAs in liver diseases.
Instructor
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: angietan@nus.edu.sg
Ms Angie Tan started working within different communities while she was still in school. Over the years, she worked on various types of projects across countries. Along the way, she picked up Sign Language and is now fluent in both Singapore (SgSL) and Chinese Sign Language (CSL). Her interest in community development led her to work with a Singaporean NGO full time where she set up orphanages and organised community development programmes in Thailand and Cambodia by working closely with the local community.
She received her Bachelor Degree of Commerce (Accounting & Marketing) from Curtin University, Australia, and obtained her Master of Arts (Contemporary China) from Nanyang Technological University (NTU).
Associate Professor
Department of Japanese Studies, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: lengthang@nus.edu.sg
Assoc Prof Thang Leng Leng is an anthropologist graduated from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with research and teaching interests on Japanese society and culture, aging, gender, intergenerational relationships and programs. She has embarked on fieldwork ranging from the studying of old and young relationships in an age-integrated institution in Tokyo, volunteering among Japanese seniors after the Kobe earthquake, migration of Japanese women to Australia and Southeast Asia. Recently, she also works on different aspects of aging in Singapore, including issues relating to grandparenthood, caregiving, seniors living alone, well-being of seniors and lifelong learning.As someone who believes that intergenerational solidarity (IGS) is necessary for a better society, she is active in promoting IGS. She is co-editor-in-chief of the “Journal of Intergenerational Relationships” (Taylor and Francies) and vice Chair of the International Consortium for Intergenerational Programmes (ICIP). She also provides consultancy on intergenerational programs and currently serves on the council of Families for Life (Ministry of Social and Family Development), and as Chairperson of Singapore Fei Yue Family Service Centre, a voluntary welfare organization active in aging, family and intergenerational programs, among others. She is head of the Department of Japanese Studies and teaches courses examining social-cultural issues in Japan. In addition, she also sometimes offer special courses such as FASS freshmen seminar titled “Generations” and also a course on service learning. In both courses, students experience service learning through the organisation of social events to promote intergenerational understanding.
Senior Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Ridge View Residential College
Email: rc3wsf@nus.edu.sg
Ms Wong Soon Fen is a lifelong learner who began her education journey outdoors as a child where hours were spent playing with friends from the neighbouring ‘kampongs’ before her first formal education in the now defunct Cambridge Primary School. The journey continued in different schools and culminated at NUS where she spent four years playing (and learning!) at Kent Ridge Hall while majoring in English Language and Sociology, and received her BA (Hons) in English Language. It took on a few different tracks as she traversed across the playgrounds at the College of Physical Education, Raffles Girls’ School, Shree Panch Ratna Rajya Laxmi Girls’ High School (Nepal) and Southeast East Asian Ministry of Education Organisation (SEAMEO) Regional Language Centre (RELC), and along the way, picked up an MSc in Applied Linguistics at the University of Edinburgh before her current stop at NUS. Since joining NUS at the Centre for English Language Communication (CELC) in 2007 and CAPT (formerly Angsana College) in 2012, she has taught and learnt from undergraduates and postgraduates from different schools – Business, Arts and Social Sciences, Computing, Science, Medicine, Music, and Design and Environment. As a student, teacher, teacher trainer, project manager and mentor at the different stations, Soon Fen has had the privilege of interacting with the beautiful peoples in Botswana, Cambodia, India, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Nepal, Philippines, Thailand, Timor Leste and Vietnam. This ongoing learning journey has given her research opportunities in language teaching, teacher education, pedagogy, collaborative learning, intercultural communication and educational work in developing countries.
Lecturer
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Division of Social Sciences, Yale-NUS College
Email: vania.yip@yale-nus.edu.sg
After obtaining her PhD in Psychology in 2018, Dr Vania Yip has been serving as a Lecturer in Yale-NUS where she taught courses ranging from quantitative reasoning and statistics, to organisational behaviour and psychological well-being. Vania is broadly interested in exploring resilience factors which can enhance the emotional well-being of individuals from the educational, clinical, and organisational settings. Her recent research examined how self-compassion, a frame of mind that promotes being accepting and kind to oneself, helps to mitigate negative emotions during difficult experiences. In addition to her research interests, Vania has also done research-consultancy work with the Singapore Armed Forces Centre for Leadership Development. Outside of work, Vania enjoys music (piano), art (oil pastels), floral arrangement, playing with babies, café hopping, and binging on Korean variety and drama.
Associate Professor
College of Alice & Peter Tan
Email: drtanlaiyong@nus.edu.sg
Upon graduation from NUS in 1985, Assoc Prof Tan Lai Yong worked as a doctor in Singapore. In 1996, he and his wife, and one year old daughter moved to Yunnan, China, and joined a community development team, working with the poverty affected in remote villages, caring for orphans, disabled children and leprosy affected.In his 15 years on Yunnan, he had to cycle about 30 km daily, create innovative ways to teach health and hygiene to the different Minority Ethnic groups and villages, plan for “surgery camps” for cleft palate babies and other disabled people, and also initiated tree planting (eg walnut) efforts that led to thousands of trees being planted to help raise farm income and also reduce soil erosion. As part of the China National Day celebrations in 2004, Lai Yong was given the Friendship Award for Foreign Experts at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, an event that was graced by Premier Wen Jia Bao. Lai Yong was also given the Singapore International Foundation (SIF Award) presented by Mr. Lee Hsien Loong and the 2005 Singapore MILK Fund (Mainly I Love Kids) Award for Outstanding Youth and Children’s Worker by President Nathan. In 2007, the Yunnan Provincial TV Station ran a series on people in Yunnan and the viewers voted Dr Tan Lai Yong as one of the “Good Citizens of Kunming”（昆明好人）Lai Yong has written several books and his first book, “Biting the Bamboo” – Experiences of Work and Life in Yunnan, is in its 5th printing. He also wrote the book , “Two Ears But Only One Mouth – Reflections on Wisdom in Rural Yunnan” and “Pilgrims” – A Photo journal of life in a Dai Village in Xishuangbanna (a joint publication with photographer Andrew Chew). He is married to Lay Chin and has 2 children.