Sunday Times Super Tutors

The Sunday Times

June 15, 2008

Super Tutors

Call this a tuition nation - 97 out of 100 children in a Sunday Times poll say they have tutors. So who are the most sought-after tutors in town? We narrowed them down to five.

From $220 monthly takings to $20,000

In the first three months of becoming a full-time tutor, Mr Phang Yu Hon earned a mere $220 monthly from his one student.

Now, the physics tutor has close to 90 students and earns about $20,000 a month.

The 41-year-old gave up his research engineer job after four years at the Ministry of Defence in 1994 and decided to tutor full-time.

'I had been giving part-time tuition and found I had a flair for teaching,' said Mr Phang.

He said it is not uncommon now for an entire extended family of children to attend his sessions.

'Word gets around and, year after year, cousins, siblings, the whole family, they come back to me for tuition,' he said.

Mr Phang has turned one of the rooms in his three-room Bishan flat into a mini-classroom, with desks, chairs and a whiteboard.

On weekdays, he gives lessons from 7 to 9pm.

Weekends are packed with classes from 12.30 to 9pm.

Until two years ago, Mr Phang was 'running around the island' giving individual one-on-one sessions.

'Group tuition can be achieved only by tutors who have reached a certain degree of stature and experience,' he said.

'When I started, I gave individual sessions, driving around Singapore like a taxi driver.'

The full-time tutor of 14 years was a Raffles Institution student.

He graduated with first-class honours in electrical engineering from the National University of Singapore.

NUS High School Tops Physics Olympiad

Congratulations especially to Fiona, Physics Olympiad Champion.

The Straits Times

Jan 11, 2008

NUS High tops physics contest

NUS High School bags top prizes in Singapore Physics Olympiad in its first showing

By Jane Ng

CHAMPION: Fiona Foo, 17,
was the overall winner.

THE National University of Singapore (NUS) High School has had a stellar first showing in the Singapore Physics Olympiad, bagging the crown as the overall school champion as well as producing the overall winner, 17-year-old Fiona Foo.

The school, which sent 15 students for the competition held in November last year, saw 10 of them receiving prizes ranging from an honorary mention to a gold award.

Of them, nine are Singaporeans who will be part of a group of 25 vying for eight spots in the Asian Physics Olympiad to be held in April.

The school, which focuses on nurturing young talents in mathematics and science, offers a six-year integrated programme from Secondary 1, culminating in a diploma.

The student participants were from the school's first batch of students, who joined at Secondary 3 three years ago.

Like other students in the school, they go through a specialised curriculum that emphasises maths and science. They are also on a modular system, which allows them to go further in a particular subject they excel at.

Fiona, who bagged the top prize, said she enjoyed being able to pursue something she loved. She prepared for the olympiad during nights in the school hostel with the rest of her classmates.

'We took an elective to prepare for the olympiad and the classes were held at night. It was a relaxed atmosphere and I took it because I enjoyed the subject.

'There was no pressure to perform, getting the top prize was just icing on the cake,' said the only child of an accountant and a businessman, whose favourite topic was quantum information theory.

According to the Institute of Physics Singapore, which organised the competition, the top prize has traditionally been dominated by male students.

The prize presentation was held on Wednesday at Micron Semiconductor Asia. Micron Foundation was the sponsor for the olympiad.

ACS(I) Tops International Baccalaureate (IB) Exams

Congratulations especially to inaugural IB students:
Kenneth (Higher Physics 7 Points), Joel (Higher Physics 7 Points), Shawna (Higher Physics 7 Points)

' 7 ' is the maximum points for each subject under the IB system.

The Straits Times

Jan 8, 2008

ACS(I) among world's best in IB exams

Students' average score, overall pass rate are tops

By Jane Ng

ANGLO-CHINESE School (Independent) students taking the International Baccalaureate (IB) examinations for the first time have produced results that are among the best in the world.

Nine obtained the perfect score of 45, making up almost half of only 20 candidates worldwide with that score. About 5,500 took the examinations around the world last November.

ACS(I) is the first Singapore school to offer the IB in place of the A levels. The new School of the Arts will also offer it.

The IB was first started 40 years ago in Geneva and is now offered by 2,200 schools in 125 countries.

All students sit for a standardised exam set by an international panel of university academics, and the scripts are marked in various countries ...

To put this in perspective, 9 out of the 20 perfect IB scorers worldwide were from ACS(I).

That means the other 11 perfect scorers were from amongst the other 2,199 schools in the other 124 countries.

ACS(I)’s stellar performance was not limited to just the top 9 perfect scorers, as seen from the following table (reproduced from ACS(I)’s website).

Singapore has proven once again that, whenever unbiased and objective standards of academic assessment are applied, we are tops.

RI, RJC to merge

Raffles Institution (Junior College), RI(JC)

Raffles Institution (Secondary), RI(Secondary)

The Straits Times

Oct 14, 2008

RI and RJC to Merge in January

The aim is to strengthen the six-year integrated programme; new school will be known as RI

By Jane Ng

TWENTY-SEVEN years after they decided to break off into two separate schools, Raffles Institution and Raffles Junior College will become one again.

The merger, which has been in the works for a few years now, was formally announced yesterday.

It will take effect in January, and the new school will be known as Raffles Institution (RI).

Another way to look at this ...

RI's Pre-University Section took a 27-year detour when RI shifted house from Grange Road to Bishan.