Introduction

Since its independence in 1965, Singapore has transformed from a small colonial outpost to a modern and well-developed city state in the span of a few decades. It has managed to do so due to its adaptability in shifting and rebalancing political priorities in accordance with changing global and social contexts. As an initial third world country rife with high unemployment rates, ethnic tensions, and other economic and political problems, priorities were placed heavily on economic security, nation-building, and eradicating political corruption to ensure Singapore’s survival as a newly independent state. As time passed, public issues became increasingly complex and multi-faceted, especially in the twenty-first century. To target such multidimensional issues, Singapore’s governance before the COVID-19 pandemic was one of government-wide collaboration, tapping into the diverse capabilities of the various public sectors under the helm of a centralized leadership. This collaborative approach allowed for coherent policy decision-making and coordinated implementation. Singapore’s small size (of about 5.7 million people) also facilitated this integrated and coherent approach to government policy.

Singapore’s Education System

Education has always been at the forefront of Singapore’s priorities, receiving heavy emphasis and investment. Political leaders compensated for Singapore’s lack of natural resources by developing the country’s only resource: its people. Therefore, much effort was put into building a strong education system which would develop good and contributing citizens. In the earlier decades of the nation’s history, Singapore invested heavily in stabilizing curriculum and practices to ensure a strong foundation for education. Over the years, the focus has shifted towards keeping education aligned with prevailing, real-world contexts and challenges such as shifting demographics or economic markets. It is believed that this has allowed Singapore to remain competitive in an increasingly globalized world. Thus, education was and continues to be viewed as essential to Singapore’s sustainable and long-term growth.

Based on the Singapore Ministry of Education (MOE)‘s Education Statistics Digest 2021, Singapore has 316 public primary and secondary schools, and about 394,721 students (Ministry of Education, 2021a). There has been a decreasing number of schools and enrollment rates due to declining birth rates. The MOE manages the development and administration of public schools and retains a supervisory and advisory role in independent and private schools. Increasing autonomy is being afforded to schools in terms of their curriculum and practices, as long as guidelines are adhered to. From 2000 to 2019, Singapore’s education spending accounted for roughly 20% or more of the country’s annual government expenditure (Macrotrends, 2022; UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2022b). This is roughly 4–5% more than the world average (UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 2022a).

Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Singapore

To understand the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Singapore, a summary timeline of the government’s policy response would be useful. Table 10.1 summarizes the evolution of events and measures from 2020 to 2022 by extracting key milestone measures in public health and education. There is generally close alignment between public health and education measures due to Singapore’s integrated multi-ministry approach to governance.

Table 10.1 Summary timeline of Singapore government’s milestone responses to the pandemic in public health and education (2020–2022)
Full size table

When the pandemic first hit Singapore in early 2020, the government’s priorities were to protect citizens’ lives and economic livelihood using two main principles: (1) relying on scientific evidence to shape policies and administrative measures, and (2) keeping others in the community well and safe by tapping on collectivist sentiments as well as social responsibility and accountability. These principles formed the bedrock of Singapore’s policy response efforts throughout the pandemic. For example, Singapore was one of the earlier countries to implement airport screening measures and aggressive testing when scientific evidence spoke of the high infectiousness and asymptomatic presentation of the newly prevalent coronavirus (Tan & Chua, 2022).

As the pandemic progressed through 2020 and 2021, Singapore continued to be steadfast in its policy response facilitated by existing science and technology research and development infrastructures. Science and technology permeated:

Implementations in testing (e.g., the Agency for Science, Technology and Research and Tan Tock Seng Hospital developed local test kits to detect the presence of the virus using real time RT-PCR; (A*STAR, 2020))

Crowd management and distribution (e.g., contact tracing apps such as TraceTogether and SafeEntry, smart and automated thermal scanners and gantry systems, and crowd analysis for safe distancing where the public was provided with regular updates on crowd levels in public places)

  • Community support (e.g., GoBusiness COVID portal which is a support portal for reopening businesses) (Singapore Government Developer Portal, 2022).

The wide adoption of these measures, motivated by a sense of community and social responsibility, cushioned the impact of growing infection rates, especially in 2021 when newly mutated variants drove infection rates up. Singapore was also early in procuring vaccines from other countries and obtaining high vaccination rates. An expert panel was put together to select vaccines deemed safe and effective, and advanced purchases were made to ensure that they were administered as promptly as possible (Abu Baker, 2021). Singapore was the first country in Asia to receive its first shipments of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines on December 21, 2020, and February 17, 2021, respectively (Table 10.1). Social responsibility was emphasized when communicating vaccine importance. The public was encouraged to get vaccinated to protect their loved ones and others in the community. Singapore started its vaccination campaign on December 30, 2020; within 8 months, 80% of Singapore’s population was vaccinated with two doses (Table 10.1). First priority was given to frontline healthcare workers and senior citizens, although education personnel were also prioritized in March 2021. This included non-teaching staff who come into regular contact with students, such as administrative staff, adjunct staff, student care center staff, and canteen staff.

Impacts on Learning

In terms of education, virus spread prevention necessitated the closure of schools and a sudden shift to full home-based learning (HBL) during the lockdown period. In Singapore, lockdowns lasted about 8 weeks from April 7, 2020, to June 1, 2020 (known as the “circuit breaker”). The shift to full HBL was a challenge for students and teachers for two reasons. First, although the concept of home-based learning was not new to schools and teachers (“e-learning” days had been implemented following the SARS pandemic in 2003), it was the first time that schools were closed for such a prolonged period of time. Second, although educational technology infrastructure was already in place before the pandemic (e.g., the Student Learning Space (SLS), an online learning portal for teachers and students), they had not been extensively adopted across schools and classrooms prior to the pandemic. Thus, there were high levels of uncertainty and change, and teachers and students scrambled to prepare for and adjust to online learning. The Academy of Singapore Teachers, which is the main academy responsible for teacher professional development in Singapore, supported teachers in their implementation of HBL through increased provisions of professional development courses and sharing sessions on the creation of e-resources and e-lesson packages on the SLS. This support, along with the fact that many teaching and learning resources (e.g., lesson plans) were already on SLS, allowed teachers and students to adapt to the new learning style.

Another innovative policy measure used to lighten the impact of school closure on students’ learning was expediting the month-long mid-year school holidays from June to May in 2020 to coincide with the second month of the circuit breaker. This helped minimize loss of learning days in in-person school to about 1 month in 2020, while maintaining learning opportunities during that month via online HBL (Tan & Chua, 2022). In the second round of HBL in May 2021, teachers and students were more adept at switching to HBL as they had experience to draw from, and it was for a shorter period (9 days).

While learning loss was ostensibly minimized due to the implementation of the above measures, there remains limited publicly-available evidence on the actual impact of learning loss due to the circuit breaker and pandemic. There is a paucity of published statistics on learning loss, although it was communicated that the overall performance of students in the 2020 national examinations was comparable to previous years in a parliamentary response (Ministry of Education, 2021b). It was suggested that based on this and student surveys conducted by the Ministry of Education on their full HBL experiences (where the majority indicated that their learning has not been severely affected during full HBL) that there was no significant negative impact on students’ learning. Nonetheless, it is important to remain cognizant of other possible effects of the circuit breaker that cannot be measured by quantitative means or captured by aggregate-level data. For example, the media surfaced issues of inequity, where vulnerable student populations suffered disproportionately during the circuit breaker. There were also rising concerns from the ground, disseminated by the media, about the impact of the pandemic on students’ and teachers’ health and development.

Impacts to Vulnerable Student Populations

During the circuit breaker in 2020, attention was drawn to the needs of vulnerable populations including students from low socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds, students with special needs, and those whose parents work in essential services which remained open during the lockdown. There were strong attempts by the government to provide support for these vulnerable student populations, although there has been limited specific and objective measures of how beneficial the measures were made publicly available. Firstly, inequity was apparent when issues pertaining to a lack of digital devices, internet, and a learning space at home impacted the learning of students from low SES backgrounds disproportionately. For example, the Singapore Longitudinal Early Development Study (SG Leads) found that 44% of vulnerable families living in rental flatsFootnote 1 do not have a computer or laptop at home (as compared to 4% for those from higher-SES families living in private properties) and 8% of these families do not have their own Wi-Fi subscriptions (Yeung, 2020). 40% of them have 5 or more family members at home sharing the small living space (36-45sqm) of the rental flat, leaving little space and privacy for learning. To support equitable student learning during the circuit breaker, MOE loaned roughly 12,500 laptops and tablets as well as 1200 internet enabling devices to students by Apr 15, 2020 (Ang, 2020a). About 47,000 primary and secondary students (i.e., the number of students on MOE’s financial assistance schemes, roughly 9.4% of students in total) who typically receive meal subsidies for meals in schools were also given their meal subsidies in the form of School Smartcard top-ups (S$60 for primary school students and S$120 for secondary school students). They could use these top-ups to purchase food and essential groceries from selected food places and markets.

Secondly, students with other special learning, behavioral, or emotional needs lacked the face-to-face support usually provided by allied educators and counselors in school. Students whose parents work in essential services lacked necessary caregiving and supervision at home. In response to this, MOE allowed a small group of students with high support needs, as assessed by each school, to return to school for limited services and school-based interventions. Others received provisions in terms of adjustments to online materials and pedagogy to accommodate their learning needs. Overall, about 1% of students were returning to schools during the circuit breaker, for provisions such as access to digital devices, face-to-face engagement, as well as lunch meals (Ang, 2020d; Ministry of Education, 2020b). While most schools were directed by the ministry to provide such accommodations, in reality priority and affordances were based on school assessments of needs and resources. Overall, while there is no doubt that the government responded with measures to support vulnerable student populations, there is a lack of specific evidence available to the public to understand the level of benefit these measures afforded them.

Other Impacts in Education

When in-person lessons were being conducted throughout 2020 and 2021, safety management measures continued to be in place. These included safely distanced seating arrangements, mask wearing, and restrictions on large-scale activities and congregations (Ng, 2021a, b). There were concerns surrounding student and teacher development and health, as reported qualitatively. The effects of prolonged mask wearing and restrictions on social interaction on children’s development – such as being unable to learn through facial expressions and lip cues – aspects important for phonics and literacy, as well as social development became apparent (The Straits Times, 2022; Yeo, 2022). This would become one of the considerations for removing the indoor mask mandate in August 2022, as explained by Singapore’s prime minister, Mr. Lee Hsien Loong, in the 2022 National Day Rally speech (Lee, 2022). Limitations on large group activities also meant less opportunities for play, social interaction, and physical activity for students. Indeed, limited outdoor playtime was found to be linked to increases in body mass amongst Singaporean children (Sum et al., 2022). In addition, teachers began taking on unprecedented roles related to the administration and implementation of safety management measures, with many working longer hours at a greater risk of burnout (Teng, 2021). There were rising sentiments and awareness amongst the public of teachers being overworked during this period.

Shifts in Singapore’s Education System in Response to the Pandemic

In August 2022, Singapore announced that masks would only be mandatory on public transport and in healthcare facilities. Group size limits on social gatherings and safe distancing were no longer required. In-school restrictions had loosened to pre-COVID levels, allowing students to attend school without having to wear a mask. As society and education regained normalcy, present interests, and concerns shifted beyond learning loss and public health, and related more to long-term educational, social, and psychological impacts that not only influence students and teachers, but also the larger ecosystem of education and its agents.

Increased Adoption of Educational Technology in Singapore

One of the silver linings of the pandemic observed in Singapore has been the flourishing of digital innovation across schools. We have started to see and will continue to see long-term shifts to curriculum and pedagogy which incorporate digitization and technology in schools and education. There were digital initiations by teachers and schools in a ground-up manner, partly due to the autonomy given to schools by ministry leadership. The MOE has also prioritized the utilization of technology in shaping its education plan, which will be described later in the chapter. As a result, many teachers harnessed SLS data analytic capabilities to assess students’ learning progress, using it to monitor individual and overall performance of a class. This allowed them to adjust their approach and address learning gaps in subsequent lessons before moving on. Other creative uses of technology in learning have also started to surface in some schools and learning situations. There have been case studies of teachers and educators using gamification and augmented reality to enhance the learning process for students, such as creating a mobile app to improve communication proficiency in Chinese (O’Brien et al., 2021) or getting students to sketch and manipulate three-dimensional shapes in augmented reality apps to facilitate understanding of chemistry structures and bonding (Lim, 2021). Other examples of harnessing technology include installing interactive digital flipcharts to facilitate teacher-student interaction (Inavate, 2018) and using swivel mounts such as Swivl in hybrid synchronous lessons so that students who login remotely can experience more intimate and authentic interactions in the class, as if they were present in person (Tan, 2022). In addition, technology has also been used to facilitate learning beyond classroom walls. Virtual reality (VR) techniques have been used to “bring students outside the classroom,” especially when restrictions on large outdoor activities such as field trips and overseas trips were still in place. For example, Primary 6 students in Kranji Primary school were transported to overseas locations using VR goggles as part of a two-day Virtual Overseas School Immersion and Cultural Learning Journey.

Such digital advancements and innovations by schools and teachers have transformed education and learning. Arguably, this created an opportunity for the Singapore education system to adapt fully to global trends in digitization and technology that had been forming over the past decade. Technology has long been ubiquitous in our and the younger generation’s lives. Students have been exposed to digital means to learn, communicate, and interact with others through online information and social media platforms, and habitually turn to technology to navigate information and interactions. However, education systems have yet to fully embrace technology by developing methods that harness it in a healthy and effective manner. Now is thus a good opportunity to transform education into a technologically enhanced sector, while equipping students with digital literacy and safety skills to protect them from potential negative impacts. Striving for balance is vital for our increasingly digitized world, where technology has penetrated our lives in an inseparable way. With the growing importance of a learner-centered approach, it would be beneficial for education systems to understand our learners today and how they are involved with technology. Education systems should meet learners where they are, providing a safe and effective learning environment that caters to their environment and skills. The pandemic nudged education systems and its agents to modernize learning, but we believe this sets the scene for larger restructuring and redevelopments of education to safely incorporate technology to enhance learning.

In Singapore, the government has been shifting education policy priorities based on insights from the pandemic. There has been a definite increase in digital adoption and a continued emphasis on self-directed learning based on the learner-centered approach. These rose in tandem with recognition of the benefits of blended learning and the proliferation of technology in our students’ lives. For example, by the end of 2021 all secondary students owned a personal learning device (PLD) under MOE’s National Digital Literacy Programme (NDLP) launched in 2020. This was brought forward 7 years from the original timeline (Ministry of Education, 2020a). Under the same program, students are expected to acquire digital skills across four components in the “Find, Think, Apply, Create” framework which equips them with the appropriate skills to gather and evaluate information (find), interpret and analyze data for problem-solving (think), use software and devices to facilitate the use of knowledge and skills (apply), as well as produce digital products and collaborate online (create) (Ministry of Education, 2022b). Cyber wellness is also emphasized in the program curriculum to ensure the safe and responsible use of technology.

In addition, home-based learning days became a regular occurrence in many secondary and post-secondary schools, and all such institutions were expected to be on board by the last quarter of 2022 (Ang, 2020c). These occurred after many educators noticed the benefits of home-based learning during the lockdown and called for them to be implemented regularly to complement classroom teaching. Ministry leadership promoted a balanced approach where home-based learning days are neither packed with curriculum teaching nor left entirely up to students’ own devices (Ang, 2020b). Home-based learning days are now implemented every fortnight, giving students more autonomy in their self-study or learning within certain guidelines. To protect against technology-related risks, some of which surfaced during the circuit breaker (e.g., incidents of hijackers in Zoom lessons; (Elangovan, 2020), MOE emphasized the use of a common secure infrastructure and enhanced security measures when using third party platforms (Channel News Asia, 2020).

Maximizing Opportunities for Disadvantaged Students in Singapore

Reflecting on the pandemic, Hargreaves (2021) and Sahlberg (2021) emphasized the importance of equity in education in the post-pandemic world. Countries should welcome and pursue an economic expansion in public education investment that benefits every child. In Singapore, the government has doubled down on efforts to maximize opportunities for disadvantaged and at-risk students. In the case of educational technology, this would mean creating the possibility of a digital dividend, instead of a digital divide. The acceleration of the nationwide distribution of personal learning devices (PLD) was targeted towards supporting accessibility to digital learning amongst lower-income students, and in hope of minimizing the digital gap. It was ensured that they received additional support so that there were no out-of-pocket payment for their PLDs. The UPLIFT Enhanced School Resourcing Program, originally a pilot launched in 2019, doubled its reach, to provide schools with more teachers and resources to help disadvantaged students stay in school. Each of the 57 schools it operates in will be provided with additional capacity to implement structures, processes, and customized programs to support these students (Today Online, 2021). For example, teachers could be deployed to provide re-integration and academic support for absent students, while other teachers could be deployed to conduct after-school programs. The original pilot program supported about 2000 disadvantaged students in improving attendance and behavior. The program will be extended to 100 schools in following years to support up to 13,000 pupils (Ministry of Education, 2021c).

Singapore is also expanding its inter-agency community support network to support disadvantaged students, consistent with its multi-agency and government-wide approach where different sectors are tapped on for their expertise. The network refers students and families who need help attending school regularly to community-based agencies and resources. For example, volunteers may check in on families to provide necessary practical or socio-emotional support. Around 80% of students who have been placed on the pilot program (UPLIFT Community Pilot) for 1 year since early 2020 are attending school more regularly (Ministry of Education, 2021c).

Supporting Mental Health and Wellness in Singapore

Another prominent issue that arose since the pandemic started relates to the declining mental well-being of students and teachers. In Singapore, there has been evidence of mental health concerns in the general public during the pandemic. The interagency Singapore COVID-19 Mental Wellness Taskforce, established by the Ministry of Health (MOH) and the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) in October 2020, released findings in August 2021 that 8.7% of 1058 participants met criteria for clinical depression, 9.3% met criteria for mild to severe stress, and 9.4% met criteria for clinical anxiety  (Ministry of Health, 2021). Amongst Singaporean youth (aged 16–34), as polled by the National Youth Council (NYC) between April and December 2020 on their challenges and sentiments on COVID-19, 52% reported that mental well-being is a challenge for them. Top stressors cited were anxiety over the future (53%), stress over finances (41%), and worries about academic or work performance (39%). Although these findings are concerning, it is difficult to measure the true impact of the pandemic on mental health without baseline statistics to compare them to. The study did not record pre-pandemic data in this categories, nor did they poll students under the age of 16.

Increased suicide rates recorded by the Samaritans of Singapore, a non-profit suicide prevention center, suggest that mental health concerns of youth aged 10–19 may be on the rise due to the pandemic. In 2020, overall suicide rates were at its highest in 8 years since 2012 (Samaritans of Singapore, 2021). From 2020 to 2021, the crisis hotline has seen a 127% increase in calls from youth aged 10–19. The incidence of suicide amongst this group also rose 23.3% from 30 deaths in 2020 to 37 in 2021 (Samaritans of Singapore, 2022).

Preliminary findings from the Singapore Youth Epidemiology and Resilience Study released in early 2022 (YEAR, 2022) found that 1 in 3 youths report experiencing internalizing mental health symptoms such as sadness, anxiety, and loneliness, while 1 in 6 youths report experiencing externalizing mental health symptoms such as hyperactivity, rule-breaking, and aggression. The study was conducted on 3336 young people aged 11–18. Youth aged 14–16 reported more serious symptoms. Based on another survey by the Singapore Counselling Centre, more than 80% of the sampled 1325 teachers reported that their mental health had been affected by their work during the pandemic (Ang, 2021). Overall, this is consistent with other international systematic reviews on COVID-19 and mental health studies which point towards the importance of improving mental health prevalence rates amongst students (e.g., Elharake et al., 2022; Loades et al., 2020; Samji et al., 2022) and teachers (e.g., Ozamiz-Etxebarria et al., 2021) ever since the pandemic started.

In response to rising concerns towards mental health issues amongst students and teachers, education policy measures were and continue to be shaped and restructured. For example, mid-year examinations in Singapore were canceled to reduce anxiety for students amidst the pandemic (Ang, 2022a, b); however, national examinations were retained as they were deemed essential and important for benchmarking and graduating. As an added measure, topics that were not covered due to the pandemic were taken out of the examination papers. This is in line with recent policy changes in past years to cater to students’ different strengths and interests, nurture their joy of learning, move away from an over-emphasis on results and academic comparisons, and reduce mental and psychological stress. For example, the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE) scoring system was revised to reduce fine differentiation of students’ examination results at a young age and recognize students’ achievement regardless of their peers’ performance (Ministry of Education, 2021d). Originally based on a T-score system which norms students’ results in accordance to their cohort, the exam is now an achievement level system which reflects how students have done relative to learning objectives. Full subject-based banding was also introduced in secondary schools, in which students are given the option to pursue their strengths and interests at higher levels should they wish to. In school teaching and report cards, teachers are encouraged to focus on students’ holistic and character development and not just results.

Moving forward, the government aims to continue destigmatizing mental health issues, strengthening peer support, recruiting more full-time counselors, and training more educators as para-counsellors to provide additional mental health support for students. Under MOE’s refreshed Character and Citizenship Education (CCE) curriculum, students will be better equipped with the knowledge and skills to understand mental health problems as well as when and where to seek support (Ministry of Education, 2022c). This aims to destigmatize mental health issues and nurture empathy and care. All schools are also establishing a peer support structure by 2022. All levels from primary to pre-university are expected to be conducting lessons from the refreshed curriculum by 2023. There are also plans to strengthen peer support for teacher well-being: the Wellness Ambassador Initiative, introduced in 2021, nominates school officers to be Wellness Ambassadors and receive training (Ministry of Education, 2022a). The government has also recently reviewed teachers’ pay and introduced a pay increase of between 5% and 10% (Teng, 2022).

Future Directions and Challenges

The COVID-19 pandemic provided lessons and silver linings for Singapore and education. It is clear that the pandemic has impacted us in complex ways. There is a need to rethink approaches and continuously adapt to shifting perspectives, trends, and contexts. Moving forward, we believe it will be beneficial to embrace educational technology and harness it in the best way possible, as well as to adopt an ecological perspective. However, complex challenges and insecurities continue to lie in the way.

Embracing Educational Technology for the Future

As mentioned, technology has become so pervasive in our lives that it would be impossible to negate it in education. The pandemic had only served to accelerate this use. Thus, education systems should embrace technology-enhanced learning in healthy and effective ways. From 1997–2019, Singapore incorporated technology in education through its ICT-in-Education masterplans. Currently, Singapore’s MOE is systemizing, concretizing, and implementing a new educational technology plan, called the EdTech plan, with strong directions towards a technology-enabled future for students and education. The new name reflects a shift in approach beyond just incorporating “ICT in education,” to develop a technology-enriched school environment which is adaptive, responsive, and agile in reacting to contextual changes (Ministry of Education, 2021e). The plan has goals to make education more:

  1. 1.

    self-directed, by developing pedagogies, tools, and structures that develop intrinsic motivation and self-ownership

  2. 2.

    personalized, by creating learning experiences catered to each student’s needs

  3. 3.

    connected, by developing collaborative learning experiences

  4. 4.

    human-centered, by leveraging data-driven understanding of students’ interests, attitudes, and motivations

Strategies include using artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance personalization, digital making to connect students in collaborative networks, and using technology for learner-centered assessments.

Adopting an ecological approach to this programming allows other agents in education to be recognized as enablers of the EdTech plan, including teachers, parents, and the community. Teachers are given professional development opportunities, teaching, and learning guides, and lesson design resources to aid in developing their e-pedagogy skills and data literacy in interpreting students’ learning and assessment data. There is also increased parent engagement with MOE’s communication channels to ensure that parents are provided with relevant resources and suggestions to ensure students’ effective and safe learning with technology at home. Lastly, there is increased involvement with community stakeholders and industry partners to provide authentic learning opportunities and address digital inclusion.

Adopting an Ecological Approach Towards Education

Taking a step back, we believe that adopting such an ecological approach for education as a whole is beneficial. Re-envisioning education and school policies from an ecological perspective could be the way forward in education, especially in the aftermath of the pandemic. This is rooted in the Ecological Systems Theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1992), which proposes that a child’s development is influenced by its different environments. In education, we identify the following different environments and agents that contribute to students’ learning: (1) schools, (2) teachers, as well as (3) home and parents. Firstly, education will benefit from re-empowering schools with resources to support every student in their learning inside and outside the classroom. It involves rethinking the concept of schools as beyond a physical site, but a facilitator for continuous learning. Next, as teachers are most directly involved with students, it is important for them to be empowered with continual professional development. Initial teacher training programmes should also equip them with the appropriate skills and knowledge. Lastly, understanding a child’s home and family background is also essential, as these familial and social factors can affect learning, behaviour, and motivation. This is also how we can better understand vulnerable students who may be underperforming in school due to home or family factors.

Future Global and Local Challenges

The world is now met with an era of profound global pessimism and fragility, with several insecurities coming together and dampening the possibility of global prosperity. We are met with a complex combination of insecurities related to geopolitics and war, economics and rising inflation, as well as existential concerns and climate change. In terms of education, COVID-19 hindered learning goals everywhere around the world, but most prominently in developing countries. Before the pandemic, the World Bank estimated that 52.7% of children aged 10 in low and low/middle-income countries did not have basic literacy abilities (“learning poverty”). Two and a half years into the pandemic, this is around 70%. This only serves to underscore the urgent need to address education equity and is a point of reflection for all countries on their social mobility.

In Singapore, the privilege of prioritized education has led to high literacy rates (97.6% in 2021; Singstat, 2021). There is also a coherent and well-planned perspective in governance which has allowed Singapore to circumvent global crises like the pandemic, as well as support systems in place to protect vulnerable populations as much as possible. However, Singapore remains vulnerable due to its geopolitical size, and is very much susceptible to external forces and shifts. We must not be complacent despite past successes, as the world presents very novel challenges to come. As a country who has only people as its main resource, there is a need to further develop the intrinsic capabilities of our people, so that Singapore remains competitive and resilient in the globalized world. Developing a strong global and cultural mindset that embraces cultural breadth and civic discourse is essential, especially with the increasing number of foreign students in our education system. Developing creative and unconventional minds is also important, as agility and innovation is now an important trait. There is also a need to refresh our social compact to uplift the bottom rungs of the population and to achieve a higher degree of social mobility and equity. These are all future questions and goals that are relevant to Singapore’s education system and policymakers.

In conclusion, it is apparent that the COVID-19 pandemic impacted our lives in ways far beyond public health and learning loss concerns, which were the main concerns in the initial waves of the crisis. Although Singapore was negatively impacted by paradigm shifts, vulnerable populations, and mental health and wellness, progress in digital innovations and technology-enhanced learning can be seen as a silver lining. While this was mainly discussed within primary and secondary school stages in this chapter, trends are similar in higher education. As Singapore continues its endemic journey, many challenges remain, and new ones arise. Will Singapore be able to remain resilient and stand the test of complex uncertainties? It will depend therefore on the innovation of its new leaders and the ability of its educational system to be nimble.