It is important for our students to learn how to learn. We have to keep in mind that we are preparing students for a future we cannot predict and for jobs that do not presently exist.
There are two things that I believe really matter in education: mindset and values. With the right mindset, our students will likely find success in life, but without the right values, there is a danger that the success may come at the expense of society at large.
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Assoc Prof Ben LEONG Wing Lup
PhD, MEng, SB (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Department of Computer Science
- Programming methodology
- Practical software engineering and software development
- Created the open source, online education platform Coursemology, which adds gaming elements to assignments, that has been widely acknowledged as making learning fun and engaging, and has been adopted in NUS modules, secondary schools and foreign universities, including Princeton University
- Developed four new modules over the years – one on Facebook application development in 2008; one on iPad programming in 2011; an experimental global software engineering education project module created in collaboration with Stanford University and Facebook in 2013; and an experimental online teaching module for returning national servicemen in 2014
- Appointed by Singapore’s Ministry of Education to train teachers to teach Computer Science, which is to be offered as a Singapore-Cambridge GCE ‘O’ Level subject from 2017
- Achieved consistently high student feedback scores across modules of different levels and complexity
- Promotes the bridging of theory and practice by encouraging the building of products for the real world, with many projects making it to the market, including two games launched on Apple’s App Store
- Eschews spoon-feeding in favour of interactive problems solved in collaboration with students while guiding them to be active learners and creative in analysing issues
- Crafts meticulously designed assignments and assessments to stimulate new thinking and illustrate concepts and applications
- Goes the extra mile for weak students by holding additional remedial classes and a peer teaching programme for the more able students to help tutor those who fall behind
- Published 33 articles in peer-reviewed academic journals and conferences
- Contributed articles on teaching to university publications
- Faculty Thought Leader Council, Facebook Inc (2013)
- Served on the programme committees for numerous international conferences
- Presented at numerous international conferences and symposia
- Invited annually to teach at the Sichuan University Summer Immersion Programme
- Honour Roll, Annual Teaching Excellence Award, NUS (2011)
- Annual Teaching Excellence Award, NUS (2010/2011, 2009/2010, 2008/2009)
- Faculty Teaching Excellence Award, NUS School of Computing (2010/2011, 2009/2010, 2008/2009)
- Communications Society and Information Theory Society Joint Paper Award (2009)
"A malaise affecting the world and society at large is that many people live rather uninspired and insipid lives.
I hope that my students will grow up to live inspired lives and become outstanding citizens. By encouraging curiosity and a love for learning, and also by inculcating habits of hard work and grit, my goal is to kindle the intrinsic motivation in my students to work towards becoming the best versions of themselves that they can be."