Singapore Government Press Release

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Good afternoon

It gives me great pleasure to be here today at the Closing Ceremony of Camp éLAN. I must commend Mendaki and the Centre for Computer Studies, Ngee Ann Polytechnic for organising this camp in collaboration with the other self-help groups - SINDA, CDAC and the Eurasian Association. I am pleased too, that for the first time this year, about 20 physically disadvantaged pupils are invited to share this experience.

The focus of this year’s camp is on Information Technology. Technology in general and computers in particular have become an important part of our lives. An IT camp like this is a good and effective way of reinforcing the importance of IT as well as for you, the participants, to learn IT skills in an enjoyable environment.

It is appropriate that your camp is held here at Ngee Ann Polytechnic, with the polytechnic staff sharing their expertise and helping you learn IT skills. For those who aspire to continue their studies at a polytechnic, this camp provides you an idea of what student life is like at a polytechnic.

Education must prepare our young for the future. While we cannot predict the future accurately, we are certain that it will be one of rapid change and technological advancement. It is therefore important for us to be able to adapt to change and learn new skills, especially IT skills. For this reason, the Ministry of Education has embarked on several IT initiatives over the past few years. In 1994, for example, we introduced a Computer Applications course for Normal (Technical) students. In this course, students learn how to operate a computer and use software packages such as word-processing and desktop publishing. These students have acquired key IT skills for the workplace of the future. Other projects include the Student’s and Teacher’s Workbench, the Accelerating the use of IT in Primary Schools project and the JCNet project. As these projects have shown to be beneficial, the Ministry decided to consolidate and build upon the experience gained through the formulation of a Masterplan for IT in education, which was announced by the Minister for Education on 28 April, 1997.

As we implement the Masterplan, teachers and pupils in schools can look forward to an exciting IT-enriched learning environment in the next few years. The government will commit a sum of $2 billion dollars from this year to 2002 to realise the goals of the Masterplan. Today, many of our schools are already equipped with computers. Every school is currently connected to the Internet. 17,000 teachers have Internet accounts. In the next 2-3 years, all schools will be networked, with computers in all learning areas including classrooms. With access to the Internet, teachers and pupils can tap world-wide information resources and embark on collaborative projects with schools in different parts of the world. The Masterplan will enable schools to take another leap up the technological ladder. Pupils will be able to learn more effectively and actively. They will learn how to locate information in databases around the world, sieve through and analyse what they get and apply it to their projects in innovative ways. These will be key skills for every worker in future.

During your camp, you will have a taste of what is it like to use IT. You have had a chance to surf the Internet and learn to create graphics and web pages. These are useful skills to develop. The Internet not only gives you ready access to information but is also excellent as a communication tool.

IT is also a useful tool to help you improve your reading, writing, listening and communication skills. IT offers you another way to learn and it can help you develop creative thinking and problem-solving skills. With these skills, we hope that you will also become more independent learners and will continue learning, even after you leave school.

For those with physical impairments, IT provides exciting possibilities and helps them to overcome these impairments. Technology such as text-to-speech translation will open up new worlds to the visually impaired, as they need not wait for text to be converted to braille. For those who are less mobile, the Internet brings all kinds of information and services to the home. With electronic mail, all of us including those with disabilities can communicate with speed and ease.

Hardware can also be modified to meet the needs of the disabled. I understand there is a variety of keyboards as well as head controlled mice to meet the different needs of the disabled, as well as special education software with adaptive devices to make them more user friendly to the disabled.

In conclusion, let me congratulate the organisers in bringing pupils of different ethnic groups and abilities together in a camp. It fosters community spirit and togetherness and makes the camp an even more enriching experience as you learn to understand one another better. I hope that all of you have had an enjoyable learning experience and made some new friends in the process.

Thank you.