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What Challenges?
A few months ago, the National University of Singapore Student Union (NUSSU) published a report on several challenges facing the student population today.
One of them was the issue of a declining hall culture and decreasing Co-Curricular Activity (CCA) participation. It stated that students in general are “torn between participating in school, Hall and/or Residential College activities and looking for a job during schooling hours. This results in an exodus of spirited, passionate undergraduates who contribute to the vibrant campus life of the university.”
The paper went on to elaborate that “this also compromises on the civic and social education of undergraduates, which are primarily achieved through the Halls, Residences and Residential Colleges.”
Given my limited involvement in Hall, I can only comment so much on the issue of declining hall cultures. However, I would like to challenge the notion that civic and social education is “primarily achieved” by staying on campus. Many other student organisations like the faculty clubs, societies and interest groups are often under-appreciated for their contributions in this area - without the need for a room in school.
I would also like to say that the impact of decreasing CCA participation is unevenly felt – this depends on the nature and type of CCA in question. More importantly, the crux of the matter here is not a decrease in participation per se, but a decline in quality involvement and commitment from members and student leaders.
Participation, Involvement, Commitment
To better understand the terms of “participation”, “involvement” and “commitment”, I use this brief conversation with a former advisor of a student organisation to explain - he ruefully lamented that, five to ten years ago, student leaders used to stay on with their respective CCAs for three or four years – practically the entire course of their study. Now many leaders function more like participants – entire cohorts of leaders change almost every year. Last but not least, by “student leaders”, I broadly define them as students who take up management committee or their equivalent positions in their respective organisations.
I believe most CCAs have no issue recruiting members. What they lack are committed and involved ones who stay for the long-term. I’m not equating the number of years to loyalty and effectiveness per se – a multiple term committee leader can also put in sub par effort and serve with all the wrong motivations. What’s at stake here is the quality of involvement, regardless of the length of service.
So what if there's a decline?
Before we even deal with the reasons for a declining hall culture and degree of CCA participation, we need to question whether we should even be concerned about it in the first place. Well, it really depends.
If the purpose for coming to university is solely to study, then this issue is a non-starter.
If the university’s main emphasis is primarily on research or teaching, with student life taking second priority, then maybe not.
If the purpose of joining CCAs in school is to experiment and to learn, then the decline that manifests itself in CCA-hopping won’t matter so much, since it should benefit students in gaining them increased exposure to a variety of activities. After all, the university would be one of the last platforms for new experiences before the banality of working life sets in.
However, while experimentation, leadership change and renewal is important, more than a few student organisations appear to suffer from an inability to retain enough good leadership. This compromises organisational development and future recruitment efforts, which in turn, may set up a vicious cycle.
Even if experimentation was the focus here, the limited time that students spend in each CCA can be enhanced if we tackle the issues that result in such a decline. This would then enhance their overall experience during the course of their university lives.
Ultimately, if the university is one of the final stages to develop youths to be leaders of society - of which active citizenship (vs. armchair criticism) and organisational commitment is increasingly in short supply, then it would be wise to start developing these two aspects while still in the experimentation stage.
Beyond Rising Accommodation Fees: Why This Decline?
Rising accommodation fees has often been cited as a hindering factor to a vibrant campus life, but this generally applies to CCAs that involve on-campus accommodation, like the Halls and Residences. Some of the other reasons that help explain a decline in hall culture and CCA participation can more or less fall into two broad categories – a lack of clarity of purpose, insufficient official support & incentives and a mismanagement of expectations.
1. Overlapping purposes and objectives:
According to the Office of Student Affairs’ (OSA) Student Organisations website, there are currently more than one hundred student organisations in the National University of Singapore (NUS). These student organisations fall broadly into four categories:
1) Students’ Union (NUSSU) and its fourteen constituent clubs;
2) Sixty-eight student societies (e.g. NUS Economics Society, NUS Buddhist Society);
3) Twenty-eight student interest groups (NUS Gourmet Club); and
4) The six Hall Junior Common Room Committees (JCRCs)
I believe that these categories do not cover the other CCAs like the thirty-nine teamNUS sports teams, the twenty-two Centre for the Arts (CFAs) groups, the three or four University Town Residential College Student Committees (CSCs), and other entities that may not be officially listed. Students are spoilt for choice, and variety is often interpreted as a sign of vibrancy, which I find very difficult to define and a nebulous concept to fully grasp.
While each CCA is supposed to have their own drawing factors and serve particular niches, this intense competition to attract new recruits has resulted in two unintended consequences.
This first one - many CCAs end up trying to do everything to cater to the broadest possible audience. Ironically, in diversifying, this results in a loss of focus and a lack of differentiation and appeal. Many CCAs organise similar activities that cannibalise financial resources, manpower and participants, resulting a decline in the quality of these events. This form of “mission creep” may also result in a loss of organisational identity. Both students and student leaders may find trouble articulating what their organisation really stands for.
The second inadvertent outcome - this “experimental” mind-set of students towards CCAs has led to many members who try out many activities throughout their three, four or five years in school – but few leaders emerge, and even fewer stay to ensure some form of continuity, stability and development of the organisation.
On a more strategic level, the myriad of student organisations makes it unwieldy to deal with issues like representation, and overlapping spheres of responsibilities may result. The development of University Town (U-Town) has not see an accompanying change in how student organisations should be run. Already as it is, JCRCs and CSCs operate as parallel representative bodies that are geographically specific to certain areas of school, like the Halls and Residential Colleges.
Among other problems, such a cumbersome framework of organisations may make inter-organisational interactions inherently more complicated, result in overlapping spheres of influences and make them prone to turf wars. This may give the impression to many students that their supposedly representative organisations are full of conflict and paralysed by bureaucratic inaction.
Not only does this put off potential student leaders, it also drives many to become “keyboard warriors” on our numerous online blogs and alternative websites, instead of them stepping forward into active student citizenship. (Well this will still happen regardless of how well organisations are run, but perhaps, it can be reduced?) Organisations like NUSSU try to co-opt such bodies into the fold, but these are at best stopgap, temporary measures that need longer-term solutions to resolve.
2. Inconsistent Student-Administration Relations, Leadership Development Efforts
Most senior NUS administrators understand and champion the importance of a vibrant campus life. Personally, I’ve also had the privilege of working with outstanding mid to lower level administrative and academic staff that have gone the extra mile to help student organisations. Unfortunately, not everyone shares this enthusiasm. With the need to regulate and balance between having student activities and ensure the smooth running of academia, certain school authorities may even find such programmes and events a nuisance to their day-to-day work.
Much frustration and friction has resulted from a lack of effective communication and cooperation from both sides - there have been many instances of students deliberately contravening rules and regulations when organizing activities, and over-zealous staff who lack the understanding when enforcing them.
Worse still, several staff that I’ve worked with may have implicitly delegated piecemeal tasks and events for student clubs and societies to “assist” in their execution. Unnecessary bureaucracy and a failure to consider student leaders as equal partners are some of the contributing factors that hinder more active and sustained student involvement.
Another area of concern is the inconsistency in staff advisory support. According to OSA’s website, “Student organisations are highly encouraged to appoint like-minded NUS staff member(s) as their advisor(s). The primary role of the advisor(s) is to guide and assist the student organization to meet its objectives. The advisor(s) should ideally share same passion, interest or relevant experiences with the student organisation.”
Unfortunately, several student organisations may have had the extremes of having an over-involved advisor that interferes too much, or someone who is totally hands-off in guiding the group. These problems, while by no means unique to student organisations, do little to facilitate good experiences for student leaders during and even after their tenures.
3. Mismatch of expectations
Pragmatism, individualism and interest fragmentation – to put in simply, sterling academic results and impressive resumes matter more. Don’t get me wrong – studying in preparation for a good career should be one of our more important priorities, but my very narrow and limited observations so far tell me that increasingly, these are becoming our only priority.
Indeed, the NUSSU report is right in stating that students in general are “torn between participating in school/Hall/Residential College activities and looking for a job during schooling hours. Students are taking up multiple internships and looking for more work experience at younger ages now. Comparatively, CCA involvement is seen as second-rate and optional.
Even among the many different activities that are on offer, CCAs that produce tangible results and achievements score more news stories and publicity, and tend to fare better attracting more members. Winning medals and trophies, raising funds for charities or overseas community involvement programmes are higher-profile activities achieved in the short-term, thus giving students more items to embellish their resumes with. Contrast this with organisational CCAs that have fewer tangible, measurable incentives that may not even materialise during the students’ stay in NUS. These include influencing and working out longer-term policy changes that may take years to achieve.
The proliferation of smaller interest groups may mean increasing diversity and variety, once again helping to add to campus vibrancy. But this may also reflect growing individualism and self-interest of our students at large. To quote an online comment – “why be stuck in school during the holidays? Do something fun and interesting for (YOURSELF).” Most of us would rather pay to be entertained and enjoy ourselves with our friends and orientation groups, rather than to be tied down with commitments or sacrifice our precious time to serve people whom we might not even know, or like, for that matter. Once again, this mind-set does little to encourage organisational commitment.
4. Lack of incentives
Altruism and passion exist, but it is idealistic to think that these two noble concepts will suffice. There are indeed good people who will serve wholeheartedly for little or nothing in return – but these are too few and far between to form a critical mass of effective leaders.
Friendships forged and personal relationships developed through networking are often cited as means to retain people and an incentive to build connections for future career possibilities. I’m not denying their importance – but these are not enough. Students will remain the best of friends long after they step down, but more often than not, no longer as fellow student leaders.
Current incentives for student leaders, while thoughtful, are usually given only after he or she performs his/her term of service. A sterling CCA record and/or testimonial may be the culmination of a student leader’s one to two year terms. CCA points may be accumulated, but are only useful for Hall residents, or until the student leader decides that staying on campus is too expensive for his/her budget.
More support is needed during the toughest times – most often when the student has to juggle between his studies, external commitments, and their CCA involvement – even at the expense of a lowered Cumulative Average Point (CAP – the Group Point Average [GPA] equivalent).
I’ve heard of cases, where student leaders who struggled to cope were granted extensions for their assignment deadlines due to their heavy involvements and commitments. But these are few and far between, and certainly cannot and should not be official policy. These are often reactive, piecemeal measures. Whatever the case is, more needs to be done to sufficiently incentivise and encourage committed student leadership.
What do we do from here?
Solutions to such issues go beyond reducing accommodation fees and requesting for greater transparency of cost breakdowns. More needs to be done if we want to match official rhetoric that espouses a vibrant student life with actions that are carried out on the ground.
1. Restructure, refocus
It’s high time for the both university and student leaders to look into how the many student organisations can be better managed. For example, the latter could specialise and restructure, by focusing on their core competencies and re-defining their purposes and objectives. Certain events or activities can be outsourced or taken up other organisations with the relevant experience or expertise. Some can be dropped altogether, if they do not fit into the overall purpose of the organisation – no matter how popular or financially viable they are.
This could potentially change certain working or reporting relationships between organisations and merging several different entities that have overlapping interests or serve similar groups of stakeholders. Such measures are also highly political and can be emotive, given that some organisations will go to great lengths to justify their raison d’être.
Restructuring always has its pains. But perhaps this is one of the few solutions that may prevent an over-drawing of the leadership pool, enable students to better identify with what these organisations stand for; pool resources for greater efficiency, improve the quality of events and policies adopted, and better serve the interests of their stakeholders.
2. Develop our stakeholders and nurture partnerships
OSA has done well to in running a variety of training and development workshops, and should continue to develop our leaders along this track. As a further example, it can also consider how conflict management and resolution skills can be put across tactfully, given the inherently political nature of such organisations. More official and informal platforms can be created for sharing of best practices, experiences and collaborations between and among student organisations, instead of relying too heavily on one-off camps for networking. On the other hand, student leaders must also recognize the need to continually develop themselves to think on a strategic level, even as they attempt to lead their organisations on a day-to-day basis.
Besides our students, the university must continue to develop student club advisers and encourage more of them to step up. Different advisers have different focuses, approaches and styles of management, but they must also understand that their removal from the day-to-day running of the organisations gives them a bird’s eye perspective – a unique privilege that enables them to provide active guidance to students in terms of sharing of experiences, role modelling and lessons in leadership.
Collectively speaking, both the university administration and student organisations need to continue to work more closely together as partners, while maintaining their autonomy and separate identities. The university must engage student organisations as equal partners and stakeholders in the overarching process of strategic planning and implementation of university-wide policies. Student organisations must strive to value-add to student welfare by proposing alternative solutions to issues faced, instead of serving as mere conduits for student feedback.
A few good examples include the continual engagement by the Board of Undergraduate Studies and NUSSU in terms of reviewing academic policies and the Office of Estate and Development’s efforts to factor in students’ opinions when opening tenders for new canteen stalls. This far-sighted and inclusive approach needs to be continually reinforced to mid to lower-level staff that may not be able to understand the bigger picture.
What needs to be noted is that the tenures of many student leaders usually last from one to two years at the most. They also need to devote a large portion of their time to manage current events of their respective organisations. The onus thus falls more heavily on the university administration and ex-student leaders to provide more active strategic guidance and oversight for longer-term issues that may not always feature prominently on the radars of those currently in office.
The measures mentioned above will not just reduce the mistakes that will cost student leaders time, effort, money and even their grades, but truly develop their leadership skills and personal growth. All in all, they will go a long way in ensuring more pleasant working relationships with the administration and a constructive experience during their time in office.
3. Manage Expectations, Recognise, Incentivise
Unfortunately, the focus on numbers and tangible achievements may be the result of external societal demands and expectations – something that the university may not be in full control of, but should seek to influence and shape in the long-term. There are also several things that the school can and should look into in the meantime.
A short-term tangible incentive that can be explored is the provision of on campus accommodation free of charge, or at reduced rates for student leaders. Currently, Halls already offer subsidised accommodation for their Inter-Hall Games (IHG) sportspeople, and Residential Assistants have their accommodation fully paid for. Why not extend such incentives to JCRC members, or other student leaders who may have contributed equally, or even more to student life on campus in so many other ways?
This of course, may result in a sudden flood of applications for leadership positions for the wrong reasons – an issue that can be resolved through tightening the talent scouting and elections processes. There is also the highly political issue of which organisations’ leaders “deserve” such privileges, not to mention the huge uproar from students who may decry such an unfair move. But this again, is an example that I’m bringing up for further discussion. The proposed measure may go some way to support student leaders while in office, and reassure potential student leaders of a guaranteed and sufficient level of official support should they decide to step up.
More recognition should be accorded to organisational leadership and contribution, beyond the annual Student Achievement Awards. The university can do its part by recognising that active and committed involvement at the higher levels of student leadership is akin to taking on wider responsibilities in society and in future, the workforce. Measures like the Leave of Absence (LOA) could be expanded to include student leaders who wish to fully focus on developing their organisations instead of having to precariously juggling their studies at the same time.
In the bigger scheme of things, the right balance between equipping students with specialised, industry-oriented skills (through academics), and nurturing more generic skills (through their leadership experience) will enable students to adapt with confidence to shifts in the global economic environment. At the same time, the faculty in our world-renowned institution can impart an appropriate mix of academic and industry expertise to deliver a more versatile and practical approach to education.
If the purpose of university is to prepare our students for the world, student leaders do not need more certificates and plaques, but more so the peace of mind and encouragement to know that their continued service will serve themselves and the society well for years after their graduation.
At the same time, it is also the prerogative of the both student organisations and administration to emphasise the importance of having the right mind-set and expectations to their incoming leaders.
Leadership may have its privileges – but current or proposed incentives must not be deemed birth rights.
The challenge here is to inculcate what might be highly subjective values, understand the purpose of volunteering and build habits are essential to sustaining volunteerism.
Blood, toil, sweat and tears are just part and parcel of what it means to lead and serve – and these acts of service will often go un-recognised and much criticised at times.
Rethink and Review
Given my extremely limited scope of student leadership, I must apologise for my lack of awareness of certain policies and solutions that may already exist to resolve some of these issues. I’ve also made many sweeping generalisations and assumptions regarding the state of certain CCAs or the stance of the university administration.
Some of the suggestions that I’ve proposed may be too far ahead of their time, or have too many limitations to be feasible. Current administrative and policy limitations, such as the terms of office for most student leaders may also prevent them from carrying out longer-term organisational reforms. For example, the current cohort of student leaders may be stepping down in less than three months’ time, and there may be little more they can do to address this issue.
But whatever that has been raised here are not short-term issues and solutions. Mindsets need to change, and longer-term perspectives need to be adopted.
Student leaders of all generations should always understand and accept the sacrifices and responsibilities of leadership. Likewise, the university administration must also review the current framework to ensure that our student leaders are better supported and encouraged for their initiatives and contributions. This should be the way forward for a more sustainable and vibrant campus life.
A few months ago, the National University of Singapore Student Union (NUSSU) published a report on several challenges facing the student population today.
One of them was the issue of a declining hall culture and decreasing Co-Curricular Activity (CCA) participation. It stated that students in general are “torn between participating in school, Hall and/or Residential College activities and looking for a job during schooling hours. This results in an exodus of spirited, passionate undergraduates who contribute to the vibrant campus life of the university.”
The paper went on to elaborate that “this also compromises on the civic and social education of undergraduates, which are primarily achieved through the Halls, Residences and Residential Colleges.”
Given my limited involvement in Hall, I can only comment so much on the issue of declining hall cultures. However, I would like to challenge the notion that civic and social education is “primarily achieved” by staying on campus. Many other student organisations like the faculty clubs, societies and interest groups are often under-appreciated for their contributions in this area - without the need for a room in school.
I would also like to say that the impact of decreasing CCA participation is unevenly felt – this depends on the nature and type of CCA in question. More importantly, the crux of the matter here is not a decrease in participation per se, but a decline in quality involvement and commitment from members and student leaders.
Participation, Involvement, Commitment
To better understand the terms of “participation”, “involvement” and “commitment”, I use this brief conversation with a former advisor of a student organisation to explain - he ruefully lamented that, five to ten years ago, student leaders used to stay on with their respective CCAs for three or four years – practically the entire course of their study. Now many leaders function more like participants – entire cohorts of leaders change almost every year. Last but not least, by “student leaders”, I broadly define them as students who take up management committee or their equivalent positions in their respective organisations.
I believe most CCAs have no issue recruiting members. What they lack are committed and involved ones who stay for the long-term. I’m not equating the number of years to loyalty and effectiveness per se – a multiple term committee leader can also put in sub par effort and serve with all the wrong motivations. What’s at stake here is the quality of involvement, regardless of the length of service.
So what if there's a decline?
Before we even deal with the reasons for a declining hall culture and degree of CCA participation, we need to question whether we should even be concerned about it in the first place. Well, it really depends.
If the purpose for coming to university is solely to study, then this issue is a non-starter.
If the university’s main emphasis is primarily on research or teaching, with student life taking second priority, then maybe not.
If the purpose of joining CCAs in school is to experiment and to learn, then the decline that manifests itself in CCA-hopping won’t matter so much, since it should benefit students in gaining them increased exposure to a variety of activities. After all, the university would be one of the last platforms for new experiences before the banality of working life sets in.
However, while experimentation, leadership change and renewal is important, more than a few student organisations appear to suffer from an inability to retain enough good leadership. This compromises organisational development and future recruitment efforts, which in turn, may set up a vicious cycle.
Even if experimentation was the focus here, the limited time that students spend in each CCA can be enhanced if we tackle the issues that result in such a decline. This would then enhance their overall experience during the course of their university lives.
Ultimately, if the university is one of the final stages to develop youths to be leaders of society - of which active citizenship (vs. armchair criticism) and organisational commitment is increasingly in short supply, then it would be wise to start developing these two aspects while still in the experimentation stage.
Beyond Rising Accommodation Fees: Why This Decline?
Rising accommodation fees has often been cited as a hindering factor to a vibrant campus life, but this generally applies to CCAs that involve on-campus accommodation, like the Halls and Residences. Some of the other reasons that help explain a decline in hall culture and CCA participation can more or less fall into two broad categories – a lack of clarity of purpose, insufficient official support & incentives and a mismanagement of expectations.
1. Overlapping purposes and objectives:
According to the Office of Student Affairs’ (OSA) Student Organisations website, there are currently more than one hundred student organisations in the National University of Singapore (NUS). These student organisations fall broadly into four categories:
1) Students’ Union (NUSSU) and its fourteen constituent clubs;
2) Sixty-eight student societies (e.g. NUS Economics Society, NUS Buddhist Society);
3) Twenty-eight student interest groups (NUS Gourmet Club); and
4) The six Hall Junior Common Room Committees (JCRCs)
I believe that these categories do not cover the other CCAs like the thirty-nine teamNUS sports teams, the twenty-two Centre for the Arts (CFAs) groups, the three or four University Town Residential College Student Committees (CSCs), and other entities that may not be officially listed. Students are spoilt for choice, and variety is often interpreted as a sign of vibrancy, which I find very difficult to define and a nebulous concept to fully grasp.
While each CCA is supposed to have their own drawing factors and serve particular niches, this intense competition to attract new recruits has resulted in two unintended consequences.
This first one - many CCAs end up trying to do everything to cater to the broadest possible audience. Ironically, in diversifying, this results in a loss of focus and a lack of differentiation and appeal. Many CCAs organise similar activities that cannibalise financial resources, manpower and participants, resulting a decline in the quality of these events. This form of “mission creep” may also result in a loss of organisational identity. Both students and student leaders may find trouble articulating what their organisation really stands for.
The second inadvertent outcome - this “experimental” mind-set of students towards CCAs has led to many members who try out many activities throughout their three, four or five years in school – but few leaders emerge, and even fewer stay to ensure some form of continuity, stability and development of the organisation.
On a more strategic level, the myriad of student organisations makes it unwieldy to deal with issues like representation, and overlapping spheres of responsibilities may result. The development of University Town (U-Town) has not see an accompanying change in how student organisations should be run. Already as it is, JCRCs and CSCs operate as parallel representative bodies that are geographically specific to certain areas of school, like the Halls and Residential Colleges.
Among other problems, such a cumbersome framework of organisations may make inter-organisational interactions inherently more complicated, result in overlapping spheres of influences and make them prone to turf wars. This may give the impression to many students that their supposedly representative organisations are full of conflict and paralysed by bureaucratic inaction.
Not only does this put off potential student leaders, it also drives many to become “keyboard warriors” on our numerous online blogs and alternative websites, instead of them stepping forward into active student citizenship. (Well this will still happen regardless of how well organisations are run, but perhaps, it can be reduced?) Organisations like NUSSU try to co-opt such bodies into the fold, but these are at best stopgap, temporary measures that need longer-term solutions to resolve.
2. Inconsistent Student-Administration Relations, Leadership Development Efforts
Most senior NUS administrators understand and champion the importance of a vibrant campus life. Personally, I’ve also had the privilege of working with outstanding mid to lower level administrative and academic staff that have gone the extra mile to help student organisations. Unfortunately, not everyone shares this enthusiasm. With the need to regulate and balance between having student activities and ensure the smooth running of academia, certain school authorities may even find such programmes and events a nuisance to their day-to-day work.
Much frustration and friction has resulted from a lack of effective communication and cooperation from both sides - there have been many instances of students deliberately contravening rules and regulations when organizing activities, and over-zealous staff who lack the understanding when enforcing them.
Worse still, several staff that I’ve worked with may have implicitly delegated piecemeal tasks and events for student clubs and societies to “assist” in their execution. Unnecessary bureaucracy and a failure to consider student leaders as equal partners are some of the contributing factors that hinder more active and sustained student involvement.
Another area of concern is the inconsistency in staff advisory support. According to OSA’s website, “Student organisations are highly encouraged to appoint like-minded NUS staff member(s) as their advisor(s). The primary role of the advisor(s) is to guide and assist the student organization to meet its objectives. The advisor(s) should ideally share same passion, interest or relevant experiences with the student organisation.”
Unfortunately, several student organisations may have had the extremes of having an over-involved advisor that interferes too much, or someone who is totally hands-off in guiding the group. These problems, while by no means unique to student organisations, do little to facilitate good experiences for student leaders during and even after their tenures.
3. Mismatch of expectations
Pragmatism, individualism and interest fragmentation – to put in simply, sterling academic results and impressive resumes matter more. Don’t get me wrong – studying in preparation for a good career should be one of our more important priorities, but my very narrow and limited observations so far tell me that increasingly, these are becoming our only priority.
Indeed, the NUSSU report is right in stating that students in general are “torn between participating in school/Hall/Residential College activities and looking for a job during schooling hours. Students are taking up multiple internships and looking for more work experience at younger ages now. Comparatively, CCA involvement is seen as second-rate and optional.
Even among the many different activities that are on offer, CCAs that produce tangible results and achievements score more news stories and publicity, and tend to fare better attracting more members. Winning medals and trophies, raising funds for charities or overseas community involvement programmes are higher-profile activities achieved in the short-term, thus giving students more items to embellish their resumes with. Contrast this with organisational CCAs that have fewer tangible, measurable incentives that may not even materialise during the students’ stay in NUS. These include influencing and working out longer-term policy changes that may take years to achieve.
The proliferation of smaller interest groups may mean increasing diversity and variety, once again helping to add to campus vibrancy. But this may also reflect growing individualism and self-interest of our students at large. To quote an online comment – “why be stuck in school during the holidays? Do something fun and interesting for (YOURSELF).” Most of us would rather pay to be entertained and enjoy ourselves with our friends and orientation groups, rather than to be tied down with commitments or sacrifice our precious time to serve people whom we might not even know, or like, for that matter. Once again, this mind-set does little to encourage organisational commitment.
4. Lack of incentives
Altruism and passion exist, but it is idealistic to think that these two noble concepts will suffice. There are indeed good people who will serve wholeheartedly for little or nothing in return – but these are too few and far between to form a critical mass of effective leaders.
Friendships forged and personal relationships developed through networking are often cited as means to retain people and an incentive to build connections for future career possibilities. I’m not denying their importance – but these are not enough. Students will remain the best of friends long after they step down, but more often than not, no longer as fellow student leaders.
Current incentives for student leaders, while thoughtful, are usually given only after he or she performs his/her term of service. A sterling CCA record and/or testimonial may be the culmination of a student leader’s one to two year terms. CCA points may be accumulated, but are only useful for Hall residents, or until the student leader decides that staying on campus is too expensive for his/her budget.
More support is needed during the toughest times – most often when the student has to juggle between his studies, external commitments, and their CCA involvement – even at the expense of a lowered Cumulative Average Point (CAP – the Group Point Average [GPA] equivalent).
I’ve heard of cases, where student leaders who struggled to cope were granted extensions for their assignment deadlines due to their heavy involvements and commitments. But these are few and far between, and certainly cannot and should not be official policy. These are often reactive, piecemeal measures. Whatever the case is, more needs to be done to sufficiently incentivise and encourage committed student leadership.
What do we do from here?
Solutions to such issues go beyond reducing accommodation fees and requesting for greater transparency of cost breakdowns. More needs to be done if we want to match official rhetoric that espouses a vibrant student life with actions that are carried out on the ground.
1. Restructure, refocus
It’s high time for the both university and student leaders to look into how the many student organisations can be better managed. For example, the latter could specialise and restructure, by focusing on their core competencies and re-defining their purposes and objectives. Certain events or activities can be outsourced or taken up other organisations with the relevant experience or expertise. Some can be dropped altogether, if they do not fit into the overall purpose of the organisation – no matter how popular or financially viable they are.
This could potentially change certain working or reporting relationships between organisations and merging several different entities that have overlapping interests or serve similar groups of stakeholders. Such measures are also highly political and can be emotive, given that some organisations will go to great lengths to justify their raison d’être.
Restructuring always has its pains. But perhaps this is one of the few solutions that may prevent an over-drawing of the leadership pool, enable students to better identify with what these organisations stand for; pool resources for greater efficiency, improve the quality of events and policies adopted, and better serve the interests of their stakeholders.
2. Develop our stakeholders and nurture partnerships
OSA has done well to in running a variety of training and development workshops, and should continue to develop our leaders along this track. As a further example, it can also consider how conflict management and resolution skills can be put across tactfully, given the inherently political nature of such organisations. More official and informal platforms can be created for sharing of best practices, experiences and collaborations between and among student organisations, instead of relying too heavily on one-off camps for networking. On the other hand, student leaders must also recognize the need to continually develop themselves to think on a strategic level, even as they attempt to lead their organisations on a day-to-day basis.
Besides our students, the university must continue to develop student club advisers and encourage more of them to step up. Different advisers have different focuses, approaches and styles of management, but they must also understand that their removal from the day-to-day running of the organisations gives them a bird’s eye perspective – a unique privilege that enables them to provide active guidance to students in terms of sharing of experiences, role modelling and lessons in leadership.
Collectively speaking, both the university administration and student organisations need to continue to work more closely together as partners, while maintaining their autonomy and separate identities. The university must engage student organisations as equal partners and stakeholders in the overarching process of strategic planning and implementation of university-wide policies. Student organisations must strive to value-add to student welfare by proposing alternative solutions to issues faced, instead of serving as mere conduits for student feedback.
A few good examples include the continual engagement by the Board of Undergraduate Studies and NUSSU in terms of reviewing academic policies and the Office of Estate and Development’s efforts to factor in students’ opinions when opening tenders for new canteen stalls. This far-sighted and inclusive approach needs to be continually reinforced to mid to lower-level staff that may not be able to understand the bigger picture.
What needs to be noted is that the tenures of many student leaders usually last from one to two years at the most. They also need to devote a large portion of their time to manage current events of their respective organisations. The onus thus falls more heavily on the university administration and ex-student leaders to provide more active strategic guidance and oversight for longer-term issues that may not always feature prominently on the radars of those currently in office.
The measures mentioned above will not just reduce the mistakes that will cost student leaders time, effort, money and even their grades, but truly develop their leadership skills and personal growth. All in all, they will go a long way in ensuring more pleasant working relationships with the administration and a constructive experience during their time in office.
3. Manage Expectations, Recognise, Incentivise
Unfortunately, the focus on numbers and tangible achievements may be the result of external societal demands and expectations – something that the university may not be in full control of, but should seek to influence and shape in the long-term. There are also several things that the school can and should look into in the meantime.
A short-term tangible incentive that can be explored is the provision of on campus accommodation free of charge, or at reduced rates for student leaders. Currently, Halls already offer subsidised accommodation for their Inter-Hall Games (IHG) sportspeople, and Residential Assistants have their accommodation fully paid for. Why not extend such incentives to JCRC members, or other student leaders who may have contributed equally, or even more to student life on campus in so many other ways?
This of course, may result in a sudden flood of applications for leadership positions for the wrong reasons – an issue that can be resolved through tightening the talent scouting and elections processes. There is also the highly political issue of which organisations’ leaders “deserve” such privileges, not to mention the huge uproar from students who may decry such an unfair move. But this again, is an example that I’m bringing up for further discussion. The proposed measure may go some way to support student leaders while in office, and reassure potential student leaders of a guaranteed and sufficient level of official support should they decide to step up.
More recognition should be accorded to organisational leadership and contribution, beyond the annual Student Achievement Awards. The university can do its part by recognising that active and committed involvement at the higher levels of student leadership is akin to taking on wider responsibilities in society and in future, the workforce. Measures like the Leave of Absence (LOA) could be expanded to include student leaders who wish to fully focus on developing their organisations instead of having to precariously juggling their studies at the same time.
In the bigger scheme of things, the right balance between equipping students with specialised, industry-oriented skills (through academics), and nurturing more generic skills (through their leadership experience) will enable students to adapt with confidence to shifts in the global economic environment. At the same time, the faculty in our world-renowned institution can impart an appropriate mix of academic and industry expertise to deliver a more versatile and practical approach to education.
If the purpose of university is to prepare our students for the world, student leaders do not need more certificates and plaques, but more so the peace of mind and encouragement to know that their continued service will serve themselves and the society well for years after their graduation.
At the same time, it is also the prerogative of the both student organisations and administration to emphasise the importance of having the right mind-set and expectations to their incoming leaders.
Leadership may have its privileges – but current or proposed incentives must not be deemed birth rights.
The challenge here is to inculcate what might be highly subjective values, understand the purpose of volunteering and build habits are essential to sustaining volunteerism.
Blood, toil, sweat and tears are just part and parcel of what it means to lead and serve – and these acts of service will often go un-recognised and much criticised at times.
Rethink and Review
Given my extremely limited scope of student leadership, I must apologise for my lack of awareness of certain policies and solutions that may already exist to resolve some of these issues. I’ve also made many sweeping generalisations and assumptions regarding the state of certain CCAs or the stance of the university administration.
Some of the suggestions that I’ve proposed may be too far ahead of their time, or have too many limitations to be feasible. Current administrative and policy limitations, such as the terms of office for most student leaders may also prevent them from carrying out longer-term organisational reforms. For example, the current cohort of student leaders may be stepping down in less than three months’ time, and there may be little more they can do to address this issue.
But whatever that has been raised here are not short-term issues and solutions. Mindsets need to change, and longer-term perspectives need to be adopted.
Student leaders of all generations should always understand and accept the sacrifices and responsibilities of leadership. Likewise, the university administration must also review the current framework to ensure that our student leaders are better supported and encouraged for their initiatives and contributions. This should be the way forward for a more sustainable and vibrant campus life.
