Filed under: 3. Blogomatic
These days there are so many people uttering clichés that it makes them almost meaningless. Like for example – think out of the box. When people say think out of the box, you should read between the lines and see the little font sized 5 clause: with terms and conditions. This I realized deeply after spending 5 years of my life as a lecturer. Maneuvering the in-roads of this career you see a lot of guarded doors i.e. rules you have to follow to fit in and conform. In fact, the whole eduscape in Singapore is about breeding conformity. Conforming to the syllabus, to the appearance, to the rule book, protocol, don’t deviate, just follow law. Don’t stick your head out, stay under the radar and be another plebian in the crowd. If you follow and not change the rules, you’ll be safe, get a teaching excellence award and a promotion to boot. Renegades tend to be treated as irritation to the workflow and must be reined in.
As a hardcore edupunk, I hold true to think-out-of-the-box mentality and am obstinately staying out of the box. Why? Because I think the problem with conformity is that it is outdated for the new millennium and for the generation WE. Conformity was important in the industrial ages where humanity was struggling to make a standard kit for the purpose of eventually putting food on the table. These days we are looking to revolutionizing lifestyle and behavior. Looking at successful characters all over the world – you’d quickly realize that there is nothing they do that conforms to the normal ‘way’ of success to attain where they are. In fact, the more successful these characters, the less education they received and observers quickly come to the conclusion that they are so because their thought processes are not ‘molded’ or should I say smothered by the decades of education the normal man goes through.
Indeed. Professor PETER NG, director, Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research at the National University of Singapore put it succinctly when questioned about a Singaporean emerging amongst us to acquire the first Nobel prize for the nation. ‘We can only call a real winner our own when he is bred and trained here. That I do not see coming. Our educational structure is still too ‘closeted’ and narrow. Many past winners have been less than responsible. Some were mavericks, a few troublemakers, many rebellious‘.
For those who are reading this now, I encourage you do the same as well. No. Thinking out of the box is not about living life insolently but always questioning conformity and finding creative and elegant solutions to life not just to the assignment of a module you’re taking now in the polytechnic or in school. And I, will continue to follow the footsteps of the edupunks ahead of me, hoping to mold a future of successful and creative graduates who will maneuver life successfully instead of conforming to it.
Being a Lecturer and more
I think some of you are quite curious about the curious case of Benjamin Yang. Well, I am nothing spectacular really, though I do acknowledge that I am massively different from the other colleagues. Firstly, I think I have found my zen in this job. This is the best thing that has ever happened to me. Everytime I step into a classroom, my spine tingles and a wave of euphoria spreads all over me. Time passes quickly whilst I explain difficult concepts and see generations and generations of students with a ‘I got it!’ look on the face. Every night before a new semester begins (even till today), I can never find sleep because of the excitement of knowing I am finally going to resume what I do best.
I am extremely lucky to have accidentally chanced upon this career. I was inspired by the great lecturers I had when I was at the University of Bristol working on my Honors degree. I saw that the lecturers not only had a thing for their own research but they loved to teach. Most of the sessions were interesting and I never fell asleep like I did when I attended classes here in Singapore. When I returned, all I wanted to do was to bring about the same level of commitment and par excellence. Teaching is not just another job. It is THE job!
That alone was not sufficient as I found along the way. Because the current educational structure I believe was built the wrong way up. Producing scores and scores of graduates every year without meaning and without passion all going through the educational system to achieve grades, dis-interested in the intricacies and the amazing pieces of work that is taught before their very eyes. Totally lost after graduation only to prolong the suffering into university and afterwards into a job which puts rice on the table as the years pass by day after day robbed off the joys of work and how powerful and history changing each of these individuals can be.
I hope to change all that. To make a difference, by thinking different and I try my best to be an example for students. Everyday as I ponder about my work, I realized there’s always an exciting thing I should try, a new corner I should dig, a new approach to teaching I should muster and the possibilities are endless. 5 years on, I get more and more excited with each new semester. Breathing onto the class a whiff of fresh air is really not that difficult. I cannot wait to seek the shelter of the untapped potential of those seedlings I helped nurtured along the way. And I hope one of them would be you.
About this website and a little biography
Hi everyone, this is Mr. Yang. If you were wondering around, and ended up here – you’ll be able to read a little more about bits of myself. Firstly – you might be surprised why I chose to relocate all my academic material to an external site like this one. Well – wordpress is quite flexible and allows me to customize this space pretty much as I like. The same liberty cannot be had from the academic blackboard site that you have grown accustomed to. There are so many rules to follow and conform to and so user unfriendly and ugly I gave up. I told myself no, I am not another one of those factory pressed perfect Toyotas that just rolled off an assembly line. I am more like the handcrafted Morgans or a mac. haha. For one, there are so many tabs and levels that things just get buried under. Why not have a single page where you can see and access everything you need for the course?
Also, I hope for this site to serve additionally as a backup for past students who might need to return to get a refresher or be used as a reference point as they progress through their studies in SP, work life or even university. Currently with blackboard you will lose access to the module site once you complete it and move on to the next stage. I think this is not the best administrative procedure because the courses in the diploma are built upon earlier foundations and you should have the liberty to check back whence you need. Besides, I have painstakingly put together the course material over the years and it’ll be great if there is an opportunity to share these with other students, colleagues or the public. Finally, students can also reference the website so that others have a ‘preview’ of the content and see how rigorous it is.
That aside, I guess I should move on to a self-introduction. I am myself a proud Singapore Polytechnic graduate. Since graduation, I have worked at Raffles Hospital, Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (A*STAR), completed a BMedSci from Curtin University of Technology (Australia), a BSc(Hons) Pathology & Microbiology from Bristol University (UK) and currently pursuing an MSc(Clinical Trials) from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (UK). I have been lecturing at SP since late 2004.
Beyond the academic matters, I spend the time with my final year project students planning, developing and executing simple clinical trials – looking at biomedical effects of different health supplementation. My primary interest is in the use of antioxidants in lowering ox-LDL, an important indicator of atherosclerosis. The interest has now expanded into cognitive effects as well as sports performance.
Work and academic life aside, I am a swimming fanatic and will spend hours making sure I do a faster flip turn off the ends of the SP pool (yea, my life revolves around the SP compound). I hope I eventually enroll myself into a Master’s swimming competition (Olympics for old folks) and scare Phelp’s 200m butterfly record… or not. Nonetheless I think we should all have a dream or a direction in life and work towards it. Growing up is all about finding the right bricks to build the castle you dreamt up when you were young (still are). The bricks you find along the way do not have to be ‘perfect’ and you might be surprised at how much character it will give to your final product. Just visit Europe to appreciate what I mean.
