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Welcome Address By Professor Cheong Hee Kiat At The MOU Signing On 23 February 2019

Welcome Address By Professor Cheong Hee Kiat, President, Singapore University Of Social Sciences (SUSS), At The MOU Signing With Changi General Hospital Pte Ltd (CGH) And Singhealth Community Hospitals (SCH), Ang Mo Kio Community Club, Sport SG Council On 23 February 2019, 11:15 A.M.

Distinguished guests, colleagues, partners, our Gerontology students and alumni

  1. Good morning and a warm welcome to SUSS!
  1. As you walked through the atrium, you would have noticed the booths we have set up to inform about our programmes.  Today is our Open House, and each year, we aim to bring in a new intake of over 3,000 part-time students and close to 1,000 full-time students, to add to our present enrolment of about 15,000 students.  We run programmes in many disciplines ranging from the social sciences, business to technology.  One of these is a master programme in gerontology, which we pioneered in Singapore 8 years ago.
  1. We have a particular interest in issues of ageing and the ageing population.  While gerontology is specifically about this subject, we run programmes in other disciplines that cluster around and support the focus on ageing – social work, counselling, sociology, psychology, HRM, human factors, and even technology which has a strong impact on our senior citizens.
  1. But, just turning out graduates from an academic programme is not enough to address the challenges of an ageing population that are already at our doorstep.We need them to be applied, to be grounded, to experience real issues and solve problems first-hand.We need partnerships with stakeholders at the frontline to understand issues, research solutions and implement them well.Ageing is a multi-dimensional phenomenon, occurring today in a rapidly-changing environment that requires adaption which some elderly cannot readily cope with.Addressing the issues will require a multi-disciplinary and multi-prong approach, and thus, a multi-party collaboration. Individually, we can do very little. We have therefore come together, through the two sets of partnerships this morning, to explore and share possible solutions through a series of health and inter-generational activities, applied research and life-long learning opportunities to support this demographic group.
  1. These two MOUs target different dimensions of ageing.  Our first MOU today will be signed with Changi General Hospital and SingHealth Community Hospitals, to serve the Singapore society through healthcare innovation, research and education in the areas of gerontology and caregiving.
  1. The second is with People’s Association (through Ang Mo Kio Community Centre Management Committee) and Singapore Sports Council (through Sport Singapore).This brings together and synergises key capabilities and capacities in promoting active ageing – and, we will do the work with three thrusts: achieving impact, researching for better outcomes, and advocacy.
  1. Our faculty, students and alumni are going to be involved in the activities envisaged in both MOUs. They will benefit from the many learning opportunities to serve and to make a strong and positive social impact on our society.  I am happy that our Gerontology Programme from the SR Nathan School of Human Development (NSHD) is reaching out to the community and taking the lead to do different applied projects. Our SUSS GeronEngage, one of the alumni-led initiatives, will continue to work with faculty, students and community partners to promote active ageing and other educational activities that will benefit seniors and their caregivers. Many thanks to all our alumni and faculty members, Carol and Kalyani, for your effort in demonstrating the social mission of our university.   We hope that through these engagements, the SUSS community will be imbued with the 3Hs (Head, Heart and Habit) – Head (knowledge with practical application), Heart (social conscience) and Habit (self-directed lifelong learning habits).
  1. We will all age <I am already feeling the slide in various capabilities>. So I, and I think many here, have a vested interest that more such collaboration is undertaken.Even if you are younger here, you are moving inexorably along the same ageing path. The message can be nuanced in another way to get more of the young on board – that is, if the elderly folks are more physically fit, more mobile, more busy with their lives, more independent, the dividend for the younger is a reduced concern and ‘burden’ on them to care for their elderly.
  1. To our MOU partners - Changi General Hospital, SingHealth Community Hospitals, Ang Mo Kio CCMC and Sport SG - thank you for co-creating with us a platform to promote healthcare innovation, active ageing and inter-generational bonding.Our sincere gratitude to Dr Lee Chien Earn, Ms Margaret Lee, Mr Teng Soon Teh and Mr Lim Teck Yin for being here with us.
  1. What’s left to say – let’s sign and get on with the work! 
  1. Thank you. 

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