Technology is radically transforming every industry sector in Singapore and most parts of the world. As Singapore’s leaders have continually reiterated, this will continue to have a severe impact on jobs, professions and careers. Although unemployment in Singapore is relatively low compared to other developed countries, the annual average of 3.1% for citizens in 2016 has been the highest in six years.

At the 2017 May Day Rally, Lim Swee Say, the Minister for Manpower, underscored the fact that a shortage of skills is likely to be the catalyst for higher unemployment in the future, rather than a lack of jobs. The key to growth ultimately depends on how fast Singapore is able to restructure its industries to remain competitive and how able workers can develop new skills to stay relevant.

Since 2016, different agencies in Singapore have been working hard on Industry Transformation Maps (ITMs) to help drive productivity and innovation. These ITMs cover over 30 industry sectors that contribute close to 80% of Singapore’s GDP. SkillsFuture, a national movement which encourages all Singaporeans to engage in lifelong learning and gain mastery in domains they are passionate in, has also gained momentum with substantial government funding and programmes to drive skills upgrading.

More significant for higher education is the fact that a second ministerial post was created within the Ministry of Education, solely to oversee Higher Education and Skills. The Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Education chairs a committee comprising the provosts of the six public universities and principals of the five polytechnics in Singapore, as well as key officers from SkillsFuture Singapore, a government agency. This committee coordinates the work of skills training and competency building among the Institutes for Higher Education (IHL) for Singapore’s workforce and the future economy.

There are now schools, academies or centres in every IHL specially focused on providing professional continuing education for working adults. Each university and polytechnic has been assigned lead roles in emerging areas identified by the government as critical for the growth of the future economy. Each spearheads training at the basic, intermediate and advanced levels in areas such as finance, data analytics, tech-enabled services, digital media, cybersecurity, entrepreneurship, advanced manufacturing and urban solutions.

How is this new imperative and surge of professional education programmes shaping the tertiary landscape, especially with regard to universities that have thus far been focused on research?

Here are three key changes in paradigms that I expect will take place.

OPEN SYSTEMS: THE NEW “TRADITIONAL”

Universities have traditionally operated on a cohort centric model where all students attend classes for consecutive years. This has allowed for a lot of efficiencies but resulted in a separation of preemployment from continuing education training.

Adult education or training should not be confined to simply “working adults”. Similar to emerging trends in the West, we have to be prepared for high school leavers with good academic grades from the junior colleges and polytechnics to choose to take their degrees in a completely new way. They may want to integrate real world or work experience with just-in-time learning and design their own academic journey over a period of years. Our autonomous
universities (AUs) do not yet have an open system for individuals to move in and out of university to periodically top up their learning. In light of this, universities should begin to think about delivering higher education in a more imaginative way, leveraging new technologies to provide greater flexibility and autonomy for learners of all ages to enter or return to university at different points in their career. Microcredentialling and nano-degrees, where learners can stack up competency-based modules to create their own degrees from different institutions, blended or otherwise, may be the new norm.

RELEARNING ADULT EDUCATION AND ANDRAGOGY

Adult learning is less about maturation and whole person development than instrumental learning, that is, learning focused on actual knowledge and skills, and the application of performance-based learning for specific employment purposes. The key to effective adult learning lies in identifying the skills or competencies that employers want, that are directly related to jobs. Adult education does not have a “captive market” unlike undergraduate education.

Adult classes usually carry significant opportunity costs for both workers and employers in terms of lost work time, wage sacrifice, increased costs, less leisure time and so on. This is why adult workers and employers have a very low threshold for training that they deem “irrelevant”. Universities need to cut straight to competency-based training that imparts the skills needed to improve productivity in the workplace.

The delivery of adult learning has to be customised to meet adult workers’ needs, that is, “bite-sized” modules and just-in-time learning. Universities will have to strike a good balance between using faculty and practitioners or adjunct with practical experience to teach courses. Having industry practitioners share their experiences and embedding real-life projects in the programmes enhances industry knowledge, makes the programmes more relevant, and is insightful and beneficial for the learners.

MULTI-MODAL TRACKS

Universities have built up valuable content for undergraduate education. Central to the new approach to continuing education is the unstacking of modules from undergraduate and postgraduate programmes and the re-purposing of the content for delivery for working adults. Continuing education centres can allow working professionals to combine modules to form a certificate or diploma. Part-time students could subsequently stack the modules from their diploma or certificate programmes, obtain credit recognition or waivers for them, and work towards a master degree in a shorter time frame or on a parttime basis. For working adults who do not as yet possess a basic degree, it is possible that they are allowed to take undergraduate modules in bite-size format and stack towards a bachelor’s degree as well.

INCENTIVISING AND REWARDING ACADEMICS

Research universities tend to reward faculty based on their research publications in top journals. With the falling undergraduate enrolment due to a decline in birth rate, and funding directed to continuing education, the allocation of faculty workload in terms of teaching undergraduates versus working adults will have to be adjusted. Incentives and schemes to recognise service or contribution towards upskilling the workforce will have to be put in place, to ensure prioritisation and sustainability. Universities will be well advised to review their performance matrix to ensure that academics who are strong adult educators are duly rewarded so that there is continual unlocking of university resources for the SkillsFuture initiative.

CONCLUSION

While the opportunities to provide industry-relevant competency training abound, universities will have to adopt appropriate measures for quality assurance of modules that are credit-bearing. There should also be coordination on the part of centres set up for continuing education with the schools so that marketing efforts and outreach to participants and funding agencies are well organised. The coordination will also ensure that there is provision for the recognition of prior learning for working professionals who seek credit exemptions, within reasonable limits, for skills and competencies acquired from previous training and on-the-job learning.