NUSWhispers – Confession #97856

NUS commencement ceremony Yesterday (20 May 2021), NUS has announced to hold the commencement ceremonies online instead of in-person for the class of 2020 and 2021. This is due to the rising number of covid-19 infection in Singapore since April this year. I agree with NUS that considering the tightened government measures and the health and safety of ourselves, family and friends who will be attending the ceremonies, it is in our best interests to not hold the in-person ceremonies as originally scheduled in June and July. However, I am disappointed in the way that NUS handled this. I listed down 3 reasons below: 1. There were ample opportunities for NUS to hold the ceremonies for the class of 2020 in February and March 2021. During this period, there were few covid cases in Singapore, and the government has gradually permitted a larger group of social gathering. Two universities in Singapore, the SIT and SIM, had taken advantage of this opportunity and held in-person graduation ceremonies in this period. Knowing that the covid situation is fluid and can change quickly, NUS should quickly grab hold of the opportunity in February and March to hold the graduation ceremonies for the class of 2020. 2. For the class of 2021 whose graduation ceremonies were supposed to take place this year, NUS changed the graduation ceremonies to online instead of postponing it to a later date to see if the situation improves. This is unlike what NUS did for the class of 2020, where the graduation ceremonies were postponed for a year, and an attempt was made to hold it in January 2021 (which ultimately did not happen because of tight government measures) before the decision was made to change to the online ceremony. I find it hard to understand why did NUS make the swift decision to hold online ceremonies for the class of 2021 where currently, the covid-19 vaccine is being rolled out and the covid situation could improve in a year, making in-person ceremonies possible. 3. Based on the swift decision that NUS made to hold online ceremonies for the class of 2021 and the responses from the NUS students that I gathered from social media, it is clear that NUS did not seek the opinion of the students, the people who the graduation is meant for, before deciding to hold online ceremonies. Despite these disappointing observations, I am heartened to know that NUS students have already taken to an online platform, change.org, to get signatures to call for NUS to re-look at its decision. This shows that although NUS did not take the initiative to speak with students, the students are not willing to stay silent. They will speak up and continue to do so until NUS is willing to listen. This is not the first time that NUS students have turned to the online platform to raise issues that NUS overlooked. If you search on change.org alone, you will see several more examples. These are good signs since universities are places where students go to learn to think critically, not follow blindly. All in all, I am disappointed in the way NUS handled the graduation ceremonies for the class of 2020 and 2021. NUS could have better manage this and many other past issues if they have communicated with students, and include student's opinions in their decision-making process. Moving forward, NUS should think of ways to communicate with students more often, such as holding meetings between students representatives and the management team every semester.