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SINGAPORE – The National University of Singapore (NUS) will bring together two of its faculties, one of them the largest, to form a new interdisciplinary university starting next year.
The College of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS), which has the largest enrollment in NUS of 6,404 college students in the final academic year, and the College of Sciences (FOS), will combine to form a proposed College of Humanities and Sciences, The Straits Times has learned.
Both colleges are located on the university’s Kent Ridge campus.
The two faculties will continue to exist, with plans for the current deans, Professor Robbie Goh of FASS and Professor Sun Yeneng of FOS, to become co-chairs of the new university, ST understands.
In response to ST’s inquiries, a NUS spokesperson confirmed the news and added that “the working draft for the proposal for the new NUS Faculty of Humanities and Sciences is preliminary and the proposal is still in the consultation stage. “.
The internal consultations, based on the working draft that was distributed to faculty members, began shortly after NUS President Tan Eng Chye wrote a comment this month in The Straits Times about the need for the universities move from subject specialization to interdisciplinary teaching and research.
According to the working draft seen by ST, students admitted to the university will have access to the facilities and courses offered in both FASS and FOS, allowing for greater flexibility of disciplines in Humanities, Social Sciences, Science, and Mathematics.
The NUS spokesperson said plans for the university “may evolve as a result of internal and external consultations over the next few months by the NUS leadership and the deanships of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences and the Faculty of Sciences.”
He added that full details will be shared when the initiative is officially approved by the relevant authorities.
If approved, the new university could begin accepting students as early as the next academic year that begins next August.
NUS President Tan Eng Chye said the proposed university will equip students with market-relevant skills to thrive in the economy of the future.
“The rapid pace of change in many industries means that the old model of intense academic specialization will no longer work for our young adults.
“Rather, graduates into the workforce will need a breath of knowledge, depth, as well as the ability to integrate multiple disciplines to solve complex problems,” he said.
He added that NUS has been a pioneer in interdisciplinary teaching and learning for the past 20 years, and its academics also excel at interdisciplinary research.
“We are confident that students in this proposed NUS College of Humanities and Sciences will greatly benefit from the multiple and integrated perspectives that will be incorporated into their flexible learning journey,” said Professor Tan.
In June, the university said it would offer 10 cross-curricular degree programs starting in August 2021, giving students more flexibility to pursue programs in all disciplines.
The goal is to take advantage of synergies between complementary disciplines, NUS said. Some possible combinations of complementary disciplines include economics and data science, computer science and project management, as well as engineering and business.
Dr. Timothy Chan, director of the Academic and Student Development divisions at SIM Global Education, noted that the university will see “two very different domains of expertise together.”
“One is hard natural science, while the other is the arts and humanities,” he said. “When dealing with real life problems, in addition to scientific research, a humanistic aspect is needed to consider the social implications.”
Despite its interdisciplinary nature, the new university is unlikely to cannibalize Yale University-NUS, which focuses on the liberal arts, said Dr. Chan.
This is because the liberal arts has a broad base in the curriculum and philosophy, unlike the new university that would still allow a major in one area, with only an additional perspective, he told The Straits Times.
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