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| 1. How degrees are offered to SPMS undergraduates?
The immediate destinations are:
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| 2. How are the undergraduate programmes offered by the school of Physical and Mathematical Sciences be carried out?
The 4-year direct B.Sc.(Hons) programme will require 144 academic units (AU) for graduation distributed over four levels in increasing depth. The 144 AU comprise the following:
We will provide a quality of undergraduate education similar to some premier universities/colleges in USA, e.g.: Amherst, Berkeley, Brown, Caltech, Carleton, Carnegie-Mellon, Chicago, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, Harvard, Haverford, Illinois, Johns Hopkins, Michigan, MIT, Northwestern, Pennsylvania, Pomona, Princeton, Rice, Stanford, Swarthmore, UCLA, Virginia, Wellesley, Williams, Wisconsin and Yale. For example, the major in Chemistry will follow the rigorous American Chemical Society accredited Chemistry programs. The major in Physics will cover the six core theories with a good balance of experiments that demonstrate how science advances technology, and the major in Mathematics will include a good mix of theoretical and fundamental, as well as the applied, computational, and industrial aspects of mathematics and statistics. The Physical Sciences major will take an appropriate cross section of such courses depending on the challenging questions the student is attracted to. The new SPMS plans to take in the first batch of about 180 undergraduate students in July 2005. |
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3. Why should I choose to study physical and mathematical sciences? Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong majored in mathematics. |
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| 4. Will the current batches be influenced by the new system? A banner at Biospace web-site screams: "Find your next Chemistry job with Biospace Career Expos." Yes, there are many jobs for chemists in the Life Science and Chemical industry clusters. There are also the large Electronics and Manufacturing industry clusters that employ physics, mathematics, and chemistry graduates in large numbers. In short, SPMS graduates, just like engineering graduates, will find employment and work together as team members all across the Singapore economy. We must not forget the government sector and the teaching service that also hire and require science and engineering graduates in significant numbers. The career choices are indeed numerous for a university graduate, and the most important qualities are a willingness to learn, adaptability, ability to anticipate and solve problems quickly, many of which are of a quantitative nature, and ability to work in teams as many problems are interdisciplinary by nature. The field of study, you're your content knowledge, whether it be physical and mathematical sciences or engineering seems to matter less in many careers in today's rapidly moving economy. And new careers are being defined all the time. There will also be a percentage of science undergraduates who will aspire to be like Yang Chen Ning, James Watson, or Andrew Wiles, and they will want to proceed further to undertake research leading to a PhD degree, either locally or overseas. As Sir Isaac Newton said: "I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the sea-shore and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whist the great ocean of truth lay undiscovered all before me." So, job prospects for SPMS graduates will clearly be only limited by the mind. |
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The majority of science and engineering graduates end up in industry and business where their quantitative and core skills are in demand. The answer to Q3 of FAQ, refers to science, engineering, etc graduates working in teams in industry where they have to be one in spirit, and everyone has a role to play. Theodore von Karman (1881-1963) is referring to research - finding new knowledge and applying new knowledge. His differentiation between the scientist and the engineer at the fundamental level may be outdated. Von Karman is at heart a scientist (mathematician and physicist) and he used the deep principles of science and mathematics in his "engineering creations". Perhaps the correct term should have been "design" rather than "creation". We can't create anything out of thin air. What we see around us everyday as human creations all rely on the principles of science and mathematics. If we want a strong, light-weight and cost-effective bridge, for example, we have to understand the science of materials, the laws of physics, and the environmental conditions. The collapse of the Tacoma Narrows bridge due to wind-induced vibrations is a good example of how engineering design must take into consideration the environment and the principles of science and mathematics. The importance of science to technology/engineering was particularly evident during and late 1940s when an analysis of the Radiation Lab work at MIT turned up that 90% of the most important work had been done by the physicists and the remainder by others including the engineers. This was also the turning point for MIT where scholars there, and at all major engineering schools in USA, today pursue Engineering Science. Engineering Science is engineering rooted in science discoveries, and at that level it's difficult to differentiate between the scientist and the engineer. There is a continuum from discovery to integration to applications, and both scientists and engineers can roam this continuum. But first we have to discover the secrets of nature, which is not easy, and Nobel Prizes are awarded for that, and then we can apply those principles to make products and provide services for the benefit of mankind. We can also use a tree metaphor. Mathematics and statistics are the roots of the tree, and the trunk of the tree represents physics, chemistry and biology or life sciences. The branches, leaves, flowers and fruits represent engineering, medicine and all applied sciences. The branches, leaves, flowers and fruits cannot exist without the trunk and roots of the tree. It's good to take a holistic view of our major branches of knowledge - like the tree, they are all interconnected. No single branch of knowledge is superior to another. Each has its aesthetic and intellectual value. We need them all for the advancement of mankind. |
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6. I'm applying for the MOE Teaching Scholarship and the PSC Scholarship. Can I enroll as a student as SPMS ? |