52 schools get new principals in 2024; 15 are first-timers
At the age of 36, Ms Hannah Chia has chalked up experience from six different job stints, mainly in the education service, from working with schools to dealing with educational policies.
Formerly a humanities teacher, she had also been seconded to the Centre for Strategic Futures – a think-tank within the Government – as its assistant director in 2017.
Ms Chia, who has been vice-principal of Methodist Girls’ School (Primary) since mid-2020, is the youngest principal to be appointed in the 2023 batch. She will be heading New Town Primary School in Tanglin Halt.
She is among 15 first-time principals appointed to schools for 2024. In total, 52 schools will be getting new principals as part of the annual Ministry of Education (MOE) reshuffle.
At its annual ceremony for principals at Shangri-La Hotel on Dec 28, the ministry acknowledged the contributions of 17 retiring principals and retiring senior education officers at its headquarters who had served as principals.
Inspired by her own teachers when she was a student, Ms Chia was set on joining the teaching profession after completing her degree at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
She started out as a humanities teacher in Commonwealth Secondary School in 2010. In 2013, she moved to MOE’s schools division where she supported cluster superintendents as a special projects officer.
She later became head of the department of humanities at Hong Kah Secondary School before her stint at the Centre for Strategic Futures, and returned to MOE headquarters in 2019 to work on educational policies.
“I think my time in different work contexts has been particularly helpful because I got to see how different offices or organisations function. I got an understanding of how to empathise with different groups of people,” said Ms Chia.
As a first-time principal, she values the insight of experienced teachers who may have been in the teaching service longer than her, and hopes to encourage her staff to do meaningful and purposeful work.
Rather than seeing herself as someone with all the answers, she hopes to build a culture where students and staff are open to learning from each other and listening to different opinions.
“I think people respond when you’re authentic. And a lot of the good things that are happening in school just need to be discovered. It’s not that you need to engineer a lot of things. I often think it’s a privilege as a school leader to see these good practices,” she said.
Speaking at the ceremony, Education Minister Chan Chun Sing said schools and educators cannot be complacent.
Principals serve an important role as leaders who can improve the performance of their staff and check for blind spots to improve the system, he said, adding that they need to help students and not just produce results for now, but lay the foundations for their future.
While Singapore has fared well by current metrics such as international benchmarking studies, it cannot avoid rapid global changes, said Mr Chan. These include geopolitical contestations, changing demographics and technologies.
He added that principals will have to bring together teachers from different generations who have diverse aspirations and needs, as well as “hyper-connected” students who now have easy access to multiple sources of information.
Another first-time principal is Ms Rezia Rahumathullah, 45, who will helm Teck Ghee Primary School in Ang Mo Kio.
She began her teaching career as an English language teacher in Da Qiao Primary School in 2002. She rose up the ranks at the school until 2023, holding various leadership positions such as level head and head of department of student management.
When she was appointed as the school’s vice-principal in 2019, Da Qiao Primary School merged with Jing Shan Primary School.
While there were challenges in rebranding and creating a new common identity, Ms Rezia said the merger process taught her the importance of communication and ensuring the voices of all staff were heard and valued.
She added: “I was really honoured to be leading a merger between the two schools. It gave me a lot of insight into the importance of celebrating the history, culture and stories of both schools.”
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