Story by Emily Tang, Features Writer | Photo credit to David Zhang
In a bid to improve the relationship between Yale-NUS and the rest of NUS, a group of students has organized a series of activities to allow their peers to better understand the day-to-day experience of NUS students.
Tensions had risen earlier this year over the increasingly visible presence of outsiders in the Yale-NUS library, leading students to complain that their “culture was being diluted” and that their “home no longer felt like home”.
Pa Wairen, ‘18, was among those who shared this view. “These NUS students come here and they’re simply not like us in the way they dress and act. They make no effort to assimilate to us – after all, it’s our campus they’re using. They come here and make use of our buildings, our institution name, and our resources. Many aren’t even Singaporean. The next thing you know they’ll be stealing our jobs and women.”
To combat the situation, a group calling itself NUS Students Count Too (NSC2) has created an experiential learning activity to allow Yale-NUS students to empathize and understand the struggles of those not from Yale-NUS. The day-long tour will bring Yale-NUS students to explore NUS students’ overcrowded and stuffy dormitories, the packed buses that ferry them back and forth from their daily routine, and the hard labour they carry out as part of an education based on rote memorization.
Founder of the group, Zuo Yigong ‘19, stated: “We send students overseas all the time to help those less fortunate than us. Why not start in our own backyard?”
This article originally appeared in the April Fools Edition of The Octant and is intended for satirical purposes.