For PRC Pre-University Scholars

Singapore is presently offering scholarships for international students, Chinese students being involved since several years ago. Both middle school and new university students in China are chosen and brought to Singapore to attend secondary schools or universities.

One important issue that they must consider, both before and after they come, is what course to undertake in the university. The choice that they make is important since they are closely related to their future. At the beginning of their stay in Singapore, the scholars may be focusing more on their bridging course and on getting acquainted with the environment here. But as the time goes along, and as they find out more about the education systems in Singapore, they should start to consider the universities. There will be a need to collect information about the courses provided for them. We hope the introduction here may prove useful for the new scholars regarding choosing the courses in the universities.

Some restrictions are imposed by MOE on the courses that the scholars from China may choose. They can only take courses of Engineering, Computing or Science. This may be one reason why only the students studying science subjects in China, not those studying art subjects, are chosen.

NTU is a technological university, which mainly offers engineering courses, whereas NUS is a full university whose courses are of a broader range, generally speaking.

Courses available in NTU

For PRC Scholars

NTU has a School of Applied Science (SAS) and three other engineering schools. The SAS consists of two departments, namely, computer engineering and material engineering, and the other engineering courses available in NTU are civil & structural engineering, electrical & electronic engineering, and mechanical & production engineering.

Computer engineering is a popular course, and it is paid special attention to. Rapid advances in microelectronics and computer science have created a need for engineers integrating the skills in the design of computer systems as well as applications in technology and commerce. This need is met by neither of the computer scientists and electronic engineers. But computer engineers specialized in both software and hardware meet this need. The subjects of computer science and electrical engineering are combined in the computer-engineering course and electronics and programming are very suitable in various jobs in the IT industry.

PRC SM2 & SM3 scholars may also choose from other engineering courses in NTU. It should be mentioned that the courses of the three engineering departments are the same at the beginning, that is, when students are admitted into the engineering department in NTU, they must take the common engineering courses in their first year. Which specific engineering courses they are going to be specialized in will be determined at the end of their first year study.

Streaming of Engineering Undergraduates in NTU

Above is a brief introduction to the courses available for PRC scholars in

NTU. In NUS, there are manycourses that our scholars may take as well.

Courses Provided by NUS for PRC Scholars

The NUS is organized into eight faculties and some graduate schools and some other departments. Our scholars can only major in courses of the School of Computing (SoC), the Faculty of Engineering and the Faculty of Science.

The School of Computing offers programs leading to degrees of Bachelor of Computer Science (CS), Information Systems (IS) or Information Technology (IT). The course of Computer Engineering began to be offered here since several

years ago, jointly by the Department of Electrical Engineering. The four-year CS program has different highlights from computer engineering and emphasizes training on software. It aims to develop graduates with strong technical knowledge in computer science and technology, and it emphasizes the fundamentals of computer science, including programming languages, networking, etc. CS Graduates may be engaged in jobs like R&D engineer system consultant and software specialist. The course of Computer Science was very popular among PRC scholars too, and a large number of them chose to undertake

Courses Offered in School of Computing

Many PRC scholars in the previous cohorts chose to take engineering courses as well, mainly electrical engineering and chemical engineering. Electrical engineering deals with practical and innovative applications of electrical sciences, including communication systems, control systems, microelectronics, computers, etc. Graduates of electrical engineering have a wide range of career prospects.

For PRC scholars, chemical engineering and environment engineering, which is a new department, require that the PRC scholars take a bridging course in chemistry. If the scholars are not offered chemistry in their pre-university bridging course, they may not be admitted into chemical engineering department normally. This should be noted.

The last faculty whose course our scholars may take is the Faculty of Science in NUS. It offers course in biochemistry, biology and biotechnology, chemistry and applied chemistry, material science, pharmacy, physics and applied physics, mathematics and applied mathematics, and so on. Students who are interested in pure sciences may want to major on the courses offered by these faculties.

The information provided here is a beginning, which we hope may give some guidance to the new scholars. More information is available in the publications by the universities and on the web pages of the universities. The homepage of NTU is http://www.ntu.edu.sg and that of NUS is http://www.nus.edu.sg.