Asia is expected to occupy 76 percent of the global demand for international higher education in English-speaking destination countries, doubling from 943,000 students in 2010 to almost 1.9 million students in 2020. Continuing education in Singapore is expected to triple from 80,000 training places in 2010, to 250,000 in 2015.
Singapore’s education system is well-respected globally for its high levels of academic achievement. However with rising global competition and changing modes of learning, Private Education institutions in Singapore need to know how to introduce fresh curriculum, pedagogies, technologies, organisational, or operational approaches that can be customised to their unique context, implemented correctly, and linked to their strategies for differentiation and sustained growth.
SPRING Singapore (SPRING) is an agency under the Ministry of Trade and Industry, responsible for helping Singapore enterprises grow and building trust in Singapore products and services. SPRING launched the Education Innovation Initiative in 2012, where it announced a S$10 million EI grant commitment to encourage capability upgrading in up to 50 EI projects over the next three years.
To further support local companies to develop their Education Innovation Capabilities of Experiential Learning, Scalable Knowledge Assets, and Organizational Excellence, SPRING appointed Eden Strategy Institute to identify and bring international EI good practices to Singapore.
Eden conducted in-depth focus groups and quantitative surveys to articulate problem statements that helped define the focus for global innovation scouting. Following a broad global scouting of hundreds of leading institutions that had successfully implemented workable EIs most closely matching the problem statements, 20 good practice education institutions in the US and the UK were identified for detailed study. Eden conducted in-depth face-to-face interviews with senior management, data analysis, classroom observations, and ethnography to depict 50 EIs that may be used by Private Education companies in Singapore.
The findings have been published in an Introductory Handbook and detailed, 200-page EI Playbook to inspire and guide local companies. This contains exercise worksheets and templates, practice notes, and detailed case studies that feature organisational challenges, EI solutions, innovation readiness assessment, implementation considerations, re-contextualization approaches, and impact metrics.
These findings were shared with local companies at the inaugral Education Innovation Network launch in late 2013, and today Eden continues to work closely with local Private Education companies to implement EI in their processes, people, and programmes.
Download the Education Innovation Handbook here.