Gone are the days when NUS, NTU and SMU were the only local universities of choice for Singaporeans. Private education institutions (PEIs) like PSB Academy and SIM are increasingly gaining in reputation and if you’re graduating from GCE N, O levels, NITEC, poly or simply awaiting your ‘A’ level results (cue nervous sweating), there’s definitely no harm in checking out your less-conventional choices.
Digital Senior has already created a comprehensive guide to choosing a private school (that offers external degrees from foreign university partners – in short we will use label “private university”), but because choosing the right institution is so important, we’ve put together for you an in-depth guide to the different campus environments offered by five private institutions in Singapore: PSB Academy, SIM GE, Kaplan, MDIS, and EASB. Campus environments and facilities are often overlooked by students when choosing their university programmes, but they can be crucial in determining what kind of learning environment you get – just think about how much more engaging learning might be in a classroom with interactive projectors and writing walls, for example. From travelling time to making use of state-of-the-art equipment, a great campus can enhance diverse aspects of your university life. So if you’re looking into what sort of campus would best fit your interests, here’s some handy info to get you started.
PSB Academy
Image Credit: The Straits Times
Campus location(s):
147, 000 sq ft (or 13, 656 sq m) Delta Campus in Jalan Bukit HoSwee (nearest to TiongBahru MRT)
*NEW* 100, 000+sqft(or 9290+ sq m) City Campus in Marina Square (nearest to City Hall MRT)
Note: for reference, size of Delta campus ≈ 124 5-room HDB flats, size of City Campus ≈ 84 5-room flats going by HDB’s approximation of a 5-room flat as 110 sq m.
Classrooms: Aside from the typical LCD projectors and visualizers, classrooms in the Delta campus are specifically tailored to create a conducive learning environment. Flipchart stands make it easy for visual aids like graphs to be displayed for the benefit of students.
But it’s the lucky students at PSB’s spanking new Marina Square campus who’ll really get the benefit of a futuristic, uniquely high-tech classroom experience. The over 29 classrooms of the new campus boast cutting-edge equipment like writing walls for brainstorming and projectors for students to share ideas conveniently in “Flipped Classroom” learning pedagogies. Its MBA seminar rooms also come with advanced video conferencing facilities and are also acoustically-treated, meaning there’s no need for awkward use of microphones to make your voice heard during class participation. What’s more, students in PSB Academy’s media and communication diploma and communication-related degree programmes will gain hands-on experiences with media studio for broadcast television and radio recording and playback facilities!
With Singapore moving towards being a smart nation, a conventional classroom can only do so much to groom students ready for the future. It is no wonder PSBA is investing around $15million in this future academy to produce the next generation of students who can thrive in thesmart nation.
Other learning spaces:
Besides the traditional facilities, students at the Marina Square campus can look forward to a suite of innovative spaces specially designed to create a comfortable learning environment. With break-out spaces for you to bounce ideas off friends between lessons and an actual town-hall, the stunning campus is all set up for student engagement and collaboration to thrive.
If you understand that attending school provides much more beyond education and certificate, you come to realize the importance of such an environment. It is almost a guarantee that you will be thankful for the network and soft skills gained once you step into the working world.
Rendering of Marina Square campus courtesy of architects61. (Image Credit: indesignlive.sg)
Rendering of Marina Square campus courtesy of architects61. (Image Credit: indesignlive.sg)
PSB’s Delta campus has an interesting range of industry-grade labs, including engineering testing facilities (that come with a true-to-life wind tunnel by the way), a sport science lab, a life sciences lab, and an electrical lab. There are also computer labs, so students will enjoy easy access to computers for viewing lectures, printing out essays and so forth.
Image Credit: Google Maps
Recreational facilities: Recreational spaces at the Delta campus are mostly geared towards the sporty types – they have a basketball court, gym, multi-purpose hall, street soccer court.
Image Credit: PSB
In terms of recreation, the City Campus has probably the most enviable range of shopping, food, and hangout places at its doorstep among all the PEIs – besides Marina Square, the Esplanade, Raffles City and the town area are a stone’s throw away (just don’t go overboard on the retail therapy!) And if you prefer studying outside school, the National Library and dozens of cafes are just close by.
Recreation aside, studying in a city campus is a strategic move for your career. You literally move closer to opportunities. Whether it be networking events, internship possibilities or partnership prospects, town is where all the actions are taking place. Sometimes, everything just come together when you are at the right place at the right time. They call it luck butyou still have to be there when it happens.
Follow this link for a virtual campus tour.
For more information, do visit PSB’s website.
SIM Global Education
Image Credit: SIM Global Education
Campus location(s):
~109, 000 sq m HQ campus in Clementi Road
Note: for reference, size of campus ≈991 5-room HDB flats
Classrooms: SIM boasts over 120 classrooms spread over 4 blocks in its HQ campus.
Image Credit: SIM Global Education
Other learning spaces: With a library, a student learning centre, a multimedia lab, and over 30 laboratories in the Clementi campus, SIM students pretty much have access to all the educational resources they might need at their fingertips. It doesn’t hurt that these learning spaces just so happen to look pretty cool either.
Image Credit: SIM Global Education
Image Credit: SIM Global Education
Recreational facilities: SIM GE offers a very comprehensive array of student facilities. The campus has many designated areas for students to chill out such as the student lounge, student activity hub, and student wellness centre. Gym rats and fitness buffs will love their sports facilities – they have a gym, a multi-purpose sports hall with sports therapy room, and tennis courts, among others – but the artsy types will find that the campus has plenty to offer too, with a performing arts theatre and a dance studio.
The Student Wellness Centre. (Image Credit: SIM Global Education)
Follow this link for a virtual campus tour.
For more information, do visit SIM GE’s website.
Kaplan
Image Credit: Kaplan Singapore
Campus location(s):
4, 743 sq m City Campus in Wilkie Road (nearest to DhobyGhaut MRT)
8, 385 sq m City Campus at PoMo
977 sq m campus at the Devan Nair Institute for Employment and Employability (nearest to Jurong East MRT)
Note: for reference, size of Wilkie Road campus ≈43 5-room HDB flats, size of PoMoCampus ≈ 76 5-room flats, size of Jurong East campus ≈ 8 5-room flats
Classrooms: Kaplan’s campuses comprise basic classroom facilities – whiteboard, visualizer and so forth – with nearly a hundred classrooms scattered around their three campuses. It has 37 classrooms at the Wilkie Road campus, 46 classrooms at the PoMo campus, 7 classrooms at its Jurong East campus.
Image Credit: lianmeiting
A classroom in the Wilkie Edge campus. (Image Credit: inSing)
Other learning spaces: Students – particularly traditional and full-time ones – might find Kaplan’s facilities somewhat limited. While the Wilkie Road and PoMo campuses do offer resources like computer labs, libraries, and student lounges, you definitely won’t find the expansive array of learning labs, sports and arts facilities, and study spots that you might expect from more traditional campuses like SIM’s, or the smart amenities such as interactive white board from futuristic academy like PSB Academy’s. The kind of vibrant, close-knit campus life that goes along with these facilities might be less active in Kaplan. On the other hand, the campuses are located around the Central area, which means plenty of eating and chill-out spaces just close by.
For more information, do visit Kaplan’s website.
MDIS
Image Credit: Asian Correspondent
Campus location(s):
Main campus in Stirling Road (nearest to Queenstown MRT)
Campus in Orchard Road (nearest to DhobyGhaut MRT)
Classrooms: MDIS contains 69 lecture rooms and 6 lecture theatres at the main Stirling Road campus, with 8 lecture rooms and 2 lecture theatres over at the DhobyGhaut campus.
Image Credit: msfatvs.wordpress.com
Image Credit: MDIS
Other learning spaces: Apart from the usual science and engineering labs for STEM students – the Stirling Road campus boasts 5 computer labs, 4 life sciences labs, 4 engineering workshops, and a psychology lab – MDIS boasts sophisticated facilities for the arts and media geeks among us. The main campus offers not one, but two fashion labs, along with a TV studio and radio studio for our future DJs and journalistic stars. They even have a hospitality training centre – all in all, that’s a pretty quirky and unusual set of specialised facilities.
Communal area. (Image Credit: MDIS)
Recreational facilities: The main campus contains a gym plus a dance studio, so there’re adequate spaces for students to unwind from their mugging stress by sweating it out.
One notable quirk about the Stirling Road campus is that it’s dotted with statues of sages such as Aristotle, Einstein and Samuel Johnson, reflecting the school’s emphasis on cultivating the spirit of innovation in their students. As far as campus environments go, this one will definitely provide random moments of inspiration as you head to class.
Image Credit: The Business Times
For more information, do visit MDIS’ website.
EASB
Image Credit: EASB
Campus location(s):
18, 000 sq m at Ah Hood Road (nearest to Toa Payoh and Novena MRT)
Note: for reference, size of campus ≈164 5-room HDB flats
Classrooms: There’re around 18 classrooms with basic facilities such as projector and whiteboard in EASB, plus 3 lecture theatres.
Image Credit: EASB
Other learning spaces:The EASB campus encompasses a computer lab, physics lab and library, along with specialised facilities such as the Hospitality & Training Centre and the Mind-Spa room, where Psychology students can conduct practice counselling sessions. Those keen to learn languages will love the Language Laboratory, which comes with computers installed with the Digital Language Laboratory and X-Class software
Image Credit: EASB
Recreational facilities: Recreation spots are mostly of the sporty variety,including a Multi-Purpose Hall, a gym, a field, and basketball courts.
Image Credit: EASB
For more information, do visit EASB’s website.
Of course, the preference for campus is a subjective one and the only real way to get a feel of a campus environment is to actually go down to take a look at the place.
However, if you have no strong inclination towards any specific feature, PSB academy definitely offers the best of both worlds with its fully equipped traditional campus and strategically located futuristic academy. If you are an aspiring psychologist, EASB might be the choice of campus for you with its mindspa room. Likewise, MDIS has a training centre specially for hospitality students to gain practical experience.
You can call the school up to ask if they offer a campus tour or simply wander about by yourself to get a feel of the campus vibe. Besides the facilities proper, remember to look out for things like quiet and ample studying areas, and eating places with affordable prices. No campus can be absolutely perfect, but with such a wide array of choices available, there’s no doubt you’ll be able to find the one that fits you best as you embark on the next exciting portion of your student life.
