By Ishani Anirudh Patil (Political Science + NUSC’25) .
Dr Aaron Maniam speaking at the Obama Foundation Leaders: Asia-Pacific Program 2023 in Athens.
In Part 2 of our Conversation Series with Dr Aaron Maniam, we chatted about the spirit of NUS College; the importance of giving back as graduates, and his own experience as a faculty in the University Scholars Programme.
Dr Maniam is a researcher and academic at the University of Oxford’s Blavantik School of Government. His focus lies at the intersection of technology, public policy, and public administration, as well as strategic futures and public sector foresight. He currently co-chairs the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on GovTech and Digital Public Infrastructure and serves on the OECD’s Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence Futures. With two decades of experience in the Singapore Public Service, his perspectives link theory and practice.
The importance of giving back to the NUSC Community
Whether we realise it or not, “the vast majority of us have received something, at least once, that has helped us in our journeys; be it a prize, a bursary, words of advice, or even the time of day.” So, in a sense, giving is really a moral duty, Aaron believes. As we all have benefitted from the goodwill of others at some point, it is important to pay it forward.
Dr Maniam’s Commencement Ceremony speech also drew important connections between Love and Giving. “We are all intertemporally connected to past and future generations” through these two concepts. Just like giving, we are products of the love we receive from families, communities, and institutions throughout our lives.
What we pass on is dependent on our lived experiences, and there are lots of ways to give back that aren’t financial in nature. Time, for example, is invaluable. Mentoring a young student, working with an intern to help make their experience more fruitful, or coming back to NUS for a career talk are all substantial ways to give back to the academic community.
Aaron also notes that there is an “intrinsic attractiveness to giving.” For one, there is the satisfaction of watching someone you mentor grow, develop, and learn new insights. He fondly remembers when he served as a faculty in the Obama Foundation Leaders’ Programme. As attendees shared their feedback towards the end of the sessions, the faculty members realised that they gained as much from the programme as the students did! Through interactions with one another, and sharing of ideas with the students, both the facilitators and the attendees benefitted massively – rather than a unilateral exchange.
Aaron’s Experience at University Scholars Programme
Dr Maniam has had a fruitful experience as an adjunct faculty member of the University Scholars Programme, since 2010. He taught modules on “Leadership in a Complex World” and “Polycentric Governance: Pitfalls and Possibilities”. Even after leaving Singapore for Oxford, he stayed closely connected to the college as an adjunct.
“When you teach, you have to understand issues so much more rigorously than you might think,” Aaron explains. But the fruits of this rigor are deeply rewarding; it is lovely to watch students acquire a new lens and run with it.
“Sometimes it takes years,” he jokes. “I’ve had students write to me, six, seven, even eight years after leaving university, to share a sudden realisation from a class.” He laughs when this happens, because such impacts cannot be captured in any year-end feedback survey. In fact, part of the value from what one teaches is only be felt in the medium term.
Despite the myriad of changes in tech-savviness, nature of assignments, and administration, Aaron remarks that the fundamental curiosity within students has remained unchanged throughout the evolution of USP to NUS College. There has always been a ‘desire for impact’ in students; an interest in connecting different parts of knowledge to one another, to link theory to a real world application. This is directly reflected by the focus on service in the ethos of both USP and NUS College.
