appConfigEntityId

bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

isVideo

articlePageQuery

article

articleSchemaContent

content

hooksArticlePageAdvertisementConfigArticle

hooksArticlePageFloatingButtonConfigArticle

appConfig

filter

json

liveArticle

Kolette Lim

After years of concern over students using artificial intelligence to cut corners, Singapore’s universities are embracing the technology, driven not just by changes in the classroom but by pressure to prepare graduates for an economy that increasingly prizes AI literacy.
But analysts say educators still face the challenge of ensuring students use AI to sharpen their critical thinking rather than relying on it for quick answers and guidance.
On August 11, the National University of Singapore (NUS) announced that its students and faculty members would have access to ChatGPT Edu, an enterprise-grade platform by OpenAI, from August 31.
The platform would be piloted in selected courses during the initial phase and be progressively made available for other courses where AI “adds educational value and augments learning objectives”, the university said in a statement.
Other universities are also expanding the use of the technology, with many mandating AI literacy courses.
Starting this month, students at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) were given full access to a suite of Google AI tools, including Gemini Enterprise, as part of what the institution coined an “ambitious effort to transform its undergraduate education with AI”.
The university aimed to embed AI into 40 per cent of its courses by 2030, to reach its goal of producing students who could create and work with AI agents, it said.
“So much is happening so quickly with AI, and universities are playing catch up,” said Reuben Ng, an associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.

There was a huge skills gap in the employment market, with many job notices requiring AI skills left unfilled, he said. “One of the key purposes of Singapore’s universities is to funnel people towards the job market, so they need to create students that have these skill sets.”
Vijayakumar Tangarasan, International Workplace Group’s country head for Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei, said most local employers were willing to “pay a premium” for AI literacy, and academic qualifications alone were no longer the focus.
“Singapore’s modern workforce demands a symbiotic combination of technological literacy and irreplaceable human qualities,” he said, highlighting the importance of technological and human skills.
“As AI becomes increasingly embedded in our daily workflows, the traditional checklist for talent is being rewritten.”
AI paradox
While critics in the education field have long worried that generative technology is eroding critical thinking, Singapore’s universities seem to have a change of heart on AI.
Aaron Thean, NUS’s deputy president of academic affairs and provost, said the institution aimed to use the tools not as replacements, but as “powerful amplifiers of human intellect, creativity and judgement”.
While the goals set out are achievable, whether AI proves a boon or bane largely depends on how it is used, according to educational experts.
If a student were to accept the first output from the prompt, the tool would become a substitute for thinking, said Ina Conradi Chavez, an associate professor at NTU’s School of Art, Design and Media. But if students were to reject, re-prompt and critique, the technology would help refine thinking, she added.
Still, Conradi highlighted several risks, such as the inability to discern AI-generated content from authorship and the acceptance of visually plausible but incorrect output.

Mutlu Cukurova, the 18th CJ Koh professor at NTU’s National Institute of Education, acknowledged that current evidence showed the technology posed more harm, potentially leading to stagnant and declining competency levels. Recent research also found that it reduced persistence, with students instinctively turning to AI to solve difficult problems, he added.
But Cukurova said AI could have a positive impact if the system were built to ask, rather than answer or solve. “Intellect, creativity and critical thinking are not by-products of access to capable tools, but outcomes of deliberate design.”
Conradi urged institutions to teach students to use AI to examine bias and train data, rather than primarily for generative or interpretive purposes. “Students who only use AI generatively will be replaced by the next generation of tools and those who learn to interrogate AI critically will not.”
She highlighted that not all AI-assisted works should be put in the same box, noting the difference in user effort between continuously refining prompts and accepting the first output.
“Public conversation collapses everything into a single category called ‘AI art’ or ‘AI use’. That framing does real damage,” she said. “The paradox is real, but often framed the wrong way.”
Evolving assessments
With chatbots producing polished essays and high-definition visuals within seconds, concerns about plagiarism and integrity have also surged.
Last year, three NTU students were penalised for academic misconduct and given zero marks for an assignment after they were found to have used generative AI tools. Their assignments had contained non-existent academic references and statistics or broken web links.
Surveillance and detection were a “losing battle”, said Cukurova, who is also a professor of learning and AI at University College London.


He urged institutions to design tasks that would require students to interact with and evaluate AI and its output. “A graduate who can prompt well but cannot judge when the output is wrong, or when the task should not have been delegated at all, is not AI-competent,” he said.
NTU will be moving away from automated surveillance to assessment designs that evaluate student learning, according to local media, citing an email from the institution to its faculty last Thursday.
Recognising that the detection tools used currently were “fundamentally unreliable”, the university said it would stop using them next year.
Conradi has already shifted her assessment focus. She now evaluates her students based on documentation and oral explanations, rather than the final product alone. Her students are asked to present their works on screens or at exhibitions, and she studies how they adapt conversations about their submissions to different audiences.
She also requires students to detail their use of AI, including exact prompts, rejections and reasoning behind each input.
“Assessment built around the finished artefact alone is increasingly meaningless,” she said. “The principle is now to assess the practice, not just the product.”
Ng noted that AI had sparked a return to the pen-and-paper format in physical settings, a method which he had adopted with his students.
“There needs to be a space where people do deep thinking and work, such as journaling with a pen and paper, debating or reflecting,” he said. “We need protected time for these things which cannot be replaced by technology.”


Singapore nets US$862,000 from first auction in money laundering case

The cooling trap: how Asia’s air conditioners are making heatwaves worse

What Hong Kong cinema can take away from a popular Chinese war film

Why AI giants are choosing Singapore to turn models into real-world tools

Singapore

Singapore’s universities race to embrace AI as job demands transform

The Learning Hub at the Nanyang Technological University. NTU students have been given full access to a suite of Google AI tools. Photo: Universal Images Group/Getty Images

A robot plays football at a robotics and AI event in Singapore in April. Photo: Xinhua

People walk in the Raffles Place financial business district in Singapore. More employers are willing to pay more for workers with AI skills. Photo: AFP

Graduates attend the 2026 National University of Singapore graduation. Students and faculty members would have access to ChatGPT Edu, NUS said last week. Photo: Handout

AI threatens nearly a quarter of Southeast Asia’s workforce but not all is lost

A man looks at a screen depicting a person made out of pixels. AI is affecting some jobs in Southeast Asia. Photo: dpa

The Generative Bionics team demonstrates the Gene.01 humanoid robot at a conference in San Francisco on July 23. Photo: AP

People walk at the central business district in Singapore. Photo: Reuters

Shoving incident in Singapore over man patting girl’s head stirs heated debate

A 73-year-old man, Yeo Song Khoon, is seen patting a girl’s head at a food court in Roxy Square in Singapore on Saturday. Photo: Instagram/being1ton


Patrons at a food court in Roxy Square in Singapore speak to a man over the shoving incident. Photo: Instagram/being1ton

Will disbarment of Singapore’s Pritam Singh further dent his political standing?

Then leader of the opposition Pritam Singh speaks to the media outside the Supreme Court after his appeal was dismissed in December. Photo: Reuters

Workers’ Party chairwoman Sylvia Lim and secretary general Pritam Singh attend a press conference at their headquarters in Singapore in 2023. Photo: Reuters

Former Workers’ Party MP Raeesah Khan has admitted to lying in parliament about escorting a sexual abuse survivor to a police station. Photo: YouTube

Singapore’s Leader of the House Indranee Rajah speaking in parliament on a motion of suitability of Pritam Singh as leader of the opposition. Photo: YouTube/MDDI Singapore

Singapore’s provision shops struggle to keep shutters open in HDB heartlands

Ramasamy Vellasamy has been running a provision shop on the ground floor of a housing block in northern Singapore since 1986. Photo: Kolette Lim

Ramasamy Vellasamy at his provision shop in Singapore. Photo: Kolette Lim

Abdul Rawoof runs a provision shop in the eastern estate of Marine Parade, Singapore. Photo: Kolette Lim

Gani Idris at a provision shop in Singapore. Photo: Kolette Lim

Sales at provision stores stocking daily and other items in Singapore have reportedly been falling in recent years. Photo: Kolette Lim

This Week in Asia

Economics

News

Asia

Southeast Asia

More employers are emphasising AI literacy and are willing to pay more for graduates with the relevant skills, analysts say


More employers are emphasising AI literacy and are willing to pay more for graduates with the relevant skills, analysts say.


Singapore’s universities race to embrace AI as job demands transform

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}More employers are emphasising AI literacy and are willing to pay more for graduates with the relevant skills, analysts say

More employers are emphasising AI literacy and are willing to pay more for graduates with the relevant skills, analysts say