socialservice.sg presents: "Before the Ballot"

GST hikes, inflation, and high HDB resale prices. Wherever you go in Singapore, you can’t miss the hottest topic nowadays: the rising cost of living. If you tak boleh tahan , that’s understandable. But what can Singaporeans do about it? Today, we’re joined by three organisers, Kokila from Workers Make Possible and the Transformative Justice Collective, Kumarr from Workers Make Possible, and Adi fr...

With Samantha Lee , we preview the 2023 episodes for our "The Future of…" mini-series, where we chat big ideas with Singaporeans engaged in social initiatives in Asia and beyond. These are the episodes we referenced today: The future of… Water and water scarcity (with Wateroam’s Lim Chong Tee) The future of… Marrying purpose and profit (with StoneSoup Partner’s Samantha Lee) The future o...

With Isaac James Neo , we preview the 2023 episodes for our "Civic Engagement and Action" mini-series, where we have conversations about expanding communities and spaces for sustained civic engagement and political participation. These are the episodes we referenced today: What’s next for youth climate change activism and action in Singapore? The potential and challenges of social media...

With assistant professor Tan Shin Bin (Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore), we explore her latest journal article centred on Singapore's Ethnic Integration Policy (EIP) as an ethnic desegregation policy. She shares about ethnic and socio-economic segregation as they relate to the EIP, their inverse relationship for majority public housing subzones, and future ar...

Throughout the past three episodes, we’ve talked about community work and community development in the present. Today, we’ve gathered three guests - Ng Bee Leng (Director, Community Development), Chuah Xing Jun (Research Assistant), and Emeritus Professor Satvinder Singh (Research Consultant) - in a more open-ended conversation about the future. In particular, we zoom into measurement. That is, ho...

There is broad consensus that research, evaluation, and evidence-based practice are important. However, to what extent are they compatible with community work and community development, especially when data and knowledge are extracted from participants? Today, we explore both participatory research and practice research with Ng Bee Leng (Director, Community Development) and Woo Pei Yi (Senior Assi...

What do community work and community development look like in practice? More specifically, what do they look like in social work practice? In this episode, I’ll first chat with Palvindran S/O Jayram (Manager, Community Hubs), who worked as a social worker before moving to community work. Next, Jermaine speaks with a resident, Lydia Susiyanti (Resident and Community Activator, 643 Community Hub), w...

Before exploring the details of community work and community development, we ought to understand: What makes a community? More fundamentally, what is a community? Or the community? With Ng Bee Leng (Director, Community Development) and Muhammad Fazeli (Resident and Community Activator, 643 Community Hub), we learn how they describe the community, the Asset-Based Community Development approach, and...

In this teaser episode, we introduce our four-episode mini-series titled “The Community”, co-produced with AMKFSC Community Services, focused on community work and community development in Singapore. We also meet our mini-series co-host, Jermaine Boh , and describe the content you can expect. This episode is part of “The Community” mini-series, co-produced with AMKFSC Community Services. Learn mor...

On this podcast, I’ve traditionally featured the research and social work and projects of others. I make a small exception today, because I want to share about two recent research journal articles I’ve published, which, I think, in an interesting fashion, draws from earlier episodes I produced for past seasons of this socialservice.sg podcast. I’ve divided this episode into three parts. In the fir...

"Jom" (Malay for "let's"; jom.media ) is Singapore's new weekly digital magazine covering the arts, culture, politics, business, technology, and more in the country. With co-founders Sudhir Thomas Vadaketh , Charmaine Poh , and Tsen-Waye Tay , we ask them about how they got started, their plans to cover civic issues that are somewhat controversial or contested in society, and navigating long-term...

" Seeking Shelter: Homeless during the COVID-19 pandemic in Singapore " is the country's second nationwide street count of its unhoused and homeless, conducted in 2021. With its authors Dr. Ng Kok Hoe and Jeyda Simren Sekhon Atac , we begin by reviewing the first street count and report in 2019 . Thereafter, we dive deeper into their most recent report, to understand the state of homelessness duri...

With Edward Yee of Givfunds ( https://www.givfunds.org/ ), a non-profit which lends low-cost funds at scale to South Asian social enterprises, and Masref ( https://www.masref.ch/ ), a Swiss fintech which seeks to increase the accessibility of safe and secure saving accounts, we chat about his three big ideas on finance and leaving nobody behind. First, the removal of persistent biases; second, the...

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in Singapore, the living conditions and well-being of migrant workers have received increased attention. At the same time, and consequently too, during the country’s first circuit-breaker in 2020, there was an intense flurry of volunteerism and donations among concerned Singaporeans. However, since then, over the past two years, public attention on both mig...

With producers of the Singapore-based “Social Work Made Accessible” podcast , Dominic Soh , Rachel Koh , and Cheong Ming Fa​​ng ( https://www.instagram.com/swmadeaccessible/ ), we chat about how they got started, the different social work episodes and conversations they’ve had, and how they are planning for the future. This episode is part of the "The Work of Social Work" series of the podcast's f...

With Chen Weiwen , the founder of Eyeviser ( https://eyeviser.com/ ), which offers 360-degree eye-care to companies and the public*, we chat about the three big ideas on the future of eye-care and eye-health. First, the shift from treatment to prevention. Second, the role of tech-powered prescription checks. And third, the personalisation of eye-care. (*This is corrected from an earlier version of...

As part of Save. Me ( https://www.screeningstatistics.com/saveme/ ), Prof. Rosie Ching and her students interviewed almost 3,000 folks in Singapore for the country’s first national survey on suicide. We ask her about the suicide stigma index, the key findings, as well as relevant policy and practice directions. This episode is part of "Making Research Sense" series of the podcast's f...

Today, as part of our “Civic Engagement and Action” mini-series, where we speak to folks about expanding communities and spaces for sustained civic engagement and political participation, I am joined by our co-host, Isaac Neo , a political and security risk analyst. We chat briefly about his GE2020 newsletter and his involvement in a number of other Singaporean initiatives and organisations before...

Today, as part of our “The Future Of…” mini-series, where we chat about big ideas with Singaporeans engaged in social initiatives in Asia and beyond, I am joined by our co-host, Samantha Lee . Samantha is the founder of StoneSoup Partners, an early-stage fund that invests in companies that do well by doing good in emerging markets in Africa and South East Asia. She shares her big ideas about the f...

“What is something that brought you joy today?” That’s the question one is encouraged to contemplate as one explores the website of HappyUrns ( https://happyurns.org/ ), an initiative to help different groups of Singaporeans engage meaningfully with death and end-of-life topics with their loved ones. With team members Amanda Swee and Adya Sadanand , we have a thoughtful conversation about their th...

Last year, the Lien Centre for Social Innovation published Singapore’s first nationally representative food insecurity study , finding that about 10 per cent of Singaporean households experienced food insecurity at least once in the last 12 months. This year, the centre's updated, second part of "The Hunger Report" explored two related questions . First, what is the impact of the COVID-19 pan...

Using two child cohorts, Dr. Jonathan Huang and his team at the Singapore Institute for Clinical Sciences at the Agency for Science, Technology and Research sought to understand - in a journal article - the lifestyle changes experienced by Singaporean children after the country's circuit-breaker as well as the potential long-term outcomes. In our conversation, we learn more about the research find...

Inspired by the short story “SIN” in Singaporean writer Ng Yi-Sheng's collection “Lion City” ( https://epigrambookshop.sg/products/lion-city ), “What’s the Matter, Mr. Monster” ( https://www.ministryofmonsters.sg/ ) is a dialogue-driven game where one role-plays as a civil servant settling complaints of otherworldly creatures settling into Singapore. With director Roshan Singh Sambhi , we dive int...

Social enterprise Wateroam ( https://www.wateroam.com ) has been working to build a world without prolonged thirst, and today with one of its co-founders Lim Chong Tee we want to push the conversation a little further, by challenging him to share his big ideas about the future of water and water scarcity. After that, we talk about Wateroam’s plans in the next five years, and then the next 50 years...

Since 2013, "Both Sides, Now" ( https://www.bothsidesnow.sg/ ) has sought to normalise end-of-life conversations, by creating artistic projects and engaging Singaporeans at public locations such as hospitals, town centres, senior homes, and HDB void decks. Last year, in 2021, the project researched and engaged the Malay-Muslim community, culminating in the "Kata-Kata Kita" variety show ( https://w...