Page 4 - Year in Review 2018/2019

Chairman’s Message

2018 was a banner year for the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA). With tremendous joy and a deep
sense of gratitude in our hearts, we launched the academy’s 80 anniversary celebrations with the opening
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of our Campus 1 Tower Block in February, followed by a year-long series of events to commemorate our
80 years of contributions to the artistic landscape of Singapore and the region.

We rejoiced over the success of the academy in overcoming the many challenges over the years to evolve
and flourish as an eminent tertiary arts institution. At the same time, we recalled with deep gratitude the
indomitable spirit of the pioneers who set up the academy in 1938, and successive generations of educators
who held fast to the vision of championing the development of the arts in the region. Driven by their selfless
devotion to helping the academy succeed, NAFA grew from a small school with just 14 students to today’s
comprehensive tertiary institution with more than 12,000 students enrolled in the diploma and degree
programmes, as well as adult learning and children’s enrichment courses. Along the way, the academy has
played a leading role in artistic and cultural development, and we are proud to count 13 Cultural Medallion
recipients and 14 Young Artist Award winners among our alumni.

Our journey does not end here. Rather, the 80 anniversary milestone marks new beginnings and our
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aspirations to reach for ever-higher levels of excellence and achievement in arts education. We envision
new areas of growth and new possibilities to nurture artistic talents as we expand our range of courses
and learning platforms.

The foundation for future growth has been carefully laid. Our efforts in recent years to enhance the
institution received strong endorsement from the External Review Panel under the Ministry of Education’s
Arts Quality Assurance Framework in January 2019. In March, we commenced the NAFA Foundation
Programme to prepare N-Level school-leavers who are interested in the arts to successfully enrol in and
complete their diploma courses at NAFA. This programme is aligned with a growing national focus on
providing quality arts education in Singapore.
The road ahead will be lined with new challenges and opportunities. I am confident that we will continue
to embody the innovative, pioneering spirit of our founding forefathers to explore new frontiers and break
new ground. Through our 10-year Strategic Plan that was brought into effect in 2015, as well as a set of
Artistic Strategies that was completed in 2017, we set the directions to achieve our mission, which is to
inspire learning and growth through the arts. Not resting on our laurels, we have embarked on a midpoint
review of the Strategic Plan to reaffirm our current strategies and set new ones.

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