in August 2008, the then Minister for Education in Singapore - Ng Eng Hen - announced that the ministry would "support the establishment of a network of educational labs where innovations can be prototyped and tested."
the initiative that evolved from this became known as eduLab, and was conceptualised to be a mechanism to develop Singapore as a 'living lab' for Interactive Digital Media (IDM) in education, funded by the Singapore National Research Foundation's IDM strategic programme.
the objective of eduLab was thus to be a "major conduit through which ideas can be brought in to practice, of which selected practices can be subsequently scaled within the education system".
in order to achieve this objective, it was made explicit at the outset that eduLab projects "would differ from traditional R&D projects, in that while the latter tend to be predominantly led by Principal Investigators, eduLab projects will seek to be true collaborations among various stakeholders and practitioners in which all parties involved work in significantly co-equal partnerships".
in this, teachers in the eduLab programme were supported by access to a physical space at the Academy of Singapore Teachers, access to experts, brokering for partnerships, and funding; these were all under the oversight of a joint office comprising members of the Ministry of Education and the National Institute of Education.
with this vision, eduLab was pretty powerful and unique.
it was launched to teachers at an event at Jurong Junior College in November 2010, with the first networking and brainstorming sessions held shortly after.
today - seven and a half years' later - funding for what was known as the eduLab programme has come to an end.
my team and i are very grateful to the eduLab programme, and to the members of its Programme Management Office (PMO), for their unstinting support and patience these seven and a half years.
the Disciplinary Intuitions / Six Learnings programme has benefitted greatly from the support provided by the eduLab programme.
we would like to take this opportunity to wish all past and present members of the PMO the very best as you chart the paths ahead.
:-)