The National University of Singapore’s Department of History has announced the shortlist for this year’s Singapore Prize, an award of $50,000 that aims to boost engagement with and understanding of the island’s history. This is the second time the prize has been awarded.
The prize was launched in 2014 as part of the SG50 programme to mark Singapore’s fifth anniversary, and is the first in the country to be devoted to its history. The prize is open to non-fiction and fiction works in English published from January 2017 to May 30 this year. The prize is administered by NUS’s department of history and its panel of judges consists of scholars of the subject.
American social scientist Benedict Anderson once argued that nations are ’imagined communities’ and the shared imagination, particularly in history, is a key glue binding societies together. Kishore Mahbubani, distinguished fellow at the NUS Asia Research Institute and one of the prize’s nominators, has echoed that view in a recent Straits Times column.
The President’s Science and Technology Awards was established in 1987 as the National Science and Technology Awards (NSTA) and elevated to presidential level in 2009. The highest accolades in the Republic of Singapore for scientific achievement, the awards aim to uphold research excellence and strengthen the growing community of science talent in Singapore.
This year’s winners were selected from a pool of entries submitted by small businesses and non-profits across the globe. They include Art Outreach Singapore, Oriental Remedies Group, Oysterly and Style Theory Singapore, who will all win S$15,000. Four will be chosen as global winners and receive an additional S$40,000 each.
Launched in 1968, the TOTO game has grown with the country. Today, there is a one-in-eleven chance of winning a prize when you purchase a Singapore Pools lottery ticket. You can choose your numbers from the six available options – or use System Entry to automatically select your tickets. You can also enjoy online and mobile ticketing, in addition to traditional pre-printed tickets at any of the over 300 Singapore Pools outlets.
The Earthshot Prize was launched by Britain’s Prince William and a panel of climate scientists and entrepreneurs to recognise the breakthrough solutions in clean energy, health, water and ocean conservation. This year’s finalists included an Indian maker of solar-powered dryers, a soil carbon marketplace and groups that work to make electric car batteries cleaner and restore Andean forests. The winners were announced at a ceremony in Singapore on Tuesday. Click here to read about them.