Comparative analysis of undergraduate life science education at NTU, Singapore and Kyutech, Japan : commonalities and differences in preparing students for employment or graduate school.

• Main Author: Lee, Kok Sang.
• Other Authors: School of Biological Sciences
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2010
• Subjects: DRNTU::Science::General::Education
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/39462
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Despite the high standard of life science education achieved by Singapore and Japan, their education qualities are less visible in a global university context. The focus of this comparative study is undergraduate life sciences education at NTU and Kyutech. Online surveys were administered to 227 students and 10 professors from Japan and Singapore.Due to the population difference of the two participating universities, the number of respondents from Singapore is about four times more than those from Japan. Students in Singapore tend to start working upon graduation while students in Japan tend to go for graduate study. The difference in class size had resulted in significant differences. Students in Singapore were found to spend more time to study and less time for entertainment compared to their peers in Japan. Differences in government policies of Japan and Singapore are believed to cause most of the differences observed. The case study’s results provide a useful basis for educational policy researchers to design a scaled-up survey involving more universities in each region.