It is never too late to learn or make mistakes, say two Singapore Polytechnic graduates
02 May 2018
Article featured two SP graduates, Lee Zheng De and Dominic Li. Even though Zheng De has just graduated from SP with a diploma in engineering with business, he already has a start-up called Packdat – an online travel planner which helps users arrange their itineraries through recommending routes and timings – under his belt. Before Packdat, he experimented with several business ideas and started Tripcendo – a platform that connects travellers with local hosts for curated travel experiences – in 2016 with his brother, Zheng Dao, who is also an SP graduate. Despite having a ready supply of over 200 hosts in Singapore, they found it difficult to ramp up the demand, especially from international travellers. Undeterred by the setback, both brothers revamped Tripcendo and started Packdat. Moving forward, Zheng De plans to head to Silicon Valley to learn how entrepreneurs run their companies. The 21-year-old, who is also SP’s 200,000th graduate, was also cited by Deputy Prime Minister and Coordinating Minister for National Security, Mr Teo Chee Hean, as an example of the type of entrepreneurs with global outlook which Singapore needs. Mr Teo, who spoke at SP’s 58th graduation ceremony, shared that the Singapore’s workforce needs two important attributes for the future – entrepreneurship and a spirit of lifelong learning. Embodying that spirit of lifelong learning is 33-year-old Dominic Li, who did not let age stop him from pursuing his goals. Coming from a turbulent family background where his mum left the family at age four, he had to shuffle between staying with different family members. Dominic did not fare well for primary school and was asked to leave Pioneer Junior College after he failed his first year. He then signed on as an army regular at the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) during National Service and was offered the SAF Military Domain Experts Scheme Study Award to upgrade his skills and knowledge after eight years. He then enrolled in SP for a diploma in energy systems and management. Despite being 10 years older than his peers, he challenged himself to be more pro-active by seeking out leadership positions, mixing around with different peers for group projects and helping his classmates in weaker modules. Dominic also received the Lee Kuan Yew Award – one of the top eight awards in SP – and was part of the team that built a full-sized working solar car for the World Solar Challenge 2017 – a 3,000km race from Darwin to Adelaide in Australia. Dominic plans to use the knowledge gained at SP back at the SAF as an assistant analyst, to help with building more efficient systems. Article also mentioned that SP has set up an entrepreneurship centre called SPiNOFF, to help students come up with a business model, a business plan, and learn marketing and branding and financial strategies in a hands-on elective module. Close to 100 students have enrolled in the module, with four projects already being incubated in the centre. A new Continuing Education and Training (CET) course will also be launched later this year for aspiring entrepreneurs in Singapore, and will be open to students and adult learners.
[Today]
