Student Features

Commentary, Humans of RI, Life After Raffles, Student Features

Interview Feature: Marianne Wang, 2024 President’s Scholar
Reading Time: 7 minutes

By M.B. Dharshni (25S03O) and Teo Hui Sian (25S06C)

Regarded as Singapore’s most prestigious undergraduate scholarship, the President’s Scholarship is awarded to the most deserving and outstanding candidates of a cohort. Last year, Marianne Wang (Batch of 2023) was one of the students recognised for her excellence.

Marianne served as the 42nd Students’ Council President during her time at RI. She was a part of the Humanities Programme, led volunteering projects and was also involved in the Table Tennis team and Chinese Orchestra. Currently, she is studying at Harvard University, majoring in Economics and Government. 

No doubt, Marianne’s exceptional abilities as a leader and as a student, alongside her extensive list of accolades, demonstrate excellence to the highest degree. But even her remarkable achievements cannot outshine what makes us truly look up to her as a role model – her unwavering dedication to service, and the humility that shines through in her recognition of the people who have shaped her along the way.

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Commentary, Humans of RI, Life After Raffles, Student Features

Interview Feature: Emily Tan, 2024 President’s Scholar
Reading Time: 7 minutes

By M.B. Dharshni (25S03O) and Teo Hui Sian (25S06C)

We need not shy away from superlatives – the President’s Scholarship is undoubtedly Singapore’s most prestigious undergraduate scholarship, awarded by the Public Service Commission to a select few students every year. Excellence, the simple but often elusive quality of being extremely, extremely good at something, forms the foundation of the President’s Scholarship’s exacting criteria. Recently, we had the opportunity to catch up with one of 2024’s President’s Scholarship recipients – Emily Tan. 

During her time in RI, Emily was part of the Humanities Programme and the Vice-Captain of the Volleyball Team. After graduating, she chose to study Economics at Stanford University. Giving us an hour of her time in the late hours of the night in California (with a time difference of 16 hours with Singapore!), Emily shared with us aphoristic reflections, life lessons and thoughtful advice with both candor and humility. 

As you read on, you’ll find that these reflections and lessons were shaped not by her academic accolades, but by a desire to give back to the community and an appreciation of the people around her.

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Features, Humans of RI, School Life, Student Features

A Level Features 2025: Quantifying the Unquantifiable
Reading Time: 7 minutes

By Bertram Wang (26S06H), Chen Ying (25A01C), Ng Dawin (25A01D)

Ihsan (إحسان) — To do good, or to do beautiful things with the sincerity and awareness that Allah is watching.

There are two ready markers for the success of a Community Engagement Project.

The first is the number of stakeholders involved. The more organisations or companies there are who are willing to partner with you, the more you know that your project means something.

The second is the extent of your reach. What was the biggest thing you did to reach out to the community? Was it a concert? Was it a talk? How many people were there?

Project Ihsan had both of these things. On top of receiving support from the Arab Association and the National Heritage Board, they had held several community dialogues sessions with an upwards attendance of seven dozen people.

But when asked about how they knew that their project had made it, neither Falisha Dina Abdul Jabbar and Emma Phyu Phyu Chain (both 24A01B) mentioned either of these things.

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Features, Humans of RI, School Life, Student Features

A-Level Features 2025: Between Studying, Service, and Sustainability
Reading Time: 4 minutes

By Isaac Chan (25A01B), Kunchur Bharat (26A01B)

For most Rafflesians, sustainability consists of occasionally recycling bottles, not taking a plastic straw here and there, and forgoing a plastic bag at NTUC FairPrice. Leadership, perhaps, is telling people what to do and when to get something done.

For Y7 Arman Ibrahim bin Mustaffa (24S05A), it’s more than that. As one of the founders of Project Futurum, a project that raises awareness about environmental sustainability, as well as the Chairperson of the Raffles Photographic Society (RPS), Arman had a lot on his plate. Raffles Press had the opportunity to sit down with Arman just before he collected his A-Levels results, where he reflected on his two years in RI and the lessons he learned, both in and out of the classroom.

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Features, Humans of RI, School Life, Student Features

Looking back on Wanderlust ‘25: Conversations with the OGLs and Ori OICs
Reading Time: 8 minutes

By Keng Yi, Nicole (25S03S) and Isaac Chan (25A01B)

Photos courtesy of Isaac Chan

Every Wayfinder needs a guide; every tribe, an elder; every Orientation, a team of hardworking, dedicated Y6s committed to making it the best experience possible for their charges.

This was no different at Orientation 2025: Wanderlust. Over four days of Orientation, Y5 Wayfinders fought and strove for their tribes. But behind the scenes, their Orientation Group Leaders (OGLs) and the 44th Students’ Council’s Orientation Committee were on duty throughout to ensure safety, energy, and fun. In this article, Raffles Press gets an inside look at Orientation 2025 from the lens of those that helped make it happen.

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