Tan Wah Thong

Whilst at lunch yesterday, I caught up with Tan Wah Thong. An amazing man. He is the Chairman of the ACS International school board and is going to be 87 this year. But he still makes it a point to go to the school every day. He is actively involved in all that the school is doing, including all its overseas ventures. And he is still driving. His contributions to ACS are incalculable.

I first got to know Wah Thong in 1996, when he first became Chairman of the ACS Board of Governors. I myself had just gotten onto the Board that year. He was an outsider of sorts as he had never been involved in anything ACS until then, other than being a student there.

I liked him and he was so full of drive and energy. So many things in ACS now are the result of the initiatives started during his tenure as Chairman of the board.

The reconstruction of the ACS campus at Barker Road into a integrated primary and secondary school happened during his time. Some of us in the board took so much flak when we had to demolish the old clock tower. But it worked out well in the end.

Getting rid of the ACJC school badge and getting them to wear the ACS badge also happened during his time.

He made changes to the ACS board of governors constitution to change the structure and composition of the Board .

He was so focused on bringing all the schools together and to ensure that they all worked together as one ACS.

One of the initiatives I suggested to him was to do a joint newsletter for all schools. We started the Echo and to make it financially viable, made the schools pay for the copies. I was in charge of this project whilst he was the Chairman. And he ensured all the school principals played ball to make it a success. Till today, the newsletter is operating.

He also asked me organise a joint Founders Day celebration for all the ACS schools. We had never done this before. We did this event in the year 2000 and it was a massive undertaking. I chaired the organizing committee and we did the event at the Indoor Stadium. The then PM Lee Hsien Loong graced the event as GOH. It was a roaring success with 8500 students present celebrating Founders Day together. We then did another one in 2005 again at the Indoor Stadium. This time with the then Education Minister and an old boy Tharman Shanmugaratnam as our GOH. He ensured that every one of our principals was committed to ensuring these events were a success.

When we started off in 1996, the quality of our education in our ACS schools was rather wanting. ACS Independent was ranked 20 the first time rankings came out which shocked everyone. ACJC had become an institution no one picked as a school of choice, even our own ACS boys. He worked to improve the quality of teaching and CCA standards at all the ACS schools and within a few years both ACS Independent and ACJC became first choices for Singapore students.

Although ACS has been in existence since 1886, no one had compiled any sort of history of the school. He asked Ernest Lau, my former principal in ACS and who at that time was an archivist for the Methodist Church, to write the history. And so the ACS Story book was born. A huge undertaking. It also gave me an opportunity to work with Ernest Lau on the chapter of the book on the ACSOBA.

He was also responsible for the birth of ACS International. He negotiated with MOE, EDB and the SLA to get the suitable site, funding and staffing to start that school from scratch. I remember being part of the interviews for the principal. He chose John Barrett, an excellent choice.

He stepped down as Chairman of the ACS board of governors in 2008 to focus on ACS International. He became the Chairman of ACS International board and he holds that position till today. He asked me to be part of the original board of directors of that school in 2007 and I am still on that board. That school had been such a success and it contributes more than a million dollars each year from its operating profits to the Methodist Mission and the other ACS schools.

When one looks back on the history of ACS, his time as Chairman of both the ACS board of governors and ACS International will stand out as some of the most outstanding years of growth and unity in the history of ACS.