25
April
2018
|
16:13
Asia/Singapore

New deans appointed for NUS public policy and medical schools

The National University of Singapore (NUS) today announced the appointments of new deans for the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKY School) and the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine (NUS Medicine). Eminent economist Professor Danny Quah will become the 2nd Dean of the LKY School from 1 May 2018. Top fetal growth and early development clinician-researcher Associate Professor Chong Yap Seng, will be appointed the 17th Dean of NUS Medicine from 1 January 2019. 

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Associate Professor Chong Yap Seng (left) will serve as Dean of the NUS Yong Loo School of Medicine from 1 January 2019, while Professor Danny Quah (right) will helm the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at NUS from 1 May 2018.

Prof Quah is currently the Acting Dean as well as Vice Dean (Academic Affairs) and Li Ka Shing Professor in Economics at the LKY School, while Assoc Prof Chong is Vice Dean (Academic Medicine) at NUS Medicine, and concurrently Senior Consultant in the Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology at the National University Hospital and the Executive Director of the Singapore Institute for Clinical Sciences (SICS) under the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR).

NUS President Professor Tan Eng Chye said, “We are delighted with the appointments of Professor Danny Quah as the new Dean of the NUS LKY School and Associate Professor Chong Yap Seng as the next Dean of NUS Medicine. 

In Danny, we have found a leader who has the vision, stature and drive that will propel Asia’s top public policy school to the next level. He is internationally respected for his work, appreciates the importance of the School in Asia and the world, and is also popular with his colleagues, students and alumni for his warmth. We are excited by what Danny will bring to the LKY School as its new Dean.

Yap Seng is an outstanding and multiple award-winning clinician-researcher, educator and administrator, and a homegrown talent. He has a clear vision and strategy for further deepening the impact of the region’s leading medical school. Yap Seng deeply appreciates the significant role our medical school has played in the island’s healthcare landscape since 1905, and its mission of nurturing future generations of doctors and nurses for the nation. We entrust NUS Medicine to Yap Seng with great confidence.” 

Professor Danny Quah

Prof Danny Quah is an eminent scholar in economics and international relations with a strong global profile and highly-cited publications across a range of research areas. His current work takes an economic approach to world order – with a focus on global power shifts and the rise of the East, and on alternative models of global power relations. He has delivered TEDx talks on this research, and his blog is regularly named one of the top 100 Economics blogs in the world. Prof Quah's research has been supported by the Khazanah Research Institute, the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation, the British Academy, the UK’s Economic and Research Council, and the Andrew Mellon Foundation.
 
Prior to joining the LKY School, Prof Quah held academic appointments at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Department of Economics, and the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). He has served as LSE’s Head of Department of Economics (2006-2009), and has been visiting professor at Tsinghua University, Harvard University, Nanyang Technological University, and NUS. He was a Council Member on Malaysia’s National Economic Advisory Council (2009-2011), and a consultant to the Bank of England, World Bank, and Monetary Authority of Singapore. Prof Quah obtained his AB in Economics (1980) from Princeton University, and his PhD in Economics (1986) from Harvard University.

Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong, who is Chairman of the LKY School Governing Board, said, “The Governing Board and I fully support the appointment of Prof Danny Quah as the new Dean of the LKY School. Danny is an outstanding scholar and leader, someone who understands the significance of this prestigious school and its talented community of scholars, students and alumni. We look forward to working with Danny and his leadership team to further strengthen the impact of the LKY School in Singapore and beyond.”

Prof Danny Quah, Dean Designate of the LKY School, said, "I am greatly honoured to be asked to serve as Dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. This School is a hallowed, trusted institution. It evokes, in the minds of many observers, powerful narratives of good governance as critical pathways to economic development and policy success. I look forward to ever-greater collaboration with the rest of NUS and with all our other partners to advance the School's mission - to improve lives, to inspire leadership, and to help transform Asia. The School will work from its position of strength and trust to become even more a global reference point for the best ideas on policy-making, governance, and international cooperation.”  

Associate Professor Chong Yap Seng

Assoc Prof Chong Yap Seng is a highly respected scholar and researcher in fetal growth and early development, and an eminent medical professional well-known among both the international and local medical and academic community. He has received numerous awards in teaching, research and clinical service, with the more recent one being the National Outstanding Clinician Scientist Award (2017) from the Singapore Ministry of Health’s National Medical Excellence Awards, and the Mentoring, Innovation and Leadership in Educational Scholarship Award (2015) from the Asia Pacific Medical Education Conference, NUS. 

Assoc Prof Chong has an impressive research track record particularly in winning big grants, and has received more than S$100 million in research grant funding to date. He is the Lead Principal Investigator of the National Medical Research Council’s Metabolic Translational and Clinical Research Flagship Programme with a S$25 million grant awarded in 2009 and renewed in 2014, and is Co-Investigator of several large A*STAR Strategic Positioning Fund and  Industry Alignment Fund-Pre-positioning grants. He is also the Lead Principal Investigator of the Growing Up in Singapore Towards Healthy Outcomes (GUSTO) study, Singapore’s largest and most comprehensive birth cohort research effort.

Assoc Prof Chong was the Head of the Medical Education Unit of NUS Medicine from 2004 to 2014, and has been Vice Dean (Academic Medicine) of the School since 2015. He has also been Director of the A*STAR-NUS Singapore Centre for Nutritional Sciences, Metabolic Diseases, and Human Development since 2014, and the Executive Director of SICS since 2015. 

Assoc Prof Chong, Dean Designate of NUS Medicine, said, “I am deeply honoured to be given the privilege of leading Singapore’s oldest and biggest medical school. Like the majority of doctors in Singapore, I am an alumnus myself and am aware of the central role the School plays in healthcare. Building on the work of my illustrious predecessors, I will do my best to ensure that the School continues improving the health and lives of Singaporeans through excellence in education, research and innovation, and a full-hearted commitment to service.”

NUS President Prof Tan Eng Chye, in expressing his thanks to the predecessor deans of both the LKY School and NUS Medicine, said, “I am deeply appreciative of the tireless efforts and achievements of Founding Dean Professor Kishore Mahbubani in building and raising the profile of the LKY School. Under his leadership, the LKY School is today widely regarded as the region’s leading public policy school. 

I extend my heartfelt thanks also to Associate Professor Yeoh Khay Guan, the 16th Dean of Medicine for his stellar leadership of NUS Medicine. Khay Guan, who is also a Medicine alumnus, has led the School with great distinction and care, while concurrently blazing a trail as an outstanding clinician-investigator and gastroenterologist, and Deputy Chief Executive of the National University Health System.”  

Please refer to the Annex 1 for the biography of Professor Danny Quah and Annex 2 for the biography Associate Professor Chong Yap Seng.