SCSE Student Achievements 2021

Alice Chua Qin Hui (DSAI, Year 4)

Hello! I am Alice, currently a Year 4 undergraduate student, majoring in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence at NTU. Throughout my 3 years of being at the university, there were countless opportunities that SCSE have planned for us students and I am grateful to be able to share snippets of my journey with you.

There are many student clubs in NTU and I am fortunate to be able to join a few of them. Resulting in me representing NTU for the annual Institutional Archery Competition in 2019 and more recently, being elected as the Honorary General Secretary of SCSE’s very own Computer Science and Engineering Club. 

These activities allowed me to improve on my soft skills such as communication and teamwork, which I had little opportunities to before university. It was also through these leadership opportunities that enabled me to join the Student Leadership Development, Impactful Leadership Program which provides workshops, leadership conversations and coaching for student leaders to hone their leadership skills. 

Overseas exchange opportunities were also one of the highlights. I was able to embark on two exchange before the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Both exchanges were focused on improving the education system in other countries. 

Being able to join the 2019 International Summer Camp on Artificial Intelligence hosted by University of Science and Technology of China was a cherished overseas experience as it gave me the opportunity to meet a diverse range of people, whom I am still in contact with today.

To end off, I would like to thank NTU, especially SCSE which allowed me to have such a fruitful and exciting university life!

 

 

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Lim Gia Lim (CS, Year 4)

I am currently a Year 4 student with SCSE. My time at NTU was enriching as it gave me the chance to wear different hats. I have participated in hackathons, worked with MOE to reform the CCE curriculum, lead the NTU Aquathlon Team and am currently the Vice-President in NTU Students’ Union. 

Throughout my first and second year, I was juggling school with work, trainings and caretaking duties at home. Thus, resulting in me not achieving to the best of my capabilities in school. And that, was a huge stress point for me; especially in such a competitive environment.

For the longest time, I was convinced that I was simply not good enough. However, I was blessed with helpful and inspiring peers who encouraged, forgave and taught me along the way. Exploring beyond my field, picking up new skills and finding other interests made me realise that everyone will have something amazing to offer, we just need to be patient and continue to strive to improve. The key is to find what works for you, instead of forcing it.

With the lessons learnt, I was able to apply them to the opportunities given by NTU. I’m currently interning at Amazon Web Services (AWS) and will go on to PayPal, all of which were unimaginable to me during my first year.

Curiosity and open-mindedness was crucial in my growth. I firmly believe that learning happens when you step out of your comfort zone. The projects and opportunities in NTU have made me realise that learning can happen anywhere, some takeaways may be tangible while others may be harder to quantify. We just need to give it a chance and have faith.

 

 

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Hoo Kah Jun (CS, Year 3)

During my first year, I have decided to join the Computer Science and Engineering Club as a Junior Events Executive, to plan and organise events for students in our school to learn new things, enjoy the events and have fun with their peers.

At the same time, I also participated in the SCSE Transition and Orientation Programme and Hall XV Freshmen Orientation Programme as a Chief Group Leader and Group Leader respectively.

This year, I have decided to take on the President role of 21^st Computer Science and Engineering Club Management Committee, to instil the vision and enforce the mission of the school’s academic club. I had to oversee, ensure and direct the planning, executive and control of every club event and operation of the club.

Also, I represent the school at the NTUSU Council to debate and review the Union’s policies. Simultaneously, I am the co-chair of SCSE Transition and Orientation Programme and Welfare Head of Hall XV Freshmen Orientation to work more closely with the Orientation committees.

I took up these roles as I am passionate in organising various events and activities to promote campus vibrancy. By acting as a bridge between faculty and students, my team and I can cater to the welfare and needs of fellow students at SCSE.

It was tough managing these roles together with studies and social life. There were times where I was busy and unable to cope with all the work due soon. I soon realised no leader can do everything alone, and delegation is one of the most important tools, to boost team and organisational performance and efficiency. Leadership means delegating the right people to get the job done right.

There were also many tough decisions made due to the recent pandemic. Events had many strict restrictions to facilitate safe distancing, some events were also virtual instead. We had to adapt to the changing restrictions and made many last-minute changes so that the event can go on.

Through these roles, I met new people, gained knowledge, skills and experience in leadership, communication, problem-solving and others. I saw myself learning a lot through this journey, allowing self-improvement.

 

 

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Marcus Foo Jun Rong (BCG, Year 3)

With a passion for technology and quantitative finance, I have explored and worked on projects involving Financial Machine Learning and Full-Stack Development. I believe that learning is a continuous process, and not constrained to just within education. Over my past 2 years in NTU, I have been actively exploring concepts and ideas which are beyond the curriculum and applying them to my school projects. 

Learning to learn was an especially important skill I had to pick up. Every student has their own “best” way of learning, and for me that was applying the concepts I have learned during internships and projects. Having an interest in both Finance and Tech, I took up multiple internships at companies like Temasek, PwC, Astignes Capital and Fullerton Fund Management. Admittedly, it takes a lot of time to prepare for internship applications. What I did was to blend the learning processes from both school and work, making it enjoyable while being purposeful. 

Last year, Marcus volunteered at Code-in the-Community as a Python instructor for children from low-income backgrounds. Afterwards, he also had the honour of being recognised as a top volunteer, which gave him the opportunity to share his experiences with the President, Mdm Halimah Yacob. (2^nd from right).

I have benefitted a lot from NTU professors, online MOOCs as well as my internship mentors, and am a strong believer in open education. Last year, I volunteered at Code-in the-Community as a Python instructor for children from low-income backgrounds. Afterwards, I also had the honour of being recognised as a top volunteer, which gave me the opportunity to share my experiences with the President. I was super impressed with how primary school students can become adept at Python so quickly, given that it is not part of their school curriculum. I urge readers to give this a shot, to help nurture and guide Singapore's young tech talents. Who knows, you might meet the next budding Steve Jobs during your stint.

 To expand my horizon, I started pursuing my interest in research by joining URECA for which I am currently in the process of publishing a paper on NLP in Finance with my supervisor. I was also recently featured on NTU SCSE’s website for being part of the only undergraduate finalist team for the AWS 2020 Hackathon. Outside of school, I enjoy stretching myself, having completed a 100km ultramarathon and taking up a bartending stint. School is the best time to try new things, make mistakes and learn from failures. So never stop learning, because life never stops teaching.

 

 

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Puvvada Meghana (CS, Year 3)

My name is Meghana and I am currently a Year 3 Computer Science Student. I have been involved in various activities that have shaped me to be the person I am today.

In my first year with NTU, I was the group leader for orientation where I helped new students adapt to the university life and help them to assimilate. Following which, I was elected as the Vice President of the Computer Science and Engineering Club where I oversee various activities conducted for students, which also gave me the opportunity to give back to the school and to be able to do more for the students.

I learnt how to better manage people of various roles through different method of communications. It also taught me that it is okay to make mistakes and that the most important thing is to move past the mistake and find a way to solve it. 

Other than that, I was also part of the Overseas Volunteering Expedition (OVE) under Welfare Services Club as the Business Manager. I have always enjoyed volunteering and joining this club gave me the opportunity to meet like-minded people. Through this opportunity, I have learnt how to raise funds and liaise with different stakeholders.

With all my various commitments and school work, time management in balancing the various roles because extremely crucial to me, an essential skill which I have learnt from my time at NTU.

SCSE also taught me the soft skills required in handling roles through group projects and various team collaboration. It has also prepared me with adequate hard skills to help me get started on my career. SCSE has taught me the basics and now I am using the basic skills that I have learnt to upskill myself so that I can be more career-ready.

 

 

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Standing on the right: Lee Ray Sheng (CS, Year 4)

My journey in NTU has been nothing but fulfilling. The professors pushed me to strive for academic excellence and provided me with various opportunities to partake in hackathons and competitions to hone my technical skills. Academics aside, I firmly believe in versatility and take part actively in co-curricular activities. As an active sports member, I represented NTU in the Singapore University National Games (SUNIG) for floorball and won the tournament with them.

During my second year, I wanted to explore the entrepreneurial spirit within myself and started Raydy Beehoon in a simple canteen stall in the hopes of providing cheap supper for NTU students. Together with a team of three, the stall eventually transformed into a mobile food truck and we built our following on a NTU student backed Telegram group with over 3,800 followers.

A month into operation, Circuit Break happened; Raydy Beehoon faced its first stumbling block as we were forced to shut down indefinitely. Instead of being pessimistic about the situation, we decided to utilize the platform that we have established to launch RaydyGives, a charity organization. In a short 1.5 months, we have managed to raise over S$160k and more than 60,000 beehoon meals were donated to the needy.

In recognition of our charitable efforts, I am humbled to have been awarded the President’s Volunteerism & Philanthropy Award by our Republic’s President, Mdm Halimah Yacob.

My interest in data analytics prompted me to engineer a solution to minimize food wastage and food cost as much as possible. A machine learning algorithms were developed to forecast how much food to produce daily. Utilizing my data analytics skills, I evaluated the businesses’ financial data so as to better understand the current and future financial health of the businesses as well as enhance any financial decision making.

In addition, I developed a cross-platform mobile application for my staff and colleagues to report claims so that the finance team can review and reimburse them quickly. The app also has the capability to do end-of-day settlement and payroll management.

My NTU experience has been so enriching. I want to encourage all prospective NTU students to step out of your comfort zone and explore the diverse opportunities presented.

 

 

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Richard Yang Chen Xiao (BCG, Year 3)

I am a penultimate year student from SCSE studying Business and Computing. I was awarded Dean’s lists from both SCSE and NBS. I also embarked on the Singapore Universities Student Exchange Programme (SUSEP) to SMU in late 2020. Despite exchange going virtual, I have made many new friends. And I still keep in contact with a few of them.

Beyond studying a double degree, I am also a leader in multiple clubs, an active hackathon participant, and a passionate volunteer. In NTU, I am President of Innovation Lab (iLAB), Head of Infrastructure at Quantitative Asset Management Club, and IT Executive of CSCE Club. iLAB is a young organisation that aims to be an open innovation platform to promote a university-wide entrepreneurial ecosystem.

In SCSE we held Flutter workshops, design thinking sessions and technical interview bootcamps, which have been popular with the students. The response has been far greater than expected, and we are encouraged by that. My aim is to continue to deliver quality content to benefit the student body.

Outside of school, I am also an active member of Access, a social mobility non-profit organisation that provides career exposure opportunities for students from disadvantaged backgrounds and educational streams. An opportunity that came after participating in a hackathon in March this year.

I volunteer my time by incorporating data analytics into the organisation’s workflow. Despite my short tenure, I was able to contribute significant insights to the operations. I was able to apply the skills I have learnt from school to solve real world problems and make a lasting impact and that was what excites me.

It is definitely not easy juggling between so many commitments. But luckily, I have got a group of close friends who have stuck with me since the beginning. The support of my girlfriend also allows me to push myself further and pursue things that I find meaningful. Without all of them, I will not be where I am today. 

 

 

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Valencia Lie (DSAI, Year 2)

I recently participated in the Starburst x NTU NTC Hackathon and clinched the top prize. My proposal mainly aims to enhance inflight customer experience and solve inefficiencies on-board by introducing a new concept of meal booking system and chatbot.

The biggest inspiration behind these ideas came from personal experience as a passenger because I noticed how inefficient flight attendants were in serving passengers and how unfair the distribution of meals were, especially for passengers seated at the back rows of the aircraft.

These observations prompted me to come up with ideas to solve the problems. However, I realized that no matter how good the ideas were, if I am not be able to prove its feasibility, the judges will not be impressed.

With a distinct goal in mind and being a Data Science and Artificial Intelligence student at NTU, I managed to create working prototypes from the necessary coding and technical skills  amassed from various hackathons and studies experience.

The experiences from hackathons like NTU CAmpcOde x Roboto Hackathon and MLH: Innovation in MedTech Hackathon, allowed me to accurately predict the expectations and demands from the judges.

Not only that, my experience of joining the NTU EDGE Programme has also allowed me to present my ideas eloquently and convince the judges that my innovative ideas are useful for the aviation industry to implement in the future.

With all these factors, I was able to emerge as the top winner, despite being the only individual finalist among three other teams. Although it seems that my victory is the only thing I gained, I actually learnt a lot from participating in this hackathon. 

In fact, my biggest takeaway from the hackathon is that everything begins with an idea and nurturing those ideas can potentially transform them into something concrete and useful. This taught me not to shy away from impossible ideas and continue to strive for innovation. 

 

 

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Vincent Ribli (DSAI, Year 4)

Hi! I am Vincent Ribli, currently studying Data Science and Artificial Intelligence at SCSE.

Earlier this year, I participated in NUS Data Science Competition 2021: Computer Vision with a group of friends. We were asked to build a computer vision-based solution for HP’s chip manufacturing tasks, such as counting chips and identifying anomalous chips. It was interesting to see how the things I learnt in the classroom can be applied to solve real-world industrial problems, allowing routine tasks to be done more efficiently and accurately. Thanks to the rigorous training I received from SCSE, the judges were impressed with the solution my team built, and my team came in first place!

I am also one of the founders of 180 Degrees Consulting NTU. The team of founders felt that the existing consulting clubs in NTU have a high barrier to entry and many interested students do not have sufficient opportunities to hone their consulting skills. As such, we established 180 Degrees Consulting NTU, with an objective of creating an inclusive environment where anyone who wants to learn more about consulting has the avenue to do so. Starting a new consulting club is not easy, but holding on to our initial motivation helped us to reach where we are today.

In NTU, I had multiple opportunities to participate in internships. Currently, I am a Quantitative Strategist Summer Analyst at Goldman Sachs, where I get to apply my strong foundations in Computer Science and mathematics to solve the most complex financial problems analytically. Earlier this year, I was also a Data Science Intern at Shopee, building large-scale computer vision models to improve users’ experiences when using the e-commerce application. Last year, I also was a Margin Optimisation and Data Engineering Intern at AMD, where I developed cloud-based solutions for AMD’s semiconductor manufacturing. Thanks to the industrial exposure I received from these opportunities, I get to see how data science is being applied in different industries and domains. 

 

 

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Liew You Sheng (BCG, Year 3)

Through my two years at SCSE, I have realized that if I want to apply the skillset taught from class to industry business as use-cases. Other than internships, the best way would be to apply for hackathons; where companies share a problem that they are currently facing and would like to get insights and solutions from students. 

I have participated in over 27 hackathons, and achieved 9 wins from different hackathons. Through my experience, I realised that there was neither a consolidated forum nor group for hackathon enthusiasts such as myself. Thus, the idea of SandboxSG was formed.

With my knowledge, I decided to move on further to share my experience and skills with my fellow students, being the first and only student mentor in DSTA’s BrainHack CODE_EXP 2021, which ended in mid-June, where one of my mentored teams achieved finalist position. 

The skills learnt from the BCG course, particularly the URECA project under Dr Ng Wee Keong, was one of my best learning experiences. Despite it being not a compulsory academic curriculum, it taught me most of the skills I still use till today – business analysis skills, patent experience, and technical skills required for creating a tech start-up. Although these may be skills that can be attained in future employment, having such skills in an early stage of my undergraduate career allow me to accelerate my career in the software industry.