Home Team Training Excellence Awards Ceremony – Speech by Ms Sun Xueling, Minister of State, Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of Social and Family Development

Chief Executive, Home Team Academy

Heads of Departments

Home Team colleagues

1. Good afternoon. It is my pleasure to join you at the Home Team Training Excellence (HT TraX) Award Ceremony 2023.

2. Today, we recognise and celebrate the hard work of our Home Team trainers.

Competency-driven Approach to Upskilling in the Home Team

3. Singapore embarked on the SkillsFuture SG initiative in 2015. This initiative encourages Singaporean workers to upskill themselves as regular upgrading in relevant and emerging skills will enable workers to remain employable for the long term.

4. In the Home Team, we have been training our officers in a set of cross-cutting skills, such as cyber and data security, data analytics and design thinking. This year, the Home Team Academy (HTA) collaborated with SkillsFuture Singapore (SSG) to develop a training-needs survey to identify emerging competencies that Home Team officers need. The findings will be used to provide targeted training interventions for our officers.

5. The HTA’s efforts complement our Whole-of-Government’s (WoG) initiatives to adopt a competency-driven approach in developing staff. This will enable the Home Team to upskill our officers and expand their skillsets so that officers have a long and enriching career in the Home Team amidst an increasingly complex operating environment.

6. The HTA plays a crucial role in this process. Kindly allow me to share some of the HTA’s initiatives for the trainer community.

Strengthening Capabilities through Centres of Excellence

7. The HTA has been delivering quality training and learning (T&L) initiatives and will continue to do so through two of its Centres of Excellence (CoE) – the first one in Online Learning, and second, through Evaluation and Assessment.

Equipping Home Team Trainers to Deliver Online Learning

8. The Centre of Excellence in Online Learning aims to strengthen the rigour of online learning capabilities within the Home Team. A key area of focus will be equipping our trainers with the essential skills to deliver online learning effectively.

9. By enhancing their repertoire of skills and capabilities, Home Team trainers can optimise use of the online space to conduct synchronous online learning, facilitate hybrid modality learning, and develop asynchronous learning packages for their learners.

HTA’s Efforts to Support Home Team Trainers in Online Learning

10. To support the development of our Home Team trainers and the wider Home Team in the area of online learning, the HTA will continue to partner the Institute for Adult Learning (IAL) and offer our Home Team trainers two additional runs on essential skills in online training delivery later this year.

11. The HTA has also revamped the Multimedia Lab so that there are conducive spaces for groups to foster collaboration - not just amongst the Home Team trainers but also with curriculum developers. The Lab is furnished with soundproof pods and is fully equipped with essential IT and studio-quality equipment so that users can deliver high quality online training to our learners.

12. Home Team trainers based in the HTA can also look forward to the progressive refreshing of classrooms at Block 12 over the next few years. These classrooms will be equipped with tools to enhance face-to-face learning and synchronous online learning, support hybrid learning modality and enhance learners’ experience (e.g. interactive display panels, configurable furniture and improved audio/video output for quality engagement with online audiences).

13. Next, the new Home Team Learning Management System (HTLMS) 2.0 is now fully operational and allows Home Team trainers to deliver asynchronous learning packages. I hope you have had the chance to explore and familiarise yourselves with new features such as the Trainers’ module and Content Creation module.

Enhancing Evaluation and Assessment Capabilities in the Home Team

14. I would now like to speak about validating our interventions and ensuring that they meet intended learning outcomes. The Centre of Excellence in Evaluation and Assessment is envisaged to drive whole-of-Home Team efforts and enhance the competencies of Home Team trainers by ensuring that course evaluation and assessment systems across the Home Team are robust and reliable in enabling us to achieve our desired training outcomes.

15. The HTA has developed an evaluation framework to serve as a baseline to synergise evaluation efforts across all course offerings.

16. I encourage all Home Team Departments to learn about HTA's application of the evaluation framework and consider adapting the relevant features to your own evaluation efforts. This will enable Home Team trainers to evaluate their training effectiveness, identify areas where they have done well and areas that need improvement.

17. In addition, the HTA, in collaboration with the Home Team Departments, is working on developing and articulating an assessment framework to enhance assessment capabilities across the whole Home Team.

Recognising our 2023 Home Team TraX Award Winners

18. Now, I’d like to talk about our 2023 Home Team TraX award winners. This year’s Home Team TraX winners embody the spirit of innovation in training. They have demonstrated true dedication by proactively upskilling themselves to deliver innovative and high-quality training to their learners.  They embody this year’s theme of “Trained for Success. Primed for Excellence”.

19. Today, 14 trainers and 9 training units will receive the Home Team TraX awards. Kindly allow me to highlight a few award winners.

20. First, Assistant Superintendent (ASP) Saliman Ishak from the Singapore Prison Service (SPS). He is the winner of this year’s Home Team Trainer of the Year (Full Time) Award. He utilises a variety of learner-centric methodologies to suit the different learning styles of his trainees. He also exemplifies the growth mindset by regularly updating his delivery skills and exploring the application of new classroom technologies to enhance his training delivery.

21. Another award winner is Ms Sarah Lavinia Joseph, also from the SPS. She is the winner of the Home Team Trainer of the Year (Adjunct) Award. Sarah strongly believes in designing experiential learning opportunities for her learners in correctional psychology. She also cultivates a positive relationship with her trainees by creating a safe space for questions and reflection to facilitate effective learning.

22. These are just two examples, out of the many that we are celebrating this afternoon. My heartiest congratulations to all award winners, and thank you for your commitment and dedication!

Conclusion

23. Achievements and accolades of the winners are not just theirs alone. For each award winner, there is a supporting infrastructure in the form of strong leadership, supportive supervisors and colleagues, and an ecosystem that primes our trainers for success.

24. I would also like to thank members of the Home Team Training & Learning community for your contributions. It is important that we continue to work together to grow the Training & Learning domain, to ensure that our Home Team officers are fully equipped to perform their duties and tackle future challenges, so that we can all work together to keep Singapore safe and secure.

25. With that, I thank you very much.