APhO 2017 and IPhO 2017 Singapore Teams

The 18th Asian Physics Olympiad (APhO) will be held from 1 - 9 May in Yakutsk, Russia.

(Updated on 9 May: APhO Results  Congrats to Teddy and Darren for being top 2 in Spore team and selected into IPhO team!)

The following Year 6/JC2 students are representing Singapore at the 18th APhO:
Byron Chen Pang Yen, NUS High
Darren Wayne Lim, NUS High
Teddy Ong Hong Ming, NUS High
Ivin Lee Jieh Wen, RI
Lim Jun Heng, RI
Matthew Shi Zhe Hao, RI
Wittmann Goh Ghin Fong, RI
Zong Daoxin, RI

The 48th International Physics Olympiad (IPhO) will be held from 16 - 24 July 2017 in Yogyakarta, Indonesia.

Top 2 from APhO 2017 will be joining the following students to represent Singapore at the 48th IPhO:
Bradley Teo Wei Jie, RI
Lee Vint Ve Shein Lin Htut, RI
Ma Zhao Yu, RI
Updated on 9 May:
Teddy Ong, NUS High
Darren Wayne Lim, NUS High

NOI 2017 Results

From left: Jeffrey (G), Shane (B), Yuechen (G), Andrew (S), Timothy (S), Wayne (S), Owen (S), Lim Li (G), Gabriel (G), Xingchen (G)

An elated Mr Li Da

Individual 3rd

Top 4 winners

Top JC Category

Individual award winners

NOI 2017 Website

NOI 2017 Full Results

Top 4 Contestants
Jeffrey Lee, NUSH
Estelle Lee, RI
Lim Li, NUSH
Huang Xingchen, NUSH

Top Junior Colleges
NUSH
HCI

Top Secondary Schools
HCI
NUSH

Top Secondary School Students
Ng Yu Peng, HCI
Teow Hua Jun, HCI

Best Female Medalist
Li Yuechen, NUSH

Top Foreign Contestant
Yeoh Zi Song, Malaysia

Youngest Medalist
Koo Ii, RGS

All individual award winners received an Apple Watch each.

Cambridge 2016-17 Michaelmas Term Supervisors' Report

Cambridge has 3 terms in a year: Michaelmas Term, Lent Term and Easter Term. There are no exams in the first two terms; all academic exams are held during the last term.

Lim Jeck's Supervisors' Report for Michaelmas Term is below, to give readers a feel of how a Supervisor report looks like.  I won't be posting subsequent Supervisor reports.

(Estimate of term's work: 1 means Class 1)

Mathematical Tripos, Part IA Trinity

Module: Differential Equations
Supervised by Mr Gunnar Peng (GGP24)
Industry: Good
Progress: Good
Interest: Enthusiastic
Estimate of term's work: 1
Comments: Outstanding work! Solved essentially every problem, but with a few minor mistakes.


Module: Vectors and Matrices
Supervised by Mr Matthew Crowe (MC756)
Industry: Good
Progress: Good
Interest: Interested
Estimate of term's work: 1
Comments: Near perfect answers to all questions, well done. Is interested but quite quiet in supervisions.


Modules: Numbers and Sets, Groups
Supervised by Professor I.B. Leader (IBL10)
Industry: Good
Progress: Good
Interest: Enthusiastic
Estimate of term's work: 1
Comments: A fantastic start to his Cambridge career. He has done a lot of hard questions: has his own particular (and very effective) way of approaching problems. A real star.
Bright and interested: a pleasure to supervise.

Euler Math Competition 2017

Euler Math Competition 2017, organized by NTU

Time: 18 March (Sat) 10 am to 2 pm
Venue: SPMS-LT2
Sponsor: Jane Street

Register here

Malaysia Johor Bahru Shopping Trip

Lunch at Kim Gary, JB City Square

Sudha, Dorothea and I had been planning for this JB trip since 2 years ago, finally we went JB City Square and Komtar JBCC today!

RSVP Singapore Corporate Video (English)

Seniors, if you have some spare time and would like to do some volunteer work, join RSVP - The Organisation of Senior Volunteers!



I am currently a volunteer with the Enriching Lives of Seniors Programme (ELSP) within RSVP.

From RSVP website:

Piloted in November 2013, the ELSP provides an opportunity for Senior Volunteers to befriend and engage the lonely seniors through regular weekly engagements motivating them to socialise, develop their skills and interest and be self-reliant by keeping them mentally and physically fit.

Through regular participation, we hope the seniors in these neighbourhoods will form bonds with one another and become a community with a spirit of mutual help. Their physical, emotional and mental well-being will also strengthen.

European Summer Program on Rationality (ESPR)

ESPR Homepage

The European Summer Program on Rationality (ESPR) is an immersive summer workshop for talented high school students all around the world (16-19 years old as of August 15, 2017) with exceptionally strong reasoning skills and a desire to understand our world.

The curriculum covers a variety of topics from mathematics to cognitive science, from social analysis to artificial intelligence, and extends the learning with guest speakers from a variety of cutting edge fields.

But the ultimate goal of our program is to show how rigorous, quantitative skills can be applied outside the classroom. How can we understand our behavior? How can we think more clearly to achieve our goals?

ESPR 2017 will be held in the second half of August in a college near London. Concrete start dates and duration will be announced after the Early Admissions phase (March 1), though it will start no later than the 23rd and be at least one week long.

The program's tuition as well as meals and lodging are free for all admitted students. Need-based travel scholarships are available.

This program is the successor of the acclaimed EuroSPARC program, and it is sponsored by the Center For Applied Rationality (CFAR).

~~~~~
Applications for ESPR are now open! Early applications are due on 11:59PM PST, March 1, 2017. To apply, click here

Google Jobs and Internships

Source: Google (via The Straits Times)

Everybody knows Google. Not everybody knows that they've had a presence in Singapore for a while now.

Google might have been here since 2007 but this is the first time the company is actively recruiting for a large number of openings.

They're now hiring an unspecified number of software engineers to fill their first local large engineering team. 

When Google first established their offices here in 2007, it was mostly focused on marketing, sales and business development. The hiring of software engineers marks a change in direction for the company's local offices as it aims to make the Singapore branch into one of its engineering hubs.

Singapore's not alone in being an engineering hub. Google has thus far established three of them; in Hyderabad, Sydney and Mountain View.

Being an engineering hub means that the Singapore team will be doing some heavy lifting work, actively developing new software for Android and as well work with as next generation technology in fields such as mobile data management and commerce. The fruits of their labors will then be used in emerging markets like India and Brazil.

If your dream has always been to work for Google, there's no better time than to now to try to get your foot in the door by checking out Google Singapore's recruitment page.

University APAC Test (to be re-named, "CodeJam Kickstart")

Get ready to solve some coding puzzles! Check out the website here, first round to start in March.  Schedule on the website will be updated mid-Feb.  In the meantime, check out past problems and you can already start practicing!

Full Time Software Engineer (Singapore)

The job posting isn't up yet, but we're happy to collect your resume ahead of time, and we can also alert you when it does post.

Please indicate your interest via this form.

Full Time Software Engineer Roles Outside of Singapore

Apply directly through the Google Careers Website

Software Engineering Intern - Singapore or Sydney

Singapore- Apply via form by Feb 3rd

Sydney- Apply directly online by Feb 28nd

UX/UI Intern - Singapore

Posting is not opened yet on the website, so please apply via the form.

Women Techmakers Scholarship (formally known as Anita Borg Scholarship)

Please look out for announcements around March for applications. 

In the meantime, check out the website here.

Hope that you found one or two programs that resonated with your interests.  If at any time you have questions, please reach out to sea-students@google.com.  

Singapore Biology Olympiad 2016 Results

Back to Cambridge

Cambridge University's terms are rather short. There are 3 terms: Michaelmas term (9 weeks), 6-week break, Lent term (9 weeks), 6-week break, Easter term (8 weeks, mainly revisions followed by year-end exams) then 3.5-month break. Effectively, undergraduate students only attend lessons for about 18 weeks in a whole academic year!

Lim Jeck was back home for holiday break, from 4 Dec 2016 to 15 Jan 2017. He will be back again on 19 Mar 2017.

Year	Full Michaelmas term	Full Lent term	Easter day	Full Easter term
2016-17	Tue 4 Oct - Fri 2 Dec	Tue 17 Jan - Fri 17 Mar	16 Apr	Tue 25 April - Fri 16 Jun

Playing Little Fighter 2.5 Again

8 multiplayers on two PCs (16 hands on two keyboards!)
From left: Hai Hui, Jia Xiang, Jin Tian, Wei Xiong, Lim Jeck, An Yu, Lim Min and Lim Li

Click here for the previous Playing Little Fighter 2.5

Student Exchange at NUS

Lim Min is currently having student exchange at NUS, besides working 3 days a week at Garena for her internship.

She is taking the following 2 modules:
LSM2251 - Ecology and the Environment
This module introduces students to the science of ecology and its role in explaining environmental processes. It covers both the major concepts and their real-world applications. Topics include organisms in their environment, evolution and extinction, life history strategies, models in ecology, population biology, ecological interactions, community ecology, ecological energetics, nutrient cycling and landscape ecology. Lectures will include both global, regional and local examples and concepts are revisited during practials, field trips and project work.

MA4251 - Stochastic Processes II
This module builds on ST3236 and introduces an array of stochastic models with biomedical and other real world applications. Major topics: Poisson process, compound Poisson process, marked Poisson process, point process, epidemic models, continuous time Markov chain, birth and death processes, martingale.

Singapore Chemistry Olympiad 2016 Results

 SChO 2016 Full Results

Singapore Physics Olympiad 2016 Results

SPhO 2016 Results

Invitation to participate in Singapore Physics Olympiad Training for 2017

Singapore will be sending teams of students to compete in the 18th Asian Physics Olympiad (APhO) on 1 - 9 May 2017 at Yakutsk, Russia and the 48th International Physics Olympiad (IPhO) on 16 - 24 July 2017 at Yogyakarta, Indonesia

On the basis of outstanding performance in the 29th Singapore Physics Olympiad (SPhO), the following students are invited to participate in the national training programme for 2017.

The training programme has three phases:
1. Initial training before selection of travelling teams (Jan to Mar)
2. Intensive training for APhO and IPhO travelling teams (Mar to May)
3. Intensive training for IPhO travelling team (May to July)

Students who take up this invitation to participate in the training should be committed to undergo as many phases of the training as necessary.

Garena Singapore Internship

Lim Min has just started her internship at Garena Singapore.

The internship at Garena Labs will be from Jan to May 2017, 3 days a week, as she still has one more module to clear before her graduation from NTU in Aug 2017. She will start her fulltime job at GIC Singapore from end Aug.

About Garena Labs Internship Programme (information is extracted from Garena's website):

Garena Labs is the company’s R&D department. It consists of a team of highly experienced and talented developers with strong technical capabilities and a keen eye for detail. At Garena Labs, we design and build software to serve over 140 million users across Southeast Asia and Taiwan. We develop innovative products and services that make a real difference in society and continuously challenge ourselves to push new boundaries in entertainment, social, commerce and financial services sectors.

Talented engineers are the driving force for Garena to grow further and the introduction of Garena Labs Internship Program serves to unleash the potential of bright young talents. As such, we are looking for candidates who are exceptionally outstanding, who take coding seriously and understand computer programming as a science.

As a software engineer intern, you will gain first-hand experience working on Garena’s leading platform to enhance user experience. You will also have the opportunity to work alongside top engineers to gain valuable insights on how to build a scalable and high performance software platform. This is a highly rewarding role as your contributions will directly impact the lives of millions of people in the region.

Individuals with outstanding performance will be invited for a full-time position at Garena.

For more information on the various Garena's internship programs, refer to here.

Welfare for Garena's employees - plenty of food supplies (see below) and dinner is catered for anyone working overtime.

Singapore IMO Team Members' University Destinations

This post is inspired by the Statistics of University Destinations for UK IMO team members (apparently, majority of the UK IMO team members had joined Cambridge, in particular, Trinity College).

Below are the university (undergraduate and postgraduate) destinations of the Singapore IMO team members.  Top 3 university choices are NUS, Cambridge and MIT. Note that most of the guys have had to serve 2 years of compulsory National Service after their High School, before joining the University. Those guys and girls with no NS obligation are marked with #.

University destinations of Singapore IOI team members can be found here.

26 Dec Gathering @ Springdale Condo

NTU 2016/2017 Semester 1 Exam Results

Lim Min's Final Year Semester 1 Exam Results:

Another Semestral GPA of 5.0

Costa Victoria Cruise

14 Dec to 17 Dec Singapore - Malacca - Penang - Singapore