School of life: These dropouts became successful entrepreneurs – here’s the grit behind their glow ups
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(From left) Ms Merida Lim, Mr Shaik Nifael Nazeemuddin and Mr Chow Yi Tong dropped out of school as teens but have gone on to launch successful businesses.
ST PHOTOS: DESMOND FOO, BRIAN TEO, GAVIN FOO
- Singapore has a low secondary school dropout rate, with fewer than one in 100 dropping out in the last five years, due to various factors.
- Non-profits like Starfish Singapore aid dropouts, addressing family issues and societal labels, as schools offer support like counselling.
- Merida Lim, Shaik Nifael Nazeemuddin, and Chow Yi Tong found success as entrepreneurs after school drop out due to different reasons.
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SINGAPORE – In a society where most children are brought up to chase the next education milestone, those who quit face an uphill battle finding their way in the world.
Fewer than one in 100 secondary school students have dropped out of school over the past five years, says a Ministry of Education (MOE) spokesperson. Their reasons vary considerably, from personal and family circumstances to negative peer influence. Some opt to work rather than study, while others struggle with academic demands.
Ms Siti Yariyati Mohamed, 53, co-founder of Starfish Singapore, a non-profit that started as a ground-up movement in 2015 to help those who dropped out of school take their N levels, agrees. It received almost 100 applications for the 60 places in its Project Starfish programme intake in 2026.
“They often come from families with complications and hardly have any adults in their lives,” she says. Many, she adds, are “unfairly labelled” once they are out of the school system.
MOE’s spokesperson says schools reach out when they notice irregular attendance and offer support in the form of counselling, home visits and engagement with parents. They will also refer students and their families to external agencies such as self-help groups, family service centres and social service agencies.
“To engage students, secondary schools have also set up after-school programmes which focus on befriending and mentoring, strengthening peer relationships and self-management skills, and utilising interest-based activities,” adds the spokesperson.
In Ms Merida Lim’s case, school was an environment that stifled her innate creativity and led to panic attacks. She dropped out of the six-year Integrated Programme, and later, the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts as well, to become her own boss at 19.
The 20-year-old’s perseverance despite the odds is echoed in the journeys of Mr Shaik Nifael Nazeemuddin and Mr Chow Yi Tong, who also dropped out of school for different reasons. The Straits Times talks to them to find out more.
He quit school at 14, worked 3 jobs to support family and got an MBA at 46
Mindlink Groups founder Chow Yi Tong at PSB Academy, where he graduated with an MBA from Coventry University in 2021.
ST PHOTO: GAVIN FOO
Mr Chow Yi Tong was 14 years old when he failed his Secondary 1 year-end examinations at Zhonghua Secondary School in 1990 – on purpose.
The extended bilingual stream student from the former Chong Shan Primary School wanted to stop schooling to support his single mother. She worked as a dishwasher, wet market stall holder and odd jobs to support him and his two brothers.
His father had abandoned the family when he was around age six, which left them surviving hand to mouth with just one set of school uniform and one pair of shoes each. Meals in their three-room flat in Ang Mo Kio typically involved heating up instant noodles topped with an egg.
He quit school at 18 to ‘clean longkangs’ and started a $3m waste management company
Mr Shaik Nifael Nazeemuddin's waste management company, Jetters Incz, was named one of Singapore’s 100 fastest growing firms in January 2025.
ST PHOTO: BRIAN TEO
When Mr Shaik Nifael Nazeemuddin dropped out of pre-university because “I didn’t want to study any more”, he did not imagine that his first job would involve cleaning grease traps – devices that separate grease from waste water.
The teen, who studied in the express stream at Nan Chiau High School, failed his O-level mathematics and combined science subjects in 2005. He retook them a year later and got into Millennia Institute in 2007, but after his first year-end examinations, he was ready to quit.
His father, then a general manager at a waste management company, was furious at his son’s decision. In a bid to convince him of the importance of school, he insisted that Mr Shaik earn his keep.
Gen Z boss with PSLE cert opens neon art-jamming studios after quitting JC and Nafa
Ms Merida Lim showing off glow-in-the-dark slime, which customers can make at Scuro.
ST PHOTO: DESMOND FOO
Ms Merida Lim’s highest educational qualification is a PSLE certificate, but that does not faze the 20-year-old.
She proudly shows The Straits Times around the second branch of her neon art-jamming studio, Scuro, which opened in late November 2025 in Serangoon Road.
With the lights off, the bigger of two rooms glows in neon colours. Cute cartoon characters pop off the walls and a cheery “Happy Birthday” sign with bunting beckons for a photo.
Ms Lim takes out neon paints – customers paint on canvases after tracing designs from the printed templates – as well as gooey housemade slime, and slaps a glow-in-the-dark tattoo on her face, turning the photo shoot into a playground of sensory delights.
Non-profit helping dropouts launches new programme for younger teens who quit school
Ms Siti Yariyati Mohamed (right), co-founder of Starfish Singapore and Mr Al Zia Taffazal, a dropout who turned his life around after attending its N-level classes.
ST PHOTO: GIN TAY
Over the last decade, Starfish Singapore has made a name for itself as a place where school dropouts aged 15 to 21 can get a second chance at education.
More than 400 young people have graduated from its nine-month-long Project Starfish programme, with an average pass rate of over 90 per cent at the N levels. Its 2025 cohort of 59 achieved 48 distinctions. About 40 per cent of each cohort applies for courses at the Institute of Technical Education to further their studies.
Since 2019, the non-profit has seen a rise in younger applicants aged 15, the minimum age it takes in as private candidates must be at least 16 years old in the year they sit the N levels. Almost one in three of its students in the 2025 intake was 15 years old, says co-founder Siti Yariyati Mohamed, 53.
