SINGAPORE – The Sport Excellence Scholarship (spexScholarship) commemorated its 10th anniversary on Wednesday with a ceremony at the Bank of Singapore Lounge at the National Stadium where its largest cohort of 105 athletes across 24 sports was unveiled.
In a first for the programme in a decade, spexScholars who are entering national service (NS) can now continue to remain on it if they meet the criteria. Previously, athletes were no longer eligible when they enlisted for NS, with the change announced by Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Edwin Tong at the ceremony.
The scholarship offers support to athletes who are deemed to have the potential to excel on the Asian and world stage. In addition to monthly stipends, they also get support in the areas of education, sports science and nutrition, among others.
The revision will see the return of three national swimmers – Quah Zheng Wen, Darren Chua and Jonathan Tan – who are currently serving NS.
Mr Tong said: “Increasingly we see many of our athletes go through national service and continue to fly the flag. We want to make the commitment to recognise them even as they go through national service.”
Four-gold SEA Games swimmer Tan, who was a spexScholar from 2018 to 2021, was pleased to be back on the programme.
The 21-year-old, who completes his NS in July, said: “The enhanced support will definitely go a long way in helping me achieve new personal bests for the upcoming major Games and qualify for the Olympics – my key goal for this year.
“I will also be enrolling in Stanford University later in September and I hope that with the more competitive environment and additional support, I can further improve my form and reduce my timings.”
Since the inauguration of the spexScholarship, it has supported 211 spexScholars and produced 13 world champions who have won a total of 25 world titles.
While Olympic swimming champion Joseph Schooling, who recently pulled out of the coming SEA Games, was among the notable names missing from the current batch of scholars, the spexScholarship welcomed 33 new athletes from 11 sports.
Among them was the programme’s first open water swimmer Chantal Liew, who was the first Singaporean to compete in the sport at the Olympics.
Liew, 24, is now aiming to qualify for her second Olympics. She said: “I’m now based in Australia and training with a dedicated open water team so I hope to perform well at this year’s world championships as well as the Asian Games, and most importantly obtain my second Olympic qualification.
“I’m so grateful that the selection committee has placed their faith in me... I hope that this inspires younger athletes to take on new challenges outside their comfort zone, just as I did with open water.”
Another first-time recipient was fencer Elle Koh, who won gold in the women’s individual and team epee events at the Hanoi SEA Games in 2022.
The 15-year-old believes the increased sports science support will help her gain a better understanding of her body in areas such as nutrition and recovery to help improve her performance.
With funding from the scholarship, the Secondary 4 student is also looking forward to more opportunities to compete and train overseas.
She said: “This support can help me maintain good physical health, especially if I get injuries, so I’m very grateful for that.
“Also training with other people overseas and having more experience fencing against other fencers will help me improve and learn more, which will help my competition overall.”
For boccia athlete Aloysius Gan, 16, who won a gold and silver at the 2022 Asean Para Games, the scholarship support will be crucial in his bid to qualify for the 2024 Paris Paralympics.
While the Singapore Disability Sports Council covers some of the costs of training and competing, Aloysius’ father Kagan Gan, 43, noted that they have to fork out their own money for many things.
The general manager of a security firm estimated that the cost of one overseas competition for Aloysius, who has cerebral palsy, could come up to about $10,000.
Gan said: “The scholarship definitely will enable us to go for more competitions and accumulate those world ranking points to have better opportunities to qualify for the Paralympics.
“There’s an ecosystem that comes with the scholarship that will help in terms of training venues, coaches and psychologists.”
