I’ve been posting about education in Singapore on social media for a while now and have received a couple of questions.
So today we answer the question “What do you think about SIM as a University”
Alright first things first. The important thing to note here is that the Singapore Institute of Management or SIM is not a university.
Basically they can’t confer their own degrees.
Previously there was UniSIM which may be causing the confusion, but UniSIM is now known as the Singapore University of Social Sciences or SUSS.
SIM is like a third party provider that partners with many universities from the UK, US and Australia. Some of the more popular universities partnered with them are RMIT, University of London and University at Buffalo.
But, I’m just some guy on the internet who has his own biases especially since I’m employed at the Singapore campus of an Australian university.
So let’s go straight to the source.
To quote the Provost of SIM Global Education, Prof Wei Kwok Kee who was answering questions at the Parent Info Seminar at the SIM Open House held in September 2021: “First of all, SIM is not a university, we do not award any degree direct. Instead we partner with globally recognised universities from countries like Australia, UK and US to offer degree programmes across a wide range of disciplines.”
That being said, I’m an alumni of the SIM-RMIT programme though that was almost a decade ago and I have to say I didn’t face any administration issues.
I wasn’t even physically in Singapore when the offer letter to study in SIM-RMIT came and I settled everything while I was working in Switzerland. So it was a fairly straight forward and convenient process.
SIM was also very quick with writing letters for me to defer my reservist because it was close to my exam period and I felt that the campus life was god-like.
Back then, I was involved with multiple CCAs and maybe spent a bit too much time having fun, which resulting in me getting less than spectacular grades.
I’m still connected with some of the administrators on Facebook till this day, but I didn’t have to deal with the SIM administrators beyond dealing with them for my CCAs and deferment letters, so your mileage may vary.
Perhaps someone who had to retake modules while studying in SIM could share their experiences in the comments of the YouTube video above.
