APCEL Student Outreach Pilot: Raffles Girls’ School

On 8 November 2022, APCEL held the third pilot session of our student outreach programme. 40 Secondary School students from Raffles Girls’ School were invited to the NUS Law campus for an interactive lunchtime workshop on environmental law in the international community and in Singapore.

The students were served lunch in a sustainable manner, having brought their own cups, lunchboxes, and cutlery. Then, Dr. Linda Yanti Sulistiawati (Senior Research Fellow, APCEL) initiated a round of introductions and delivered a warm welcome speech.

Selene Tanne (Research Assistant, APCEL) kicked off group discussions by having the students calculate their carbon footprint and brainstorm about the significance of law and policy in tackling environmental issues.

Following that interactive segment, Linda returned to teach the students about the basics of international law and how international treaties work. She then tied that to how international environmental law is directly transposed or indirectly implemented in individual countries (e.g., Singapore) to meet the goals and/or requirements set out by international environmental treaties. She also talked about her experience as one of the lead authors of the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), demonstrating how science, law, policy, and international relations could intersect in reality.

Nikhil Dutt Sundaraj (Visiting Researcher, APCEL) and Selene shifted the focus to Singapore’s actions. Selene started by introducing Singapore’s Nationally Determined Contributions under the Paris Agreement, and how that sets out our country’s mitigation and adaptation ambitions. Nikhil elaborated on Singapore’s mitigation strategy, explaining about the principle, what forms that might take, and examples from Singapore like carbon taxes. Selene returned to talk about adaptation and why that is crucial, citing examples of recent weather events exacerbated by climate change.

After the presentations, the students engaged presenters in a lively Q&A session, asking questions on issues like the implications of carbon capture technologies, the efficacy of international cooperation, and the impacts of individual action. Dr Jolene Lin (Director, APCEL) led the Q&A and thanked the students for their participation.

To conclude, the students worked in groups to compete in a trivia game of KAHOOT, and then embarked on a campus tour led by Julia Liaw and Robin Buxton-Leow (undergraduate research assistants, APCEL).

Our pilot was very well received by the RGS students. They particularly enjoyed learning complex information in an understandable way, and being introduced to larger ideas about international environmental law. Students also liked the interactive group work segments, as these had helped them to understand the connections between individual action and broader responses to environmental problems.

A student presenting her group’s findings from the group discussion

A group photo