More sports like open-water swimming included on spexScholarship's 10th anniversary
Programme is also adjusting its criteria to allow NS-serving athletes to continue receiving scholarship support
SINGAPORE — She was the first Singaporean open-water swimmer to have qualified for the Olympics, and on Wednesday (12 April), Chantal Liew also became the first Singapore open-water swimmer to receive the Sport Excellence Scholarship (spexScholarship).
The 24-year-old finished in 23rd place at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, after qualifying for the race barely two months before the Games.
With the spexScholarship support, Liew hopes to make the push to qualify for her second Olympics next year.
"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," she said in a media release by Sport Singapore on Wedneday.
"I'm also extremely honoured to be the first open water spexScholar and hope that this inspires younger athletes to take on new challenges outside their comfort zone, just as I did with open water."
Criteria revision for spexScholars serving NS
As it celebrates its 10th anniversary, the spexScholarship welcomed 33 new athletes from 11 sports, marking it a total of 105 athletes across 24 sports who are currently receiving the scholarship funding.
Since the programme was launched in 2013, it has supported 211 spexScholars, and produced 13 junior and senior world champions with a total of 25 world titles.
During the award ceremony at the Singapore Sports Hub on Wednesday, Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Edwin Tong announced that, with effect from this year, spexScholars who are entering national service (NS) are eligible to remain on the programme.
Previously, elite male athletes cannot be a spexScholarship holder while they are serving NS. These spexScholars will also be eligible to receive a stipend and programmatic support to train while they fulfil their NS obligations.
"We want to make the commitment to recognise the (male athletes') efforts even as they go through national service. It brings me great pleasure to announce that, from this year, spexScholars entering national service will remain on the scholarship as long as they continue to deliver their promise," Tong said.
This criteria revision will thus see the return of three national swimmers who are currently serving NS: Quah Zheng Wen, Darren Chua, and Jonathan Tan.
A total of 68 spexScholarship nominations were received by the Singapore Sport Institute this year. A second round of assessment will be done later in the year for the athletes who were unsuccessful in their application.
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