June 9, 2022

ELTS alumnus with Rhodes Scholarship has a dream to teach

Darcel Anastasia Al Anthony

With a Rhodes Scholarship under his belt, ELTS alumnus Brendan Loon aspires to be a teacher to give back to the community. (Photo: Brendan Loon)

Brendan Loon is the NUS Department of English, Linguistics and Theatre Studies’ first and only Rhodes Scholar.

Established in 1903, the Rhodes Scholarship Programme is the oldest international graduate scholarship programme in the world, and considered one of the most prestigious of its kind. The Rhodes Scholarship enables outstanding and talented young people from around the world to receive full sponsorship to study for almost any full-time course at the University of Oxford. Since its inception, the Scholarship has sought to nurture a global community of fellow leaders—distinguished by their intellect, concern for others, energy to lead, and focus on public service—whose fellowship, friendship and mutuality would be put in service of the better interests of humanity.

Singapore resumed the conferment of one Singapore Rhodes Scholar per year in 2018, after a 14-year hiatus. Given his enduring and stellar track record of academic and community leadership, Brendan was named the nation’s Rhodes Scholar for 2020. He then matriculated into the University of Oxford, where he undertook a Master of Studies in World Literatures in English while residing in the heart of Oxford at Jesus College. Brendan has thus joined the select company of only a handful of NUS alumni to have ever received the Scholarship — including the likes of NUS Professor of Physics Andrew Wee, who formerly served as NUS Vice President (University and Global Relations) and historian Thum Ping Tjin.

“I see it as no basis for hagiography or hubris. To be grafted into such a heritage as to stand alongside and amongst Rhodes Scholars, and then further still to be counted as one, presents one a bounden duty: to bear this blessing in a spirit of humility, in service of others,” commented the 25-year-old.

The Rhodes Scholarship is not the first scholarship Brendan has received. In 2016, Brendan was awarded the Public Service Commission Scholarship (Teaching Service) to study for a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in English Literature at NUS.

An English Literature major who excelled in both the arts and academics, Brendan had an enriching and holistic four years at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. A resident of the College of Alice and Peter Tan, Brendan leveraged the College’s focus on active community engagement to read modules under the University Town College Programme that further nurtured his commitment to serving others and engaging with social issues. He also participated in campus student life through being part of his house’s dragon boat team in the College’s Inter-Neighbourhood Games, and scriptwriting for CAPT Theatre.

“NUS provides much space for students to curate your own learning. The curriculum is not structured to put students through the paces of any particular regime, as a cohort. Depending on the diversity, frequency and intensity of your module selection, you could find yourself taking modules with final-year students as your classmates, even in your second year. And this would probably be true on many occasions, in fact. As iron sharpens iron then, this should spur you on to mature faster as an academically-responsible scholar, academically-rigorous critical thinker, and independent learner — to keep pace with seniors who are now, functionally, your peers,” observed Brendan.

Even from an early age, Brendan came to view teaching as his calling and vocation. He recalls having to conduct self-directed learning for ‘O’ Level English Literature during his time in secondary school. His chosen subject combination meant that he was unable to attend any timetabled English Literature classes offered in school. With his literary passion lending him the drive and discipline to keep going, though, Brendan studied independently and collaboratively with a small group of two other fellow students who were also without a teacher. All three of them ultimately went on to attain an A1 grade in the subject. Brendan now cites this as one such key experience that led him to want to become a teacher — so that other students like him would not have to do as he did.

He has since fervently gone on to do just that, aiding even more students in similar predicaments who lack the resources to support their ambitions and aspirations. Brendan undertook teaching stints in ‘A’ Level English Language and Linguistics at Anglo-Chinese Junior College; ‘O’ Level English Language and Literature in English at Bukit Merah Secondary School; and English at St Paul Methodist School in Timor-Leste. He also worked on curriculum and policy issues at the English Language and Literature Branch and the University Policy Branch under the Ministry of Education.

Beyond being an educator, Brendan hopes to give back to the community by being a mentor to youths. In 2016, he co-founded the non-profit organisation Advisory to empower youth to make career and further education choices through professional mentorship, professional competencies training, industry learning journeys, industry engagement events and a repository of personalised career information.

“We wanted to ensure that there would be a full spectrum of programmes that all students could undertake progressively, at their own pace and in their own areas of interests, that did not hold against them their having come from different backgrounds, educational histories, families, schools and personal circumstances,” said Brendan.

Brendan is no stranger to mentoring young people too, with a decade’s worth of experience in The Boys’ Brigade as both a captain at the company-level and a committee member at the national-level. In these capacities, he is responsible for stewarding the personal development of between hundreds to thousands of students, with a focus on enabling and enhancing their character formation, commitment to service, intellectual curiosity and social engagement.

For his work in Advisory and The Boys’ Brigade, Brendan was recognised in 2021 as a Global Top 50 Finalist for the Chegg and Varkey Foundation’s inaugural Global Student Prize, out of thousands of nominees worldwide. In spite of how far he has come, Brendan continues to remember where he has come from. He looks back fondly and with much gratitude on his time at NUS, especially his interactions and relationships with teachers like Professors Philip Holden and Robbie Goh; Associate Professors Anne-Marie Thell, Chitra Sankaran and John Phillips; and Dr Er Yanbing, Dr Gilbert Yeoh and Dr Tania Roy. Brendan continues to keep in touch with many of his teachers — and is proud to refer to them now as his mentors, and to some also as friends.

“(My teachers) have been critical to my own intellectual development and personal formation. Personally and professionally, I have received much from—and therefore owe much to—this academic community at NUS for its ethical education, humanistic vision and social mission. These are legacies I hope to and am humbled to honour,” remarked Brendan.

After completing his National Service, Brendan will begin his career in the public service as a teacher, and later join the Public Service Leadership Programme. In this new capacity, Brendan can look forward to continuing his good work of inspiring future generations, as an educator, a friend, a leader and a mentor.

In rare moments of downtime, Brendan plays the organ, piano and Pokemon (though it has been a while since he played Pokemon competitively); and reads widely across disciplines — most recently having completed Ibn Khaldun’s The Muqadimmah; Adrienne Mayor’s Gods and Robots: Myths, Machines, and Ancient Dreams of Technology; and Yossef Rapoport’s Islamic Maps.