In the spirit of celebrating student achievements and collegiality at SMU, the University’s 8th Patron’s Day was held at University Square on 28 January 2008. During the official proceedings, which were graced by His Excellency, President S. R. Nathan, Patron of SMU, new undergraduate and Alumni-initiated scholarships were awarded for the first time. The recipients included third-year Business Management student Miss Nguyen Tue Vy (SMU Alumni Scholarship), first-year student Miss Ser Xue Ling, Serene (SMU Sports Scholarship) and third-year undergraduates Miss Teoh Pei Ying and Mr Lim Yong Ming Wilson (SMU Students’ Association-Business Committee Co-curricular Activity (CCA) Scholarships).

Patron’s Day 2008 was a fun-filled afternoon for the University’s Board of Trustees, management, faculty, staff and students to get together and interact socially and reflect on a year of remarkable milestone achievements. SMU has over 90 student groups representing the arts and culture, sports and adventure, community leadership and special interests. This adds to SMU’s active and varied campus life. President Nathan also presented the SMU University Student Life Awards to honour outstanding students who have achieved both academic excellence and exceptional performance in various CCA categories, contributing to the vibrancy of student life in SMU.

Student Ambassadors toured with President Nathan throughout a series of exhibits that were created under the theme “Dreams”. Each exhibit was created to show SMU’s Patron what they would like to achieve during the academic year. Many displays were interactive and involved groups of undergraduate students from each of the University’s six schools.