Keeping Our Tree Alive

I think most of us will remember the minor controversy of the renaming of Angsana College to College Alice and Peter Tan (CAPT). A family made a generous donation, and the college was renamed. It was a sudden change – and I'm not sure how the Angsana guys initially reacted to it, but they've seemed to have settled into it.

Even though this was Angsana that was renamed, it was an issue that unsettled Tembusians as well. Word has it that we're open to being renamed too – it's all a matter of how much money comes in, and from who.

This of course does not sit so well with all of us. I think the college has already embraced Tembusu as part of our identity. The Tembusu tree has become a running metaphor to how we visualize the college. We're an ecosystem, the college our home. The deep, mossy green has become our colour. We may branch in different directions, majoring in different disciplines, but we all have one common root – Tembusu. Our Houses are nature-themed, named after endangered species of animals. Our rector is Champion of the Earth.

Speaking of him, Prof K semi-jokingly mentioned in the last formal dinner that if/ when someone were to be generous enough to much such a donation, s/he should rename the college Tembusu College.

The thing is, all of have have grown to be proud of the name. Student-resident to rector. How do we protect a blossoming identity, so closely tied to our name, in the face of generous donations?

Who knew the inspiration for a soluation could come from our very neighbours, Cinnamon College. Those guys are better known as USP, the University Scholar's Programme, which was established long before Cinnamon College existed. As such, the scholars don't seem to identify with 'Cinnamon' as much as they do with USP.

So the trick to keeping Tembusu in our name is to dissociate the programme from the building. Right now, Tembusu very ambiguously refers to both. (Technically, the programme's name is uTown Residential Programme, UTRP, but nobody in it calls it by that. More on it later.) If a distinction between Tembusu College the programme and Tembusu College the building were made in name, then it wouldn't matter if either (but not both) the programme or the building were renamed; we could still identify ourselves as Tembusu.

It then boils down to an issue of which entity should be renamed, the mechanics of which I am unsure. It seems to make more sense for the programme to be renamed, since the building is built and there is not point in donating towards that "cause". But then since Angsana the building has been renamed, and Cinnamon's programme has and will probably always have a different name from its building, then it might be more coherent to open Tembusu the building for renaming instead.

Now back to the thing on UTRP. I'm not sure if keeping the Tembusu name is incentive enough to change the programme name as such. Strictly speaking though, the UTRP only refers to the two-year residency, so there may be a way around renaming it Tembusu Programme.

One idea is to officially package this hypothetical Tembusu Programme to include UTRP, the Third Year experience, and maybe some sort of an alumni programme (particularly for students who have graduated from Tembusu but not from NUS), so that it'll be different programme all together. Things in that realm aren't as clear at the moment though, since only one cohort has (just) graduated from Tembusu. But, it'll be good to think of a more concrete plan for Tembusu students that expands beyond their two or three years of residence. Whatever it is, I think these possibilities are worth more consideration. Maybe more on them next time.

For now, may the name of Tembusu live on.