The Chinese High School (Singapore)

Founding

As early as May 1913, Tan Kah Kee, a prominent businessman, proposed setting up a secondary school for Chinese boys in Singapore. Tan's proposal was supported by the Tung Teh Reading Club and a dance troupe, claiming to have raised S$20,000 as funds for building the school. On 21 March 1919, the Singapore Nanyang Overseas Chinese Middle School was formally opened at Niven Road with an enrolment of 78 students. Six years later, with an additional funding of S$600,000, the school moved to its new campus at Bukit Timah Road, covering an area of 79 acres (320,000 m²), and officially renamed The Chinese High School.^[1]

After its founding, the school offered comprehensive secondary level Chinese education. It continued to be funded and supported by Tan Kah Kee until shortly before World War II. The school was temporarily closed in February 1933 when all the teachers resigned. Later in February 1934, the school was reopened with a new principal and staff. In the same year, Lee Kong Chian, son-in-law of Tan Kah Kee, became the chairperson of the school's management board, and he held the post until 1957. During Lee's tenure, the school almost closed several times due to financial difficulties, but managed to survive due to strong financial support from both Tan and Lee.^[1]

Turbulent years

During the Battle of Singapore, the school's clock tower, for its height and vantage point, served as a headquarters for the Allied defenders and later for the Imperial Japanese Army during the Japanese occupation of Singapore. The school also served as a temporary concentration camp to detain people for examination during the Sook Ching massacre. After the war, the school resumed its predominant Chinese education. In the 1950s and 1960s, during periods of civil unrest in Singapore, many students, teachers and alumni participated in or led the anti-colonial riots.^[1]

Transformation into a top school

In 1987, the school was granted the status of an independent school by the Ministry of Education and proceeded to implement changes to its curriculum that were unprecedented in other Singapore schools. The changes include the abolition of mid-year examinations in favour of camping trips for the school, as well as the introduction of numerous enrichment programmes in place of lessons.

In the early 1990s, the school underwent an extensive renovation, which saw the construction of a new hall, named after the school's founder, a gymnasium, a renovated clock tower block and new classrooms. In the late 1990s, the school embarked on a consortium scheme to improve the quality of education for students. It started with the establishment of the Quest and Aphelion consortiums, followed by ProEd and Radix. In 2000, the iSpark consortium was set up for students in the Gifted Education Programme (GEP). In 2002, Quest and Radix merged to form the Ortus consortium.

Entrance archway of former The Chinese High School, and the current Hwa Chong Institution.

On 19 March 1999, the school's clock tower was gazetted as a national monument to mark the significance of the institution as the first Chinese medium school to be built in Southeast Asia to cater to the education of overseas Chinese. As part of the school's 80th anniversary celebration in 1999, the school's heritage centre was formally opened by Ong Teng Cheong, President of Singapore from 1993 to 1999, who was also an alumnus of the school. In addition, artist and alumnus Tan Swie Hian presented the school with a giant sculpture of a horse, which currently stands near the school field.

In recent years, the school's reputation as a premier high school in Singapore has been increasing. In 2000, Richard Riley, the then United States Secretary of Education visited the school. Edward de Bono also once called the school "Eton of the east".

Merger

On 1 January 2005, The Chinese High School merged with Hwa Chong Junior College to form Hwa Chong Institution. The new institution retains the Chinese name and the logo of The Chinese High School.^[2] Along with the merger, a six-year Integrated Programme is introduced in collaboration with Nanyang Girls' High School. The new scheme, which integrates four years of high school education and two years of pre-university education, allows students to skip the Singapore-Cambridge GCE Ordinary Level examination (typically taken by students in secondary four) and proceed to take the Singapore-Cambridge GCE Advanced Level examination at the end of the programme.

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  Clock Tower Building in the 1950s
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  Science Building in 1950s
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  Side view of the Science Building in the 1950s
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  Classroom building in the 1950s
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  Dormitory in the 1950s
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  Students playing basketball in the 1950s
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  Bird's eye view from the Clock Tower Building in the 1950s