Queenstown Neighbourhood Police Centre (NPC) hosted its inaugural ‘Silver Academy’ Graduation Ceremony on 14 November 2015 at Ulu Pandan Community Club. The graduation ceremony was held in conjunction with the Ulu Pandan Active Aging Day 2015 event which was graced by Member of Parliament for Holland-Bukit Timah GRC; Adviser to Holland-Bukit Timah GROs, Mr Christopher De Souza.
The Silver Academy Project
The Silver Academy is a new joint Community Safety and Security Programme (CSSP) by Queenstown NPC and Ulu Pandan Active Aging Committee to engage the aging population. Based on a back-to-school concept, a group of elderly are enrolled into a class to attend a series of 5 educational modules conducted over three months. The Silver Academy programme comprises of 5 sessions of both indoor and outdoor activities that are carefully designed to equip the elderly participants with knowledge and skills that are useful and relevant to them during their golden years.
The Silver Academy programme kick-started on 25 August 2015 with a class of 43 participants. The participants are Senior Citizens who are above 50 years old and majority residing in Ulu Pandan Constituency.
1st Session - 25 August 2015
Participants were introduced to the Silver Academy programme and given a briefing on the ground rules. The session then ended with a visit to the Police Heritage Centre at the New Phoenix Park, Police HQ.
(A tour guide from Police Heritage Centre explaining to the participants the history of Singapore Police Force)
2nd Session 7 September 2015
Participants were brought to the Road Safety Park where they learnt about road safety practices and traffic rules. Beside the road safety talk conducted by Traffic Police, QT NPC collaborated with Traffic Police and NPCC cadets from Queenstown Secondary School to customise a Road Safety Amazing Race for the participants. Divided into teams, the NPCC cadets partnered the ‘Silver Academy’ participants to navigate their way through the park and to solve crime prevention and road safety challenges at the various stations while observing traffic rules.
(NPCC cadets from Queenstown Secondary School guiding the participants in the ‘Road Safety Amazing Race’)
3rd Session 28 September 2015
SCDF was invited to educate the elderly participants on first-aid and fire safety. Besides learning on fire prevention, the participants also tried on the different types of first-aid techniques with their fellow classmates.
(Participants enjoying themselves in practising the first-aid techniques guided by SCDF)
4th Session 12 October 2015
The session begun with a sharing on elderly abuse by CareCorner Project StART and then followed by crime prevention talk by Queenstown NPC. The highlight of the session was the Silver Academy Activity Book, which is a new initiative by Queenstown NPC to allow the elderly to better resonate with the crime prevention messages that was earlier brought across to them. Using the customised crime prevention activity book, the participants were required to answer crime prevention questions and quizzes which had Chinese translation and pictorial illustrations.
(A participant working on the ‘Silver Academy’ Activity Book)
5th Session 29 October 2015
The final session of the ‘Silver Academy’ took place on 29 October 2015 at Ulu Pandan CC where QT CPU performed a crime prevention skit to reinforce the crime prevention messages that were taught during the previous session. After the crime prevention skit, the participants went on an outdoor excursion to the SCDF Heritage Centre along Hill St.
(A crime prevention skit acted by officers from the Community Policing Unit of Queenstown Neighbourhood Police Centre)
Graduation Ceremony
At the end of the Silver Academy programme, the participants were invited to a Graduation Ceremony where they received a Certificate of Graduation from Member of Parliament, Mr Christopher De Souza and Commander of Clementi Division, Assistant Commissioner of Police Gerald Lim.
During the event, the Top Student Award was also presented to 4 participants, in commendation of their good attendance, learning attitude and participation rate displayed throughout the Silver Academy programme.
(A Silver Academy participant receiving the Graduation of Certificate from Member of Parliament, Mr Christopher De Souza)
(Group photograph of Silver Academy participants with Member of Parliament, Mr Christopher De Souza and Commander of Clementi Division, Assistant Commissioner of Police Gerald Lim)
(Participants taking a group photograph at the Silver Academy Graduation Booth)
NCPC Crime Ambassadors
Following the graduation ceremony, the participants will be appointed as Crime Prevention Ambassadors (CPAs) of the National Crime Prevention Council (NCPC), where they can assist in future crime prevention exhibitions. This would also enable the Silver Academy graduates to take on leadership roles in crime prevention in order to maximise the outreach to the elderly in the community. Not only would they be appointed as CPAs, these graduates would also have the skills to conduct joint patrol with the Police and to engage other elderly residents in providing crime advisories in a more effective and knowledgeable manner.
SINGAPORE POLICE FORCE
14 November 2015 @ 5:30 PM