Yale opens liberal arts college in conservative Singapore

SINGAPORE - Yale University formally opened a controversial liberal arts college in tightly governed Singapore on Tuesday, saying there was demand for "critical thinking" in the city-state and other Asian nations.

The Yale-NUS College, a joint project with the National University of Singapore, had been criticised by faculty members of the leading US university due to Singapore's restrictions on protests and on student political activity.

"Singaporeans, and Asians more broadly, have a greater hunger for pedagogy that truly encourages critical thinking and a model of liberal arts and science education adapted for the 21st century," Pericles Lewis, president of the college, said in a speech.

He told AFP that "we're not setting out to change any political discourse, but we're giving students the tools to be active in citizenship, to think about the issues".

"We think that a well-educated citizenry is the most important thing for any country, especially in Singapore."

The pioneer batch of 157 students from 26 countries - 97 of them Singaporeans - was selected from a pool of over 10,000 applicants and began lessons this month in temporary facilities.

The college's own purpose-built campus with residential facilities will open in 2015 and is designed to have a full capacity of 1,000 students.

The college is the first established by Yale outside its campus in New Haven, Connecticut.

"We believe that the college has the potential to serve as a model for others, particularly in Asia," said NUS president Tan Chorh Chuan.

In a resolution passed in April 2012, the Yale faculty expressed "concern regarding the history of lack of respect for civil and political rights in the state of Singapore".

It called on Yale-NUS to uphold civil liberties and political freedom on campus and in broader society.

Campaign group Human Rights Watch accused Yale of "betraying the spirit of the university as a centre of open debate and protest by giving away the rights of its students" at the new campus.

"Instead of defending these rights, Yale buckled when faced with Singapore's draconian laws on demonstrations and policies restricting student groups."

Singapore's education ministry said at the height of the controversy that student demonstrations on campus would require approval from the Yale-NUS administration.

source: interaksyon.com

We’re so money

MANILA, Philippines -It’s the typical conundrum of every fashion-obsessed twentysomething: How do I make more money so I can spend more of it? While we here at YStyle don’t have all the answers (far from it), what we can help you with is figuring out which wallet suits your style, determining what kind of spender you are, and just in case you’re harboring secret supermodel dreams, whether or not you can make money off that mug. The only actual financial advice we actually can give you? Put off getting a credit card for as long as you can and when you do, try to keep it in check. We’re not all crazy rich Asians.

source: philstar.com

Fashion grads from Asia have their New York moment

NEW YORK - There's nothing glamorous about ironing your own collection before a show at New York fashion week, but if that's what it takes for Jie Jessie Liu to break into the business, she'll do it.

Liu was among nine jury-selected master's degree graduates - all women - from San Francisco's Academy of Art University fashion school whose creations Friday got the kind of runway exposure usually reserved for top designers.

Five of the newly-minted designers hailed from Asia, underscoring the region's rise as a fashion power, and Friday's well-attended show was a prized opportunity to be spotted by international buyers, talent scouts, and journalists.

"This is a way for them to be seen across the globe," said university spokeswoman Edith Mead Barker.

Backstage at Lincoln Center, ground zero for the ongoing spring-summer 2013 collections, 32-year-old Liu reflected on her long and winding journey from her seaside hometown of Penglai, in China's eastern Shandong province, to New York.

"I was just like most women when I was young. I loved to dress Barbie dolls," she told AFP during a break from steaming out the creases of the silk outfits she created with Belgrade-born textile design classmate Tanja Milutinovic.

"When I was grown up I was still obsessed by fashion ... and after I worked as an accountant for three years (in Toronto, Canada, where she got a first degree in accounting), I just realized that I would enjoy doing it every day."

The eight distinctly modern looks Liu sent out Friday, with their sharp lines and angular silhouettes, drew inspiration from London-based sculptor Anish Kapoor and Beijing's "bird's nest" Olympic stadium, she said.

Liu's ambition? Her own label, like those now firmly established by pioneering young designers of Asian origin like Alexander Wang and Jason Wu, with a firm hand on every aspect from initial design to final distribution.

"That's my long-term goal," she said. "In the short term, I'm looking for suitable position (in New York next year), maybe an associate designer position, just to sharpen my design skills."

From Taiwan, Ginie C.Y. Huang, 28, let the hypercolorful floral still lifes of Japanese photographer Ninagawa Mika inform skirt-and-jacket combinations that strolled down the runway in lime, red, orange and fuchsia.

"Actually, my whole collection is really tailored, but I added feathers to make it crazier, but not by too much," the Taipei native told AFP. "I design for the woman who is really willing to take a risk, who knows what she is doing."

Also a fashion devotee since childhood, Huang faced stiff resistance from her banker father and teacher mother when she first aspired to break into the business -- resistance that eased only after she first got a business degree.

"I just held out and finally they understood," she said, and indeed the entire family was on hand for Friday's show.

Jarida Karnjanasirirat, from Bangkok, had no such problem with her next of kin. In fact, she said, she enlisted them to send over "hundreds and hundreds" of swatches of Thai silk, of which she picked a handful, some of them antique.

The result seen Friday comprised silk tunics, dresses, shorts, and jackets in shades of champagne, silver, rose, and white, with three-dimensional lapels and pleats inspired by relief sculptures at a church near her San Francisco home.

"I kept looking at it for three years," Jarida said. "I took that as my inspiration because I liked it so much."

A big fan of Calvin Klein creative director Francisco Costa's designs ("I want them all, even the menswear"), she too dreams of having her own label in Thailand, and teaching as well.

But for the immediate future, her sights are on New York: "The fashion industry in Thailand is not as developed as here. I want to get experience and then I can go back home and develop."

Other Asians participating in Friday's graduate show were Jisun Lee from Seoul, who reinterpreted men's suits from the 1920s as women's wear for today, and Yanfei Fan, from Shijianhuang, Hebei province, China, whose silk and organza looks were inspired by the windows of modern buildings.

source: interaksyon.com

Pinoy Population In US Rising

MANILA, Philippines — Residents of Filipino descent are now the second largest subgroup in the single-race Asian category in the United States, according to latest data from the US Census Bureau.

The Census Bureau said there are now 3.4 million residents of Filipino descent in the US in 2010, a 44.5 percent increase from year 2000.

Among the Asian race, Filipinos rank second in the US to the Chinese who number around 4 million in 2010. People of Indian descent rank third with 3.2 million.

These three groups accounted for 60 percent of Asians which is considered as the fastest-growing segment by race of the US population within the period 2000-2010.

According to the bureau, almost half of the total Filipino population in the US (49 percent) reside in the West Coast, 16.3 percent live in the South, 9.7 percent in the Northeast and 8.4 in the Midwest, while the rest are scattered throughout the other states of the US.

Meanwhile, Filipinos had the highest proportion of Asians that lived in California (43 percent).

The state with the second-largest proportion of Filipinos was Hawaii (10 percent), followed by Illinois (4.1 percent), Texas and Washington (both with 4 percent).

The latest bureau report said people in the US population who trace 100 percent of their origins back to Asia numbered 14.7 million in the 2010 census, while people who said their Asian heritage was mixed with one or more other races numbered 2.6 million.

Combined, the two categories totaled 17.3 million, accounting for 5.6 percent of the US population.

Their numbers grew by 45.6 percent from 2000 to 2010, compared to 9.7 percent growth for the overall population.

The bureau defines the US Asian population as people who say their roots extend entirely or partially back to the Far East, Southeast Asia or the Indian subcontinent, including Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, North or South Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.

The report pointed out that Asians in the United States are faring well economically, by and large.

The median household income for single-race Asians was nearly $69,000 in 2010, compared to the $52,000 US national average.

Asian communities in the United States reported a range of incomes, including a median annual income of more than $90,000 among Indian households and less than $47,000 for Bangladeshi households.

In terms of educational attainment, a high percentage of US Asians go to university.

The bureau reports that 50 percent of people at least 25 years old who identify themselves as single-race Asians have a bachelor’s degree. The percentage for the overall US population is 28 percent.

Twenty percent of the same category has gone on for more advanced degrees, such as master’s, doctorates or professional degrees. This is double the percentage of the total US population that has advanced degrees.

The fastest-growing subgroup among US Asians was the population from the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan. There were about 200 Bhutanese living in the United States in 2000; their number expanded to more than 19,000 by 2010. Still, the Bhutanese population remains one of the smaller Asian subgroups in the United States.

The Census Bureau says that Asian population in every state except Hawaii grew by at least 30 percent, with the most growth occurring in Nevada (116 percent), Arizona (95 percent), North Carolina (94 percent), North Dakota (85 percent), and Georgia (83 percent). But the U.S. Asian population is not evenly distributed across the country. Nearly three-fourths of all Asians live in just 10 states — California, New York, Texas, New Jersey, Hawaii, Illinois, Washington, Florida, Virginia and Pennsylvania, the bureau reported.

The Census Bureau projects that the number of US residents who identify themselves as Asian or Asian in combination with one or more other races will rise to 40.6 million by the 21st century’s midpoint, making up 9 percent of the US population.

The data for this report are based on the 2010 Census Redistricting Data (Public Law 94-171) Summary File, which was the first 2010 Census data product released with data on race and Hispanic origin, including information on the Asian population, and was provided to each state for use in drawing boundaries for legislative districts.

Data for this report also come from the 2010 Census Summary File 1, which was one of the first 2010 Census data products to provide information on selected detailed groups, such as Asian Indians, Koreans, and Filipinos.

source: mb.com.ph