Mr Ong Ye Kung, Singapore’s Minister for Education, announced on 3 May that educational institutions in Singapore are going to issue blockchain-based digital certificates to graduates in addition to the physical certificate. Starting from this year, all graduates with ‘N’, ‘O’ and ‘A’ Levels, Nitec, Higher Nitec (National Institute of Technical Educational Certificate), Polytechnic diplomas, degrees from Singapore’s six Autonomous Universities, NIEC (National Institute of Early Childhood Development) and Singapore Workforce Qualifications, will receive digital versions of their certifications concurrently with their hardcopy ones. Individuals will be able to access their digital certificates through the MySkillsFuture internet portal and mobile app. Their personal MySkillsFuture account will include a Skills Passport which contains all of their digital certificates.
This will allow anyone to quickly check the validity of a digital certificate and make job application and hiring easier and smoother for both the applicant and the employer by addressing the issue of forged certificates or degrees from Singapore institutions.
Mr Ong Ye Kung described the benefits, “In your case, when you apply for a job, you need not go through the hassle of requesting for certified true copies of your diploma from your polytechnic. You can send potential employers your digital diploma together with the job application. Employers can immediately validate the digital diplomas received as genuine, because that is what blockchain offers – secure and immutable records.”
This is being done under an initiative called Project OpenCerts, a project by SkillsFuture Singapore (SSG), GovTech, Ngee Ann Polytechnic, and the Ministry of Education (MOE). GovTech is a statutory board under the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) and is responsible for the delivery of the Singapore government’s digital services to the public, while SkillsFuture is an initiative under MOE to provide lifelong learning and skills development opportunities for Singaporeans.
(Sources: Ministry of Education, Singapore; Channel NewsAsia)
