Hello from Dr. Megan Kek, TIIS Academic Dean

November 5, 2021

Dear TIIS Students, Colleagues, and Teammates,

I am the New TIIS Academic Dean Megan, and Marshall has asked me to introduce myself. So here goes …

I hold a PhD in Education (University of Adelaide) focusing on student development and higher education, an MBA majoring in Marketing (Oklahoma City University), a Bachelor of Science in Business Information Management (California State University), and a Bachelor of Arts in Social Science and Humanities (National University of Malaysia). I started my early career in the Malaysian banking sector, at the back-end as an organisational analyst improving business processes, and later at the front-line serving clients as a senior bank officer. Before being attracted to the academia, I applied an interest in consumer behaviour while working in the banking sector to researching entrepreneurship and innovation of Singapore SMEs at the Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

The keen interests in how consumers behave and what industries lacked motivated me to enter the academia with the vision to build meaningful interconnected educational environments that develop skills, knowledge, attitudes, and values that students would need to fulfil their capabilities, so that they know who they are, possess the agency to reach their potential, and contribute to the well-being of themselves and families, communities, nations and ultimately, the planet. I have contributed to the higher education sector as the Academic Director of the Student Academic and Career Success at UNSW (2019-2020), Associate Director of Student Development and Learning, and Deputy Director of Learning and Teaching Services at USQ (2012-2018). And prior to Australia, I was a Section Head within the Diploma of Marketing, at the School of Business, Temasek Polytechnic, Singapore.

I have published papers in influential and high-ranking journals. In 2017, I co-authored a forward-oriented book published by Springer, Problem-based Learning into the Future: Imagining an Agile PBL Ecology for Learning, arguing for an interconnected educational environment for student development and learning that can be more humane, agile, and responsive to overcome complacencies, contradictions, and dilemmas. A new educational handbook focusing on student support and services will be published by Springer by early 2022. I am most proud of my team’s contribution to educating students for a super-complex world with the Singapore Prime Minister Office’s Enterprise Award for Innovation in Education in 2001 and 2003. The award recognised my team which I co-led as the most outstanding team whose educational work created the highest new value to the public service.

I have learned from Marshall that all of you have done a great job supporting each other during the Covid-19 pandemic. Congratulations! Well done! This can only be achieved from your resilience, efforts, and collaborative spirit. So a big THANK YOU!

It’s my humble pleasure to join you in what is going to be an exciting phase of TIIS’s history where together we will grow and advance to even greater heights. Most of all in our quest in facilitating student success, and supporting each other!

I understand that some of you are still studying and working remotely. Please come by to say hi when you are on campus. I look forward to meeting you at TIIS..

All best wishes,

Dr Megan Y.C. A. Kek, PhD.

Academic Dean

Honorary Associate Professor, UNSW Sydney

Adjunct Associate Professor, USQ