New and old immigrants must both make efforts to ensure integration into society

During the National Day Rally speech last night, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong cited Ms Le Ha Thanh Mai, a 21-year-old Vietnamese lady as an example of how Singaporeans and foreigners should work at integration. When she arrived here from Vietnam on a scholarship, she was 15 and did not know English. Like many foreign students, she found it hard adjusting to life in Singapore at first due to the language and the different way lessons are taught here compared to in Vietnam. But things improved after she joined Temasek JC, where her classmates helped her fit in. PM Lee remarked, “By the time she went to SMU, she was so localised that if you didn't know her name, you wouldn't know she came from somewhere else." Ms Le Ha Thanh Mai was even elected as the international students' secretary of the SMU Students' Association to lead efforts to integrate international students.