SMU Provost Professor Lily Kong shared her views on the discretionary admission (DA) scheme for universities. Up to 2,240 university places will be available this year under the DA scheme. SMU, NUS and NTU will increase the places for the DA scheme, from 10 per cent to 15 per cent of their intake. This translates to about 290 places at SMU, 1,050 at NUS and 900 at NTU. The total university intake figures for this year are still being finalised, but the Ministry of Education said the number of places will increase by a few hundred.

Prof Kong said the University welcomes the increase as it recognises the value of a student body with diverse interests and talents. Over the years, the University has admitted sportsmen, artists and students with a passion for community service and entrepreneurship. Polytechnic graduate Sean Koh, 25, who was admitted into SMU's information systems degree course, impressed admission officials with his coding skills and experience working in two IT start-ups. "I had a diploma in real estate and my GPA (grade point average) fell short of the entry score required. If not for the discretionary admission scheme, I would not have had a place in the IT degree course which really interests me,” he said.