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As artificial intelligence (AI) reshapes the future of work and society, technical proficiency alone will not be enough for the workforce of the future. Dr Ming Tan, our Board Member, reflects on why service learning is a critical investment for a world in flux. Through immersion in real-world needs and real-time problem-solving, service learning cultivates the quintessentially human capabilities that the economy and our communities need for growth and resilience: critical thinking, judgment and cross-cultural communication. In an AI-enabled future, these competencies will matter more than ever. This article draws upon a keynote speech given by the author at the Youth Action Summit by Spin Up on 16 March 2026.
The extraordinary potential of artificial intelligence (AI) is prompting a digital redefinition of our reality and an urgent question of human value.
Even before AI went mainstream with the launch of ChatGPT in 2022, algorithms were curating what and who we knew. Since then, facts have felt increasingly optional and trust in institutions remains fragile. Tasks that once required years of specialised training, such as writing, analysis, coding, and pattern recognition, are increasingly performed by machines. We are more connected than at any point in history, and yet lonelier than ever.
In Singapore, our response rests on more than upskilling and driving AI adoption. As Prime Minister Lawrence Wong stated in his Budget 2026 Speech, AI “must serve our national interests and our people.”[1] To do this, we need to build something more durable beyond the next frontier model: an open, trusted ecosystem for responsible technology deployment, while staying committed to creating good jobs and an inclusive society. Realising this commitment requires a kind of human capability that no technical curriculum can achieve on its own.
When the half-life of knowledge becomes ever shorter, thriving in an AI-enabled future demands the ability to navigate disruption with compassion, discernment and ingenuity. Understanding another’s perspective, adapting one’s point of view, reframing challenges into solvable problems and building genuine relationships are not soft skills. They are the hardest skills of all. Building these capabilities across society and the workforce, however, can turn uncertainty, volatility and complexity into a future full of potential and possibility.
Where classroom meets reality
This is precisely where service learning comes in as a complement to classroom learning.
In the classroom, we acquire knowledge. We exercise that the discipline of rigorous thinking, nurture the habits of reading and practice logical reasoning. These are foundational capabilities we need. By design, the classroom is a controlled environment in which the questions have answers and the problems are designed to scaffold learning.
During service learning, students learn that communities do not come pre-packaged with learning objectives. People are complex, sometimes contradictory, often surprising. Problems are messy and unformatted. There are ample opportunities to practice competencies such as critical thinking, discernment and cultural competency, vital for a society and an economy augmented with AI.
Critical Thinking: In the classroom, critical thinking is largely a performance, constructing arguments and writing essays. We have time to think. We are assessed on whether our logic is internally consistent. In service learning, critical thinking becomes functional and real-time. The quality of one’s thinking is not measured by a rubric or exam, but rather by whether it actually makes a difference to a real organisation, with real clients, real constraints, and incomplete information. Through hands-on service, we learn not to be paralysed by messiness of real life, but to develop, test and iterate workable solutions in emotional moments while remaining focused on outcomes.
Discernment and Judgement: Service learning teaches one to recognise fine-grained distinctions on top of trends or patterns. For example, it takes skill and experience to tell the difference between what a community says it needs and what it actually needs. Split-second judgements on when a moment calls for listening rather than speaking, or when someone needs empathy rather than a solution, make all the difference. Sometimes, discernment is what separates a well-meaning intervention from a genuinely useful one.
Cross-Cultural Communication: Ranked as a “Skill on the Rise” on LinkedIn’s annual list of in-demand skills for 2026,[2] cultural competence is not tolerance, nor knowledge about other cultures. It is the lived, practical, embodied capacity to enter an unfamiliar social habitat and to move in it with grace, care and effectiveness. It is the ability to enter a room where people disagree, but to leave with each individual feeling heard. In an AI-enabled future, the diversity of perspectives we cultivate in ourselves makes teams more creative, decisions more robust, and societies more resilient. Singapore is one of the most ethnically and culturally complex societies in the world. And yet, many of us live within remarkably narrow social worlds. We work or study with people like us. We eat with people like us. We imagine futures largely for people like us. Service learning places us inside different contexts that can feel worlds away from our own, even if they are just around the corner. Cultural competency is not innate, but can be learned through misreading a situation and recovering, through saying the wrong thing and being corrected with kindness.
Service learning as pedagogy
Service learning is distinct from volunteering in its intentional integration with learning outcomes and capability building. It is a deliberate practice in which the act of service and the structured reflections of the experience of service are equally important. When we ask ourselves “what did I actually see?“, “what did I think I knew that turned out to be wrong?“, “who benefited from this?“, and “what would I do differently next time?’, we move from “delivery” mode to “discovery” mode.
While educational institutions such as NUS College and Republic Polytechnic design service learning into the academic curricula for students, we can all benefit from the pedagogy of service learning. We can acknowledge the reciprocity in the act of service in which both the volunteer and community benefit. We can actively analyse our experience to understand the capabilities we are building for personal growth, such as critical thinking, problem-solving, empathy, and social responsibility, which are equally in demand in the workplace.
To champion service learning is not to diminish the vital importance of volunteering, but rather to elevate it into a practice for lifelong learning. While volunteering provides the soul of community support, the lens of service learning can encourage all volunteers to view every act of service as a classroom without walls, where real-world challenges are invitations to refine our skills and broaden our perspectives.
Transformation through service learning
Beyond building skills, service learning reveals us to ourselves. We discover capacities and assumptions we did not know we had. Service learning gives us the opportunity not to show up as a problem solver, but as a curious learner, in a spirit of genuine partnership and openness to learning from one another despite and because of our differences. In the process, we learn that some of the most durable solutions are not always about the individual becoming stronger, but about reading one another well enough to build something no one could build alone.
Service learning has the potential to transform at the individual, community and national level. In a future where human effort will likely be augmented by AI in every domain of professional and personal life, these competencies are vital for bridging cultures, disciplines, geographies and generations to build institutions and communities that work for everyone.
About the Author
Ming Tan’s career has focused on fostering cooperation between the public, private, civil and academic sectors for social good and sustainable development.
In addition to her board service to the National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre, her current portfolio spans philanthropy, social impact, sustainability and innovation, including Senior Advisor roles at DGA-Albright Stonebridge Group and HOL. She is also Senior Fellow at the Tech for Good Institute, a regional tech public policy think tank, and the Centre for Governance and Sustainability at the National University of Singapore. She was founding executive director of both the Tech for Good Institute and COMO Foundation, a private grantmaker and corporate philanthropy supporting gender equity globally. In the public sector, she was Managing Director of IPOS International, part of the Intellectual Property Office of Singapore.