Hi everyone,
I hope this email finds you well and winding down for the year. What a year it has been for JGIS!
The highlight would obviously be Dr Jane’s visit in August, where we organised a sold-out public talk, launched the Macaque Working Group with partners, and had our Roots & Shoots Singapore Conference amongst other events. Apart from Dr Jane’s visit, we also started phase 4 of our ongoing population study of the Raffles’ Banded Langurs, launched our inaugural R&S Awards, and expanded our Monkey Walks to three locations – Bt Timah, MacRitchie, and Lower Peirce.
I can go on about the many other events and initiatives, as well as the feedback and requests I’ve received asking us to organise more. However, I want to wrap up the year talking about an area that has really made the difference for us in 2017. Before she left, Dr Jane had a chat with me and told me how encouraged she was to see that we have grown the JGIS community, especially our active and passionate volunteers who came out in full force to organise and help out at JGIS events!
As I look back at the year, I realise the many things we accomplished this year, we have done so as a team. Whereas in the past, it was a small group of people doing everything, I now find myself looking at so many new faces wearing our familiar forest-green polo t-shirts! Thank you to all the volunteers who made it possible for us to do so much this year, and I look forward to doing more next year.
As I write this note, the various teams are already planning for 2018 and I know many of us will be involved one way or another. Let’s continue the momentum and help nurture more future Jane Goodalls in Singapore. If you’re looking to do more with us, whether as a volunteer or donor, please feel free to get in touch with me.
Best Regards,
Kae Fong Tay
President, Jane Goodall Institute (Singapore)
