STAR Awards Programme

Cleaning attendants’ appreciation activities

Objective: To recognise cleaning attendants’ efforts and value their contribution to the school. Students acknowledge their service either by organising an appreciation day. This further serves to make students aware of the challenges that school cleaners face and their dedicated service. Other programmes involving school cleaners can also be planned and incorporated.

Manpower requirement: For appreciation day, a small group of students (a class, CCA group, etc.) can complete this activity. For other programmes, teachers can select either a class or an entire level.

Proposed duration: Most activities can be undertaken and completed within the same day. Logistics and planning would be undertaken about a month prior to execution.

Process: Teachers identify the class or level that adopts the project. Students spend some time to interview cleaners, follow along with them in their daily routine and plan for an Appreciation Day assembly programme to offer tokens of appreciation and profile them to the rest of the school.

Students (recommended for Secondary school students) can also undertake the routine of the cleaning attendants to better understand and appreciate their contribution to the school.

Outcome: It is envisioned that upon completion of this project, students will appreciate their cleaning attendants and the work they do. They could treat their school restroom facilities with more consideration. The cleaning attendants themselves would know they are valued members of the school and a sense of pride would be reinforced as they perform their daily duties.

Creating educational/awareness material for an exhibition

Objective: To raise awareness about proper restroom etiquette, environmental issues and social graciousness through the creation of posters, puzzles, games, videos and other exhibits. Students demonstrate their creativity and artistry in the creation of positive awareness material for their peers.

Manpower requirement: Either an entire class (recommended for Primary schools) or a group of 5 to 10 students per class (recommended for Secondary schools).

Proposed duration: A suggested duration would be 1 to 3 months for creating the exhibition material and one week for holding the exhibition.

Process: The teacher would identify the students involved and assign them their sub groups.

RAS would then be called to arrange a date and time for a 45 minute workshop to brief the students on how to go about creating the exhibition material, provide examples of what other schools have created before and assessment criteria for their work done.

Students then brainstorm possible designs and messages they intend to project within their exhibits. Students would subsequently work on their exhibits and create a set of presentation posters, artwork, games and other interactive exhibits.



Teachers would serve as facilitators for consultation when required. The teacher in charge would then choose a day (or the week) for the exhibition and the venue. Teachers can choose to make this project as a competition to award the groups with the most creative and innovative exhibits.

Once arranged, the teacher would call RAS to assess the exhibition displays. This date and time also includes assessing the cleaners and all the washrooms in the school.

Outcome: The outreach to the entire school community is substantial due to the exhibition being displayed at a prominent area. Students could use the exhibition to conduct surveys and quizzes to generate interest and ascertain their thoughts about the school's washrooms. The exhibition also serves to remind the school community about proper hygiene habits and respect school property. Once the exhibition has concluded, the created exhibits can be placed in the washrooms to serve as decoration and enhancement within the washrooms.

Conducting surveys or case studies

Objective: To gather feedback from the school community about the state of the washrooms and improvements they look forward to. To better understand the behaviour of students while they express their opinions about the school's and Singapore 's restroom standards.

Manpower requirement: Either an entire class (recommended for Primary schools) or a group of 5 to 10 students per class (recommended for Secondary schools). This project is recommended for Secondary and Tertiary school students.

Proposed duration: 1 to 3 months or 6 months for a broader target group.

Process: After the teacher allocates the students in their sub groups or assigns the classes involved, RAS will be contacted for the 45 minute workshop. This workshop specifically goes into the process of compiling the right questions depending on what specific information the students intend to gather. Sample questions and data formulation techniques will be provided and websites like Feedback Farm and Survey Monkey will be introduced. Students will be provided with the requirements and assessment criteria of their project.

Download Suggested Survey

Students then work within their groups to create either physical or website surveys while carefully selecting the demographic of people to be interviewed. Once the survey is completed, students would have to analyse their findings and compile a report to their teachers.

The teacher would then arrange a date and time for RAS to assess the report or case study while performing an assessment of the other two components of the STAR programme.

Outcome: This project is a valuable tool for the school management to ascertain student feedback about the condition of their washrooms. This project also allows for students to express their opinions and subsequently make them more accountable from the information they gathered. Suitable action can be taken from the survey report to better enhance the restrooms within the school. If the survey has been administered to the general public, selected results will be published on the RAS website as well.

Creating videos or web content

Objective: To spread quality messages through creative method such as games, skits, instructional videos and social media platforms.

Manpower requirement: Either an entire class (recommended for Primary schools) or a group of 8 to 15 students per class (recommended for Secondary schools). This project is recommended for Secondary and Tertiary school students.

Proposed duration: 1 to 2 months for scripting, execution and post editing (suggested)

Process: Students are placed in their groups. Each group should have at least one student from the Audio Video Engineering Club or with knowledge of video / web editing (recommended).

RAS would conduct a workshop for the students and show them sample videos that have been made by students from other schools. The importance and relevance of the web content / video material will be explained along with the assessment criteria.

Students are to procure video equipment with the teachers' help or find web platforms (Facebook, Blogs, etc.) for their task and brainstorm ideas and story boards for their project. The next stage would be to film or create their content based on their brainstormed ideas once approval has been given by teachers. Regular edits must subsequently be made to provide the final cut.

Once the final cut is produced, RAS will be contacted to view the completed projects for assessment. The other two components of the STAR programme will also be assessed at the arranged date and time.

Outcome: Students would have an interesting platform to demonstrate their creativity while sharing important messages about the environment and restroom etiquette, hand hygiene and other issues. RAS will select the best projects to use for its school education programmes with other institutions and community outreach initiatives. Created web content and /or videos can be used to promote the school while serving as a reminder to students about the valuable messages that have been used.

Inspecting their own washrooms and providing feedback

Objective: To provide the school's Operations Manager and stakeholders with relevant feedback about the school's washrooms on a consistent basis. To also empower students to bear the responsibility of reminding their peers about the need for a cleaner restroom environment.

Manpower requirement: All or some of the student washrooms can be assessed by students. Students can work in pairs for this project. Either an entire class (recommended for Primary schools) or a group of 10 to 30 students per class (recommended for Secondary schools).

Proposed duration: A period of 3 to 6 months (recommended).

Process: Teachers would select the classes or groups of students involved. It is preferable if students involved do not have any physical disability for this task.

A workshop is held at the school and conducted by RAS. During the workshop, students will be introduced to the inspection checklist and an instructional video about the process of checking their washrooms.

Download Suggested Checklist

Students would then be placed in a duty roster and assigned either one or two (or more, depending on number of washrooms) washrooms to inspect during the 3 to 6 month period. Every week, students would spend either one or two days to perform the assessment. Each check will take about 15 to 30 minutes to be completed. At the end of each week / month, students would then report their findings or any problems to the Operations Manager or Teacher. Students should report any severe problems immediately if experienced.

If there are many student groups or classes, the duty roster can be rotated whereby students can inspect other washrooms that were assigned by their peers.

Once the inspection period is over, students would file their inspection reports and prepare an oral or written presentation for assessment.

RAS will be contacted to come to the school to view this presentation and perform the other two assessment components of the STAR programme.

Outcome: This project serves to make students, cleaners and the school accountable for the school washrooms. The provision of feedback serves to help the Operations Manager to immediately rectify any outstanding issues within the washrooms and improve the standards within the washrooms. Other students would see this as an effort to uphold high hygiene standard in public toilets and this could potentially reduce any instances of vandalism and other inappropriate behaviour.

Holding assembly talks in school or at other community establishments

Objective: To encourage peer-to-peer education and empower students to teach others about good hygiene habits and proper restroom etiquette. To also foster stronger ties between schools and other community organisations that require assistance.

Manpower requirement: Either one class, CCA group or a group of selected students. More classes can be added if there are more community establishments and organisations tied to the school.

Proposed duration: The timeline is quite flexible depending on the arrangement the school has with the community establishments. A suggested period for planning and execution is 3 to 6 months.

Process: Once teachers have selected the classes or student groups involved, they would also source for community establishments like Childrens' Homes, Societies for the disadvantaged, pre-schools and other organisations for the proposed tie-up.

The teacher would then invite RAS to conduct a workshop and provide the RAS trainer with the community organisations' information to better facilitate with the training during the workshop. Students will be given ideas and information on how to gather and present information such as proper hand washing, good restroom etiquette and other environmental messages that can be shared with the community organisations. Students would also be encouraged to represent the school with the proper decorum and share their school's achievements.

Upon the completion of the workshop, students would begin compiling their education material using relevant delivery platforms and work on a good presentation structure.

The teacher would then invite RAS to accompany students during their talk to assess its effectiveness and their delivery.

A subsequent date would be arranged by the teacher for RAS to complete the other two components of the STAR programme.

Outcome: The project serves to promote an excellent relationship within the school and the school's interaction with external organisation. Students can take this opportunity to improve their public speaking skills while recognising the importance of community involvement especially after leaving the school for higher pursuits. Social welfare institutions for the underprivileged would benefit from the effort provided by the students while receiving an important education about proper etiquette.

Any other project that relates to restroom cleanliness, hygiene awareness and environmental awareness

Objective: Teachers can suggest a set of customised projects that are more suited to their students' strengths and aptitudes. This allows for flexibility and accommodation.

Manpower requirement: Depends on the project, similar to requirements of other projects.

Outcome: Once completed, the teacher would call RAS to arrange for a date and time for the assessment which includes assessing the cleaners and all the washrooms in the school.