Soo Peck

We remember and celebrate the life of Dr. Soo Peck Eng, who died on Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2014 at the age of 82. He was the son of Poh Choon and Sai Hiang Eng from the Republic of Singapore, to which his parents had immigrated. He was the husband of Mrs. Siok Mui Eng née Lee and father of Charis Eng, MD, PhD.

Dr. Eng began his career at Pearls' Hill Primary School, considered a premier boys school in that era and a feeder school to the prestigious Raffles Institution (secondary school). His education was interrupted by World War II, where at the age of 14 with only his mother and three other brothers, he had to help upkeep his family and to keep himself and his family alive during the brutal Japanese occupation of Singapore. Even amid the bombs and air raid shelters, he liked to tell about a relatively lighthearted moment where in the middle of the night, with air raid sirens blaring, he and his extended family hurried down the stairs of their tiny Lorong 23 house; like any sleepy 14 year old, he fell asleep evacuating to an air raid shelter (apparently, one of his adult cousins carried him to safety).

When the war was over and the British returned, he returned to school only to find out that he and all the other students had forgotten all the English they had learned before the War started. He was determined to achieve (perseverance was his middle name) and so by making index cards with English words and definitions, he would refer to them even when he worked during nights and weekends to ensure he and his family could go to school and to live.

With tremendous hard work and discipline, Dr. Eng did well enough in his primary school leaving exams to win a slot at Raffles Institution (aka RI or rigorous imprisonment as the alums like to refer to their institution). However, compared to the other boys, it was not good enough to gain a slot in the A class. Again, he worked smart and hard and got into the A class the next year; not only that, he and another boy vied for top spot each year thereafter. He was one of the very rare Singapore school boys who achieved six A1's for his Cambridge exams.

Normally, that would mean being sent to any top university in any country of the world. However, he was extremely poor, and we suspect his school did not counsel him well. Thus, he chose to enter the Teachers' Training College (TTC) because during that training, he could also receive a stipend. It was there that he met Siok Mui, his beloved and devoted wife of 53 years. He graduated top of his class at the TTC, and began to teach secondary school.

During his teaching career, he discovered that he had the gift of imparting difficult topics to students who came from poor homes and rough neighborhoods (who did not know where their next meal would come and thus had no interest in schooling). Because he came from a poor family and lived in poor areas, he was able to make the students see that he was one of them, and that education can lift them up too. One of the tricks of teaching he liked to impart to his colleagues and his student-teacher trainees was standing very still and quietly and looking around the class until the boisterousness died down and the students gave him their undivided attention.

After years of teaching regular school and then tutoring after hours, nights and weekends just to make ends meet for him and his new wife, Dr. Eng succumbed to a three year long illness where he describes feeling daily fatigue and drenching sweats (he brought three shirts to school to change), which no doctors could diagnose or cure. Yet he continued his academic work. At the end of three years, his only child, Charis, was born and he rapidly became better and was completely cured, with renewed energy. He took great meaning in the association of events, and pointed out that Charis is Greek for gift of God (this name was originally chosen because Mrs. Eng was unable to hold fetuses to term and lost children before and after Charis).

With renewed energy came the desire to continuously educate himself. While continuing to teach at Beatty Secondary School, Dr. Eng studied externally (called distance learning these days) for a BSc in economics from the University of London, which he achieved with third class honors (honors degrees are rarely conferred on external students). In recognition of his hard work and contributions to the school (he got amazing results from boys who should have failed!), his principal sent him on a scholarship to the University of Bristol to study advanced teaching. The family of three flew to England - what an invaluable experience. Only years later did he tell the story that he and his non-white international students had a terrible time finding housing for their families (the singles lived in hostels). Finally, Dr. Hopkins, a retired physician and kind Jewish lady rented my father one floor of her three-storey house on 28 Archfield Road. While at the university, Dr. Eng greatly admired Professor William Taylor, a master teacher and a master of his content, a decent human being full of integrity and very straightforward (which also meant that he pe'od incompetent staff).

Dr. Eng and his family returned to Singapore and after a stint at Whitley Secondary School, he was recruited as a lecturer at his alma mater, the TTC which eventually morphed to the Institute of Education (IE), which is a statutory organization with a relationship to the university as the Cleveland Clinic's relationship with Case. After creating modern curricula and lecturing at TTC, he was sent on a scholarship to the University of Chicago for his PhD in the economics of education. Again, the family of three went on a grand adventure to Chicago. Social sciences PhD's at the U of C often take 8 years on average. Because TTC (who now had a new principal who knew nothing about academia or leadership, and was what my father would refer to as a charlatan with a title) did not understand the American system, my father worked like mad day and night (smoking like a chimney) to complete his PhD in an unheard two and a half years. Profs Foster, Dreeben and Bidwell were prime influences in my father's academic life. He also admired Gary Becker who did finally win the Nobel Prize in economics but never saw a shadow of Milton Friedman. There was great camaraderie amongst his fellow graduate students from around the world and the US. This was also the first time where Mrs. Eng was stunned to find out that American grad students had to have their English and grammar edited by her. When Dr. Eng rushed and completed his PhD and returned to Singapore with his wife, Charis chose to stay but she was at the Lab School and a minor. Her principal however had her interview with the University of Chicago and she matriculated at the age of 16. She never returned to Singapore and stayed to complete her MD and PhD at U of C, internal medicine residency at the Beth Israel Boston and medical oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, after which she was sent to the University of Cambridge to receive unique training as a clinical cancer geneticist, both at the bench and bedside. She returned to a faculty position at the Farber and Harvard, and eventually was recruited to the Cleveland Clinic in Sept, 2005 to found and lead the Genomic Medicine Institute.

Back in Singapore, Dr. Eng was shunned by the charlatan-with-a-title principal of TTC and was underutilized as a lecturer. He had a loathing for insecure people with porous backbones, and especially as bosses, and he had his fair share. Nonetheless, undaunted, he put his head down and created curricula (such as his M. Ed. Program which he was proud to say was more rigorous than the PhD program in education at the University of Singapore), did his own research and lectured to many generations of teachers to come. A new Director, LIM Siew May, was appointed in the newly named Institute of Education, which comprised 4,000 staff members and 40,000 employees. Being a brilliant secure systems person, she very quickly spotted my father, promoting him from lecturer to head of department, then head of school and finally as her Deputy Director Academic (equivalent of the executive Dean for a college of education). In this capacity, she sponsored him to work on special projects directly with then Minister of Education, Dr. GOH Keng Swee. These were the happiest years of his post-PhD time. How fulfilling: here was a Director who created an environment of meritocracy, integrity and engagement.

Dr. Eng was best known for his charismatic lectures, full of humor, and easily digested and remembered by his students. He also liked to create new curricula and he led multiple research programs, the most significant was out of NORC (headquartered at the Hague) comprising a multi-year, multi-million dollar effort. After being sent for advanced training in moral education in Harvard, Dr. Eng worked closely with Dr. GOH Keng Swee on moral education in Singapore and the meaning of educational excellence. His students over the years remember him for being a great and caring mentor, often protecting students from faculty overbearance or worse. For his contributions to education in Singapore, he received the Bronze Medal during Singapore's National Day Honors from then President of Singapore.

Dr. and Mrs. Eng retired to Vancouver, Canada. Finally, they were able to join Charis in Columbus and moved with her to Cleveland in 2005. After over 25 years of living in separate continents and countries because of the educational pathways and subsequently academic jobs of both Drs. Eng, the family finally could be together in Ohio.

Qualities he admired and lived by: Integrity, discipline, perseverance, hard work, competence, security and backbone, simplicity, privacy

His Pet Peeves: Dishonesty, hypocrisy, charlatanism, lacking backbone, lack of security, pomp-and-circumstance

Contemporary Public Figure He Admired Most: LEE Kuan Yew, founding Prime Minister of the Republic of Singapore (Bill Clinton was a close second)

His Favorite Non-Fiction Books:
F.L. Holmes' Being and Becoming

Benjamin Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives and Developing Talent in Young People

Alvin Tofler's Future Shock

Desmond Morris' The Naked Ape

Jim Collins' Good to Great and Built to Last

His Favorite Moto: Non Vi Sed Arte (Not with force, but with skill) - Beatty Secondary School moto

The family prefers that those who wish may make contributions in his name to The Cleveland Clinic Genomic Medicine Institute, 9500 Euclid Ave., Desk NE 50, Cleveland, OH 44195. Family services will be held.


PDF Printable Version