Did you visit the Orchard Road shopping belt this weekend?
If you did, you would have seen more young people than usual partying in the National Youth Council (NYC)-organised SHINE Festival.
The youth festival, which encourages youth in Singapore to identify their passions and create positive change in the community, is in its 10th year.
Therefore, NYC decided, in its chairman Lawrence Wong's words, to running "an extra big festival with lots of activities and programmes for young people to participate (in)".
SHINE'>
Festival street party at Orchard Road this evening - celebrating the best of youth, and Inspiring them to dream big and reach high! #BuildYourWorld #SHINEFest
The three-day SHINE Festival has gotten many things right.
First, the event is "organised by youths for youths". There are a range of youth-related programmes related to urban sports, visual arts, music and dance.
Second, the festival occurred in the right place, at the youth "heartlands" in Orchard, along the stretch of ION Orchard to Ngee Ann City.
Third, the festival attracted young international celebrities who could get young Singaporeans excited.
All that said, though, the amount of resources being poured into the festival (including road closures) must be prettty hefty.
Now'>
we are talking - SHINE Festival is taking over the entire Orchard Road right now! The fun has just begun :D #SHINEFest #BuildYourWorld
Americans Ryan Higa, David Choi and Arden Cho were featured as the headline acts of our local youth festival.
The same thinking was applied to the Shine Youth Festival advertisement (below), where an edited version was circulated online and Toggle the past week:
Our very own rapper Shigga Shay appeared 38 seconds after Ryan Higa, David Choi, Arden Cho, Lydia Paek, Jun Sung Ahn, JRodTwins, DanakaDan, Sean Garnier, and Ryan Doyle.
Thankfully, and to give them credit, the SHINE Festival did not completely ignore our local talents -- YouTube stars Night Owl Cinematics and musician Charlie Lim were featured too.
But you cannot help feeling that the #BuildYourWorld SHINE festival line-up appeared to have a heavy American and Korean presence rather than a "strong Singaporean core".
Moreover, the programme highlights featured the international talents doing their own thing.
For instance, the YouTube Creators finale show featured an all international cast.
Looking'>
forward to the SHINE Festival weekend? Here are some of the programme highlights!#SHINEFest #BuildYourWorld #nycsg #celebrateyouthsg #youthsg #youthsingapore
Our local talents would have learnt more and would have received higher profiles if they had the opportunity to share the same stage and interact more with the international talents.
For example, a young Singaporean fan of Ryan Higa could have been introduced to local YouTube stars Night Owl Cinematics, should the two acts have shared the spotlight.
2. The organisers missed the opportunity to integrate the existing "youth spaces" in this year's mega festival.
There are several government-managed or initiated "youth spaces" in town, namely the Skate Park, the Youth Park, and *SCAPE.
It would have been a good opportunity for the mega SHINE festival to create spill-over effects to these areas, for it may be the first time young Singaporeans are made aware of these spaces.
A good example is the National Arts Council's Singapore Writers' Festival. It created an interesting "cultural eco-system" of writers and participants every year by using the surrounding spaces at Singapore Management University, Singapore Art Museum, National Museum, The Arts House, and School of the Arts Singapore for its events.
3. A festival should not be judged by the size of the turnout, but by the hearts that it ignited.
There is no doubt that the festival would be viewed as a success in terms of its turnout, but it HAS been a decade since SHINE's first year.
When environment minister Vivian Balakrishan held the youth portfolio, he told parliament in 2005 that the inaugural SHINE festival attracted more than 100,000 young Singaporeans in over 60 events spanning three weeks.
In 2013, Minister Wong told MP Tin Pei Ling that the SHINE Youth Festival reached out every year to about 300,000 youths outside the school context.
But what's the significance of these numbers, anyway?
If success can be measured by the number of people who show up for something, NYC could very well sponsor events such as F1, K-pop shows or One Direction concerts to get its name out.
But we know all those things wouldn't effectively inspire young Singaporeans toward creating positive change in the community.
To use Martin Luthur King Jr's "I have a Dream" speech, it is not the size of the crowd that matters, but the "content of their character".
Let's talk about some numbers that would count.
How are we measuring youth leadership, volunteerism and engagement in Singapore? What is the participation rate of young working adults in youth programmes?
How many young Singaporeans have started their own youth organisations or initiatives, and how many NYC programme alumni are in leadership positions to effect change?
The mission of the NYC is to "drive youth development and broaden outreach to young Singaporeans and youth sector organisations".
This will be the tight-rope that incoming CEO David Chua will walk as NYC completes its first year as an autonomous agency under MCCY.
July 12, 09:05 PM 
514 Chai Chee Lane 03-16, Singapore 469029 
