CORRESPONDENT for The Business Times (BT) Wong Pei Ting won the Story of the Year prize at SPH Media’s English, Malay, Tamil Media group annual journalism awards on Monday (Mar 20).

Wong won for her report on the trend of top university students in Singapore changing their preferred education or career tracks, and choosing courses that would lead to top jobs in fields such as data science and environmental sustainability. The report was among the 20 most-read BT stories in June 2022.

At the awards ceremony on Monday, Wong said she was surprised that the data-driven piece received the recognition it did.

“The award is validation that scoops can also be scored in seas of numbers stored in long-forgotten Excel sheets. I would like to thank Joan Ng for being the editor who first saw potential in the observation that I casually brought up during a meeting one Thursday.”

Wong started searching for data on the minimum grade profiles needed to enter various university courses after a source told her that accountancy courses had become a dumping ground for students who could not make it into computer science programmes. She had been speaking with the source about the high attrition rates at accounting firms for a separate story.

BT editor Chen Huifen said: “We are proud of Pei Ting. Her winning story may not be a scoop in the traditional sense, but it shows enterprise on her part in sussing out data to prove or debunk a trend we had a hunch on.

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“Traditional scoops still count, but if we can also back them up with intellectual analysis supported by data journalism, they tend to have longer runways. Her story not only generated buzz among the industries which popular faculties feed into, but also among parents with children taking A-level exams.”

Wong’s win marks the second year in a row that a BT journalist won Story of the Year at SPH Media’s annual news awards. Senior correspondent Anita Gabriel won last year for her report on the closure of Singapore’s largest independent electricity retailer.

Other winners at this year’s awards included Ng Keng Gene from The Straits Times, who won Young Journalist of the Year, and Danson Cheong, also from The Straits Times, who won Journalist of the Year.

BT reporters Paige Lim, Corinne Kerk and Sharanya Pillai also won awards for excellence.