The Active, Beautiful and Clean (ABC) Waters programme by PUB, the national water agency of Singapore, aims to restore the waterways and create new waterscapes in Singapore so as to bring people closer to water and provide a beautiful environment for all to enjoy. The conventional engineering approach for designing man-made channels is replaced by an integrated view that includes engineering, science, landscape design, urban design and a commitment to community connection. Singapore Polytechnic has adopted the Singapore River and Kallang River at Bishan Park, and will be adopting and organising activities at the Marina Reservoir. All these places are in the central catchment of Singapore. The paper describes how the adoption programme can help engineering students better appreciate the external and societal context for engineering systems and the engineering profession and provide learning experiences for students outside classrooms. This is aligned with the Conceiving-Designing-Implementing-Operating (CDIO) syllabus, a component of which is focused on the external and societal context.
