The Leaders of MindChamps


"Education is the toolbox for building the future."

David Chiem
Founder, Chairman and Group CEO


“David Chiem is a man who has crossed many bridges of success to achieve a remarkable synthesis of art, education and entrepreneurship. He impresses me!”
- Professor Allan Snyder FRS


From an early age, David Chiem was destined for success as a creative artist, an entrepreneur and a visionary businessman. The key to his success has been his ‘champion’ mindset, the mental ability to stay positively motivated and focused amidst all adversities and challenges, making him a role-model for anyone aspiring to succeed in any field.

His natural ability to inspire and motivate his audiences has made him an invaluable and highly sought after speaker. He has spoken to over 150,000 people internationally during the past 10 years. His amazing energy and positive mindset have taught many to venture out of their comfort zone, unleashing new passion and potential.

Arriving in Australia as a refugee at the age of eight, David understood the value of education and a resourceful attitude and his early achievements predicted his later approach to success. During his graduating year in High School, he was awarded three medals of honour in the diverse fields of English, Mathematics and Art, and his successes since have shown a similar versatility.

Beginning in the Arts, David became the first Asian to be given a leading role on the mainstream Australian television, in the internationally acclaimed drama series “Butterfly Island”. David went on to study acting at the prestigious Theatre Nepean. He has since played leading roles at the elite level on mainstream television, film, radio and theatre. He graduated with a BA (Communication) at the University of Technology, Sydney and a Master of Film-making from the world-renowned Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS). As well as his success in front of the camera, he is also accomplished behind it, as both director and producer.

He has also published, with internationally-recognised author Brian Caswell two critically acclaimed novels, ‘Only the Heart’ and ‘The Full Story’ which were nominated for three NSW Premier’s Literary Awards between them. ‘Only the Heart’ is a best-seller in its 15th print run and is studied in both the NSW Higher School Certificate and the Victorian Certificate of Education. His latest book written with Brian, Deeper than the Ocean – the Complete Guide to Creating a Champion Mindset for Your Child, has been hailed as the ‘parenting bible of the 21st Century’.

All these successes in the Arts derive from his ability to work with and inspire talented people and his skill in sharing his vision clearly and with passion. But it is not only in the Arts that David has excelled. The same attributes which led to success in the creative fields have fuelled impressive results in his business and entrepreneurial enterprises.

From ‘ground zero’, he has grown MindChamps into a successful international organisation which has caught the attention of one of Asia’s most prominent multi-billionaire business tycoons, Mr Kwek Leng Beng. When asked if he was looking for other education providers at the press conference announcing the partnership of MindChamps to his Hong Leong Group, Mr Kwek replied, “No, we are married only to David Chiem. He is also an entrepreneur and has a creative mind, which is why our wavelengths gelled.”

If anything epitomises David’s ability to creatively ‘cross boundaries’ it is the association he has forged between his MindChamps and world-renowned scientist Professor Allan Snyder – the founder and director of Centre for the Mind (a daring venture of University of Sydney). To quote Professor Allan Snyder, “David Chiem is a man who has crossed many bridges of success to achieve a remarkable synthesis of art, education and entrepreneurship. He impresses me!”

At 37, David Chiem has achieved more than what most people would have wished for from a lifetime of work, and this is only the beginning. From a childhood of hardship and challenge, he has built a career of diversity and success. David is indisputably a man whose personality and achievements encapsulate the very concept of the ‘champion mindset’.



"The truly intelligent person is not the person who knows everything. Rather, it is the person who can find out anything."

Brian Caswell
Dean Research and Program Development

Brian Caswell is an internationally-acclaimed award-winning author and a respected educationist with thirty years experience in the areas of public and private education - including over a decade as an examiner of the NSW Higher School Certificate. For the past fifteen years, he has been in constant demand as a speaker and literary consultant. During that time, he has visited hundreds of schools, libraries and universities and has spoken to hundreds of thousands of people on three continents, including being an international guest-speaker at the famous Hay on Wye Literature Festival in Wales.

His novels and short-stories have been recognised internationally, both in English and in translation, and screenplays for the much-anticipated movies of three of his novels - Only the Heart, The Full Story and A Cage of Butterflies - are currently in development.

Brian is also one of Australia's most innovative thinkers and an acknowledged expert on today's youth and their response to the modern environment and the demands of the school system, as well as the link between the development of students' creativity and academic success.

His chapters in Crossing the Boundaries, The Eye of the Soul, and The Written World demonstrate his expertise in the relationship between film, society and the narrative structure in modern youth literature.

Brian's work has been described in the following terms by educationist Sue Clancy of Charles Sturt University:

"He forces us to look towards the future, not just for Australia, but for humanity in general. He confronts us with important issues which impact on us all.

He challenges our ability to cope with those who are different, whether it is in terms of race, mental ability, physical disability or a combination of these.

He asks us to challenge the morality of those behind scientific discoveries and multi-national companies, as they pursue their own needs for personal glory and monetary reward, and demands that we rethink our concept of 'family'."

Brian's current work is dedicated to creating programs that enhance students' learning, active recall and thinking processes - and their social development - using creativity, whole-brain learning strategies and mnemonic structures which take into account the latest research into how the brain learns and stores information.

He has been appointed to the Australian Council Literature Board's Register of Peers. He has held the post of Writer in Residence at the University of Western Sydney (UWS) and has judged numerous writing and literary awards, including the prestigious NSW Premier's Literary Awards, the national Nestlé Write Around Australia Award and the UWS Young Writer's Award. However it is the emotional accessibility and the widely-acknowledged social conscience and literary depth of his literary work that has made his books - both science-fiction/fantasy and realistic fiction - a staple in virtually all Australian schools.



"MindChamps is a delightful place to expand brain-power and learning capacity based on scientifically validated cognitive research.”

Mrs Carmee Lim
Mentor Principal

Mrs Carmee Lim, MEd (Early Childhood Education) is a visionary educator who is committed to making a positive and significant difference in the way we learn. She is a pioneer in applied brain research and an advocate for music and gymnastics in early childhood. She is the founder and chief education officer of Jumpstart Kidsports Pte Ltd, which offers a multi-sensory KidzGym program for pre-school children. Carmee is also the founder of Aoede Music Enterprise, which aims to give children the "Gift of music for a Lifetime" by integrating music with technology to make music-making fun and enjoyable.

Carmee's background includes serving as a science and mathematics teacher, a principal, as well as a Senior Inspector of Schools in the Ministry of Education, Singapore. She was the Principal of Raffles Girls' School for 12 years before being drawn to the field of mind/body research and breakthroughs in learning and performance enhancement.

Carmee was the first Executive Director of the Academy of Principals AP, (2003-2004), and was instrumental in setting up the Principals Academy Inc, a Joint Venture with EDB, as the business arm of the Academy of Principals.

Carmee facilitates innovative professional and personal development workshops on brain-based learning, educational kinesiology and creativity. She is the author of "Bright Brains - fun activities to unlock your child's potential", a curriculum handbook "KidzGym - A fresh approach to gymnastic play for pre-school children" and launched her book of action songs "Learning with Get Active Songs for Pre-schoolers" in December 2005.

As Mentor Principal of MindChamps, Carmee will continually bridge MindChamps' ground-breaking learning strategies with that of the nation's educational system and its curriculum, creating a synergistic link that will benefit all students in Singapore.



“MindChamps provides a comprehensive and unique approach to the core of learning”

Dr Tan Sie Keng
Dean of Mathematics

As the Dean of Mathematics in MindChamps, Dr Tan oversees the mathematics module of the Exam Content Mastery program. Dr Tan is a highly experienced Professor of Mathematics, having lectured at the former Nanyang University from 1966 to 1979, and subsequently at the National University of Singapore in the Department of Mathematics from 1980 to 2000. While at the National University of Singapore, he was voted as one of their best lecturers.

Graduated from Nanyang University with a BSc degree in Mathematics, he pursued and obtained a MPhil from the University of London, UK and then a PhD in Mathematics from Nanyang University.

During his long and distinguished education career, Dr Tan gave numerous lectures on modern algebra, calculus, as well as engineering mathematics. He was a Research Associate in Berkeley, University of California on two occasions, a Visiting Fellow of the Institute of Mathematics in Aahrus, Denmark and also visited various universities in Japan under an exchange scheme.

Dr Tan has a keen research interest in graph theory and fuzzy logic. He published various papers in international journals such as Fuzzy Sets and Systems, Journal of Intelligent & Fuzzy Systems and Congressus Numerantium.

A co-author of a series of text books on mathematics for secondary schools in Singapore, Dr Tan strongly believes that learning mathematics can be fun and enjoyable – he says that the word mathematics in Greek means fond of learning.