About

Shuling Yong is a Singapore-born, Chicago-based award-winning documentary filmmaker, DP and Location Sound Recordist with a passion for social change. She has worked on films like Becoming (Michelle Obama Documentary, Netflix, 2020, dir. Nadia Hallgren), The Feeling of Being Watched (Tribeca/POV, 2018, dir. Assia Boundaoui), It’s Only Life After All (Indigo Girls Documentary, Sundance/Netflix, 2023, dir. Alexandria Bombach), And She Could Be Next (Tribeca/POV, 2020, dir. Grace Lee and Marjan Safinia), American Doctor (Sundance, 2026, dir. Poh Si Teng), Radical Grace (HotDocs, 2015, dir. Rebecca Parrish), In Time To Come (HotDocs, 2017, dir. Tan Pin Pin), and films by the award-winning Chicago media collective Kartemquin Films like In The Game (2015, dir. Maria Finitzo) and America To Me (Sundance, 2018, dir. Steve James).

Shuling’s most recent film Unteachable premiered at the Singapore International Film Festival 2019 and became the first local film to clinch the Audience Choice Award in the festival’s 30-year history. It is currently being used as a teaching tool at Singapore’s only teacher-training college, the National Institute of Education (NIE). During production, Unteachable was selected for the Tribeca Film Institute Network Market 2018, Good Pitch² Southeast Asia 2017, and won “Best Pitch” at the CNEX Chinese Documentary Forum 2017.

Shuling’s previous film Growing Roots premiered on the Discovery Channel in 2015. She is currently working on a short documentary about two public school teachers navigating the challenges of weaving Asian American history into their classroom curriculums after Illinois became the first state to mandate teaching it in all public schools through The TEAACH Act. It has received support from the Asian-American Documentary Network (A-Doc) & WGBH, and was selected for the Zhao-Chen Family AAPI Voices Fund by Kartemquin Films.

Shuling was selected as a DOCNYC “40 Under 40” honoree, a NewCity Film 50: Chicago Screen Gem, is a Tribeca Film Institute program alum, a Kartemquin Films Diverse Voices in Docs Fellow & Mentor, a Center for Asian American Media (CAAM) Fellowship Pitch Coach, and a participating filmmaker at the Doc Society Queer Impact Producers Lab, NewportFILM Cinematography Lab, Docs By The Sea, the DocNet Southeast Asia Strategy Workshop and the KOMAS Video For Change Forum.

“Shuling is professional, patient, insightful, and a delight to work with. She has a great eye and a strong sense of story. Shuling brings a calm assuredness to any shoot and I look forward to working with her again in the future.”

Shaleece Haas
Filmmaker and Educator

Shuling obtained her degree in Radio/TV/Film at Northwestern University. She currently lives in Chicago with her wife and kid, and travels frequently doing freelance documentary work and speaking engagements.