SINGAPORE – In a move that marks the largest school merger in five years, 22 secondary schools will be merged into 11 schools by 2018.
According to a report by The Straits Times, the Ministry of Education (MOE) will merge the seven schools which will not have a Secondary 1 cohort in 2016 with seven other schools in 2017.
The schools that will be merged are:
1. Balestier Hill Secondary and Beatty Secondary
2. Henderson Secondary and Bukit Merah Secondary
3. MacPherson Secondary and Broadrick Secondary
4. North View Secondary and Northland Secondary
5. Pioneer Secondary and Boon Lay Secondary
6. Siglap Secondary and Coral Secondary
7. Si Ling Secondary and Marsiling Secondary
In 2018, the following schools will be merged:
1. Bedok North Secondary and Damai Secondary
2. Bishan Park Secondary and Peirce Secondary
3. Chong Boon Secondary will join Yio Chu Kang Secondary
4. Greenview Secondary and Loyang Secondary.
This move comes on the heels of the four merged schools which are currently running: Fajar Secondary, Ping Yi Secondary, Bartley Secondary and Tanglin Secondary.
Falling student numbers was cited by MOE as being a reason for this merger. According to The Straits Times, it said that a “sufficient critical mass” is required for a school to be able to serve its students with a range of educational programmes and co-curricular activities.
The Straits Times said that the names of the merged schools have not been released yet.
prabukm@sph.com.sg
