Additional Primary School within New Brickland Constituency in View of Oversubscription during Primary 1 Admission Exercise
Ministry of EducationSpeakers
Summary
This question concerns the potential construction of an additional primary school in Brickland constituency to address oversubscription at nearby schools during the Primary 1 Registration Exercise. Minister for Education Lawrence Wong explained that school planning is based on localized demand, noting that 14 primary schools currently serve the area within two kilometres. He highlighted that 430 vacancies remained across five of these schools after Phase 2C (Supplementary), demonstrating that existing capacity is sufficient for residents despite high demand at specific institutions. Consequently, the Ministry of Education has no plans for a new school but has already adjusted intakes at several schools to cater to recent and upcoming housing developments. Minister for Education Lawrence Wong affirmed that the Ministry will continue reviewing demand trends and will adjust school intakes if necessary to meet the needs of young families.
Transcript
23 Mr Don Wee asked the Minister for Education as South View Primary School, Chua Chu Kang Primary School and Unity Primary School are oversubscribed by many times during the Phase 2C of the Primary 1 admission exercise, whether an additional primary school can be built within the new Brickland constituency, which is a BTO precinct with many young families, to cope with the increased demand for Primary 1 places.
Mr Lawrence Wong: MOE builds new primary schools based on localised demand projections and planned housing developments to ensure that there are sufficient school places for all Singaporean children in each residential area. However, individual primary schools in the same residential area could experience different levels of subscription for places based on many factors, including parental choice.
There are five primary schools within one kilometre and another nine primary schools within one to two kilometres of Brickland constituency. We are aware that there are several recently completed and upcoming housing developments in Brickland constituency and have made appropriate adjustments to the Primary 1 intake to cater to higher demand. Five out of the 14 schools had a total of about 430 remaining vacancies at the end of Phase 2C (Supplementary) in this year’s P1 Registration Exercise.
Although places in South View Primary School and Chua Chu Kang Primary School were taken up by the end of Phase 2C this year, nearby Teck Whye Primary School had 88 remaining vacancies at the end of Phase 2C (Supplementary). Unity Primary School did not ballot at Phase 2C and still had 57 remaining vacancies at the end of Phase 2C (Supplementary).
As the existing schools in the vicinity of Brickland constituency have sufficient places to serve residents, we have no plans to build a new primary school within the constituency. Nonetheless, MOE will continue to carefully review the demand and supply trends for the coming years and if necessary, adjust the intake for some schools in advance to meet projected demand.