Average Teacher-Student Ratio in Schools

25 Mr Christopher de Souza asked the Minister for Education (a) what is the average teacher-student ratio for Primary, Secondary and Junior College levels respectively; (b) what efforts are being taken to reduce class sizes and increase the ratio of teachers to students; and (c) how will the Ministry further alleviate teachers of administrative duties to allow them to focus their day in school on teaching.

The Minister for Education (Mr Ong Ye Kung): I thank the Member for his question and interest in teaching quality, especially class sizes. I note that he has raised this issue before, in fact, as early as October 2013 – I dug it out.

Over the last decade, our Pupil-Teacher Ratio (PTR) has improved and is currently 15:1 for Primary schools, 12:1 for Secondary schools and 11:1 for Junior Colleges. This is comparable to many OECD countries and better than countries, such as the US, UK, Germany, Korea and Japan.

However, PTR and class sizes are different concepts. PTR measures resourcing, that is, the total number of teachers provided against the student enrolment numbers. On the other hand, the class size reflects how we deploy our teachers – how much teaching they conduct vis-à-vis out-of-classroom activities, such as curriculum planning, conducting Co-Curricular Activities (CCAs), or attending professional development training. It also reflects whether teaching resources are deployed evenly for all students or varied depending on the needs of the students.

Once we differentiate the two concepts, we will realise that there are only two ways to reduce class sizes. One is to stick to existing resourcing levels but give teachers more teaching load and reduce their out-of-classroom activities.

I visited a French primary school recently that is run that way. It has a PTR of 19:1 – much less resources compared to Singapore, but it has class sizes of 15 to 20 – smaller than Singapore's. It is able to achieve this because it deploys its teachers fully for teaching. Given that resourcing is a zero-sum game, it means the French school may not have a lot of resources for lesson preparation, CCAs, learning journeys, teachers' training, as well as dedicated help for students with specific learning needs. So, something has got to give.

A second way is to expand the teaching force so that we can have the best of both worlds – small class sizes, without undermining out-of-classroom activities. But that has significant budgetary implications, especially given that manpower is the largest cost component of our education budget. Remember, our resourcing level is already at OECD standards. Furthermore, a big increase in recruitment will also alter the quality of the teaching force – inevitable, when you try to recruit in such big numbers. It is also difficult to sustain, in our context, given increased manpower demands in other sectors, such as healthcare and the needs of the economy, all competing for the smaller and smaller cohorts of adults entering the workforce.

Because of these reasons, we have decided not to implement any broad-based reduction in class sizes. But where we can, we deploy teaching resources to help students with a greater need for teachers' guidance. For example, MOE allocates additional teachers to our schools based on their student profiles and to allow them the autonomy to organise class sizes appropriately.

In the Secondary schools, for example, while Express classes are mostly taught in class sizes of close to 40, Normal (Technical) classes for some subjects are commonly sized at 20. In the Primary schools, levelling-up programmes, such as the Learning Support Programme for Lower Primary students and the School-based Dyslexia Remediation Programme for students with special education needs, are conducted in classes of eight to 10 and four to six respectively. In NorthLight School, Assumption Pathway School, Crest Secondary School and Spectra Secondary School, students are taught in class sizes of 20.

Over the years, MOE has taken steps to also ease teachers' administrative duties through the use of technology to streamline processes through e-platforms, such as Parents Gateway and the use of apps for attendance-taking. In the 2018 OECD study on Secondary school teachers, we are happy to see some positive outcomes as our teachers have reported 3.8 hours a week spent on administrative duties – a drop of 1.5 hours compared to the 2013 survey.

MOE will continue to introduce additional measures and better leverage technology to reduce the administrative workload and other demands on our teachers' time, such as on lesson preparation and marking, to allow them to focus their day in school on teaching.

Mr Christopher de Souza (Holland-Bukit Timah): I agree that ensuring, maintaining high quality in our educators must be an over-riding factor. If classroom sizes can be reduced while quality of teaching remains high, that is an ideal win-win. The trade-offs will take time to iron out. In the meantime, my question is: can MOE please invest in Allied Educators and administrative support staff to ease the load on the teachers such that teachers can focus on teaching to the benefit of students. Career progression for the Allied Educators and administrative support staff is also key.

My second supplementary question: in the way MOH is building up capability in the allied health worker force to aid the doctors in performing their duties, would MOE also build up training and continuing professional development for allied educators or even set up an Allied Educator Academy, so that teachers can be very ably partnered by Allied Educators in the education of our young. My two supplementary questions for the Minister.

Mr Ong Ye Kung: I thank the Member for his supplementary questions. These are very valid observations. In fact, in my visits to schools, usually the top suggestion from teachers is, “Can we have more help from Allied Educators”, partly to help them teach as teaching aids, but also to help them deal with – sometimes, disruption in class. Having an Allied Educator would be most useful. So, indeed, we are looking into it – trying to recruit more Allied Educators and give more resourcing to support schools, especially through Allied Educators in what we call Learning Behavioural Support. At the same time, as we recruit more, we will also have to look at their career paths, career progression as well as their professional training.

Ms Denise Phua Lay Peng (Jalan Besar): Minister, since there is a decline in the birth cohort and classes, number of students are actually getting fewer and fewer. How are the excess teachers deployed currently? Do they go into pre-schools other than the NorthLight Crest and Spectra? How are these other teachers deployed? How can they be deployed elsewhere to support an even better quality of education?

My second question: there is a lot of talk about administrative duties of teachers, of educators. Can Minister define what administrative duties? So, if educators work with parents, partner parents or they take on duties to encourage students to come to school or work with delinquents, and spending time, are those considered administrative duties? Is teaching currently defined as just being in front of the classroom or just doing the academics?

Mr Ong Ye Kung: I thank the Member. I reported improving pupil-teacher ratio (PTR) and one big driving force of that improvement is really because of falling cohort sizes. We are keeping the teachers in our system and we improve PTRs as a result.

And in general, what we wish to use the additional resources for are really pull-out classes – for Normal (Technical) and weaker students to give them more dedicated attention or in the lower Primary, where we have the Learning Support Programme (LSP). We use these additional resources to be able to pull out the students. That is why I am always worried about across-the-board fixing of class sizes because it can mean that all these additional resources today used to help weaker students, may disappear overnight. So, we always provide for enough resourcing but let the schools have the flexibility to deploy the resources to help the students that need it most. And that is my preferred method.

As for the administrative duties, I thank the Member for that question. Indeed, we cannot split hairs. I think every teacher has a great role to play beyond the classroom – working with parents, sometimes guiding the students outside of the classroom, and going out of their way to make sure they help students. Regarding administrative duties, I am talking about consent forms, making sure they are signed, collecting them, and taking attendance. I think we can use technology to better handle them.