Impact of New L1R4 Requirement for JC Admission on Secondary 3 Subject Selections and MOE's Policy Intent

129 Mr Shawn Loh asked the Minister for Education in light of the Secondary Three students in 2026 being the first batch to be affected by the change from L1R5 to L1R4 for Junior College admission from 2028 (a) which O-level subjects have seen the largest changes in Secondary 3 students choosing to study these subjects compared to previous years; and (b) whether this is aligned with MOE's policy intent.

Mr Desmond Lee: The intent of revising the Junior College (JC) admission criteria is to give students more autonomy to recalibrate their curriculum load, such as by offering one fewer subject for the Singapore-Cambridge Secondary Education Certificate examination, and to use the freed-up time to strengthen their holistic development.

The change to L1R4 continues to require students to offer two languages and three subjects from the mathematics/science and the humanities subject groups, including the compulsory social studies paired with geography, history or literature. This ensures that JC-aspiring students continue to have a broad-based education to prepare them for JC.

For the first cohort under the new policy, fewer students are enrolling in geography, physics and principles of accounts. Fewer students are taking eight subjects or more, which is in line with the policy intent.