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Press Releases

May 12, 2011

84 Secondary Schools to Participate in Direct School Admission Exercise

This year, 84 schools will be participating in the 2011 Direct School Admission—Secondary Exercise (DSA-Sec) for admission to Secondary One in 2012. The DSA-Sec Exercise promotes holistic education by giving participating schools greater flexibility in selecting students, while holding to the key principles of transparency and meritocracy. For students, DSA provides them the opportunity to demonstrate a more diverse range of achievements and talents in seeking admission to secondary schools.

The 84 schools participating in the DSA-Sec Exercise this year are listed in Annex A (116kb .pdf).

New Secondary Schools Offering Integrated Programme

As part of the expansion of the Integrated Programme to more secondary schools1, Victoria School and Cedar Girls’ Secondary School will admit their first Integrated Programme student intakes for Secondary One in 2012. They will admit students via the 2011 DSA-Sec Exercise and Secondary One Posting Exercise.

New Niche Programme Schools

Four new schools have been approved by MOE to offer discretionary places via the DSA-Sec Exercise for admissions from 2012 onwards. Another two schools, Fuhua Secondary and Outram Secondary, will offer a second niche. Three new niche areas—Visual Arts, Design Education and Business Enterprise—are introduced this year. The schools’ niche programmes are as follows:

School Niche
Fuhua Secondary Uniformed Groups*
Hai Sing Catholic Robotics
Orchid Park Secondary Visual Arts
Outram Secondary Business Enterprise*
Ping Yi Secondary Design Education
Serangoon Garden Secondary Uniformed Groups
* This is the school’s second niche area of excellence.

A list of the 44 niche programme schools is at Annex B (52kb .pdf). Information on the schools’ selection criteria and their application and selection processes can be found on their respective websites. MOE will continue to invite applications from schools interested to establish niche programmes in subsequent years.

DSA-Sec Exercise

The exercise will be conducted in 3 stages:

Stage Stage Name Description Period
1 Selection Schools will conduct their own selection exercises, and inform students of the results (Confirmed Offer, Placed on Waiting List or Rejected). 27 Jun 11 to 2 Sep 11
2 Exercise School Preference Students may indicate their school preferences during this stage, based on the Confirmed Offers and Waiting List Offers they have received. Offers not taken up will be considered as lapsed. They can indicate their preferences online or at their primary schools. 24 Oct 11 to 28 Oct 11
3 Results Release The results of the DSA-Sec Exercise will be released together with the PSLE results. Late Nov 11

Students who take up Confirmed Offers or Waiting List Offers by schools during the DSA-Sec Exercise are still required to take the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE). Those who take up Confirmed Offers are guaranteed a place in the school that has extended them an offer, provided that their PSLE results meet the minimum requirement for a course [Express/ Normal (Academic)/ Normal (Technical)] offered by the school.

Similar to previous years, students who have been admitted through the DSA-Sec Exercise will not be able to participate in the centralised Secondary One Posting Exercise.

For Further Information

Students who are interested in participating in the DSA-Sec Exercise should approach any of the participating secondary schools or visit their websites for more details regarding the selection exercises. They can also call the MOE Customer Service Centre at 6872-2220 or refer to the DSA-Sec website.

Background

MOE has been giving schools, polytechnics and universities greater flexibility in their admission of students to allow a more diverse range of student achievements and talents to be recognised.

Since 2004, MOE has introduced a phased plan to provide greater flexibility in the secondary and junior college school admission system. The plan includes:

  • allowing schools with Integrated Programme or Specialised Independent Schools (viz. NUS High School, School of the Arts and School of Science and Technology) full discretion in admissions;
  • enhancing the autonomy of Autonomous Schools and Independent Schools by:
    • increasing their level of discretionary places to 10% and 20% respectively, and
    • allowing them to adopt their own merit-based admission criteria for these places;
  • extending discretion on admissions, of up to 5% of intake, to mainstream secondary schools that are able to develop strong niche programmes; and
  • giving discretion on admissions to all junior colleges.

Footnote

  1. MOE announced an expansion of the Integrated Programme to more secondary schools on 1 September, 2010. The press release is http://www.moe.gov.sg/media/press/2010/09/more-pathways-secondary-schools.php. ↩