SINGAPORE - The Ministry of Education (MOE) will not revisit the names of merged schools, said Senior Minister of State for Eduation Janil Puthucheary on Tuesday (Feb 6).
"We should let the schools focus on their teaching and learning programmes to benefit their students," he said, in response to Mr Zainal Sapari (Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC).
Mr Zainal had asked why MOE has been inconsistent in naming merged schools, depending on whether they are primary, secondary or junior colleges (JCs). He also wanted to know if the ministry would be willing to reconsider names of merged schools to "manage ground sensitivities".
In the past, alumni groups have been unhappy over the names of merged schools, such as in the case of Angsana Primary, which was formed in 2015 from the merger of Qiaonan Primary and Griffiths Primary. The two schools in Tampines had a combined history of around 145 years.
When MOE announced last year that it would merge four pairs of JCs - the first time that JCs are going to be merged - there was concern about how the four merged schools will be named.
Last month, the MOE announced that four merged JCs will take on the original names of the eight schools. For each pair, the name of the older JC will come first to reflect its longer history and heritage.
Anderson JC and Serangoon JC will be known as Anderson Serangoon JC, and Innova JC and Yishun JC will become Yishun Innova JC. Meridian JC and Tampines JC will be Tampines Meridian JC and Jurong JC and Pioneer JC will be called Jurong Pioneer JC.
On Tuesday, Dr Janil said the decision to have combined names was made to "allow the merging JCs to move forward as a combined entity".
In naming merged schools, he said that MOE considers factors including the schools' history and heritage, stakeholders' interest and the sentiments of the schools involved.
"This results in three naming approaches from considering the unique situations of each pair of merging schools: retaining one of the two names, adopting a new name, or having a combination of names," he said.
He added that students' age profiles are also taken into consideration - MOE had previously that younger children may find longer names "less manageable".
Besides the JCs, school names were combined too in the case of the newly named Loyang View Secondary School in Pasir Ris, formed at the start of this year from the merger of Greenview Secondary and Loyang Secondary.
Dr Janil added that the combination of schools' names can be repetitive in some cases. For instance, the school in Yishun formed last year after the merger of Northland Secondary School and North View Secondary School took on the former's name.
