In the beginning of the year, it was the acting Minister for Education (Higher Education and Skills) Ong Ye Kung to announce about the amazing scheme of admission to polytechnics. Basically, the offers were made at the end of the Early Admissions Exercise (EAE). It clearly states that the students would be allowed to secure their place in diploma programmes through course-specific talents and interests. This was earlier done on the basis of academic grades.
What was the earlier procedure?
Before this scheme’s introduction, polytechnics used to consider students through the Direct Polytechnic Admissions exercise (DPA) and the Joint Polytechnic Special Admissions Exercise. In these, only up to 2.5 per cent and 5 per cent of the polytechnic intake were recorded per year.
What are the consequences?
The response to this new scheme is astounding. Around 3,680 students have received this conditional offer for a place in a polytechnic course, that too before they head off for their O levels next month. Thanks to the Early Admissions Exercise for this. These figures were announced through a Facebook posting by the acting Education Minister himself. To this, he added that it was encouraging to see a large number of applicants and offers.
And that’s not all! Do you know around 8,000 students applied for the scheme? Out of these, 46 per cent of the applicants received conditional offer and 92 per cent of them have accepted the offers.
Among the offers made, the courses included visual communications, early childhood, sports and exercise sciences, mass communication, nursing, media design and so on.