If you’re one who believes in investing in your children’s future by kickstarting your child’s education journey in a top primary school, you will definitely have heard of Balmoral Road, located at the Bukit Timah district in your house-hunting journey.
Balmoral Road, which is named after Balmoral Castle in Scotland, is in a strategic spot in District 10 and is within distance of top primary schools such as the two Anglo-Chinese Schools (Primary & Junior) and Singapore Chinese Girls’ Primary School.
The Primary One Registration Exercise (PORE) takes place from July to August every year, and it’s a system set in place to register one’s child in a mainstream school for the following year.
One’s residence can bear a huge significance on the consideration of priority in admissions in primary schools – with the residential address used to determine the home-school distance category. Do also note that families are required to stay at the residential address for at least 30 months (2.5 years) from the commencement of the PORE.
Places in schools are allocated accordingly to the order of priority laid out in the various phases of the PORE, which we have listed below.
While certain phases and their eligibility requirements sit outside of one’s control, you’ll be glad to know that MOE reserves 40 places in every primary school for registrants in Phase 2B and 2C to ensure continued open access to all primary schools – meaning you can actually apply to do volunteer work at the school you’re interested to send your child to in a bid to increase their admission chances. Do note it’s better to get started ASAP as you’ll need to clock in certain number of hours based on what the school sets.
With the top schools bound to be a popular choice in the PORE, there’s a strong likelihood of application numbers exceeding the number of vacancies during the various phases. When this situation arises, Singapore Citizens are given absolute priority over Singapore Permanent Residents (PRs) followed by the home-school distance coming into play. Here, vacancies will be allocated on one’s home-school distance in the following order of priority: (1) within a km from the school, (2) between one and two km from the school, and (3) outside two km from the school.
It’s no wonder houses are able to fetch a premium should they be closer to popular primary schools, and it then comes as absolutely no surprise that there are currently over 10 condominiums situated all along Balmoral Road.
If your child’s up for the PORE next year, you may want to consider the following freehold condominiums situated on Balmoral Road that TOP-ed not too long ago (2016-2017):
However if you have a few years till your child’s PORE, you may want to keep your eye on the upcoming development Sloane Residences (TOP in 2021) Besides being in a strategic spot with nearby access to the top primary schools (hint hint – all less than 1km), you’ll also be a conveniently located close to Singapore’s ever-popular Orchard Road and can enjoy numerous shopping, entertainment and dining establishments.