All About Home Addresses

[BlueBells]

If I am not wrong, I think you must be staying at your registered address for at least 1 year prior to the P1 registration.

[workingmom]

BlueBells:

If I am not wrong, I think you must be staying at your registered address for at least 1 year prior to the P1 registration.

That was what someone had told me a few years back. Then we wrote officially to MOE. The reply was : \"the address must not be a temporary one.\" When we sought further clarification from them as to what \"temporary\" meant, they said \"If you are renting a place for purposes of registering for a primary school you should stay there for the full 6 years.\"

We thought the reply was rather absurd... such a requirement was not stated anywhere in the MOE guidelines or FAQs under P1 registration.

I do not think there is a minimum requirement period prior to registration. I understand that most schools just look at the address on the IC. They don't look at when that address was changed.

[onemoreparent]

But is it true that we have to live for 6 years once we rent near to the school…

[MMM]

Yah, I really wonder if the school will actually check subsequent to that. I wonder if they actually have the resource to do such tracking eg. the child got in becoz of within 1km and now the address has changed,etc…

[jedamum]

MMM:

Yah, I really wonder if the school will actually check subsequent to that. I wonder if they actually have the resource to do such tracking eg. the child got in becoz of within 1km and now the address has changed,etc...

School may not have the means to check every kid, but they may look into complaints from other parents.

[ChiefKiasu]

Being kaypoh, I checked with MOE and got a response today. A very detailed one too... so kudos to MOE and the staff involved for customer service.


Essentially, other than what is published on their website (ie. the regulation on using the address of an uncompleted property), there are no regulations pertaining to how long before or after P1 registration that parents are required to rent or stay at an address. If you register with an NRIC address, your child \"should\" stay at that address for the duration of Primary school, but it is not mandated and you are allowed to move. If you do not intend to stay at that address for long, you are expected to inform the school during the registration process so that the school will assign the correct priority to you during balloting. It's pretty much an honor system. Though you are allowed to move subsequently, if you are unable to provide a reasonable explanation as to why you are doing so should the school finds out and inquires, the school retain the right to reassign your vacancy to others in the waiting list.

There have been cases as highlighted earlier in this thread where people were caught red-handed taking advantage of the system without proper explanation. The punishment is severe and embarrassing for the parents and children involved. Again I say that no school is good enough for parents to resort to such means of getting a school for their children.

[workingmom]

ChiefKiasu:

Being kaypoh, I checked with MOE and got a response today. A very detailed one too... so kudos to MOE and the staff involved for customer service.


Essentially, other than what is published on their website (ie. the regulation on using the address of an uncompleted property), there are no regulations pertaining to how long before or after P1 registration that parents are required to rent or stay at an address. If you register with an NRIC address, your child \"should\" stay at that address for the duration of Primary school, but it is not mandated and you are allowed to move. If you do not intend to stay at that address for long, you are expected to inform the school during the registration process so that the school will assign the correct priority to you during balloting. It's pretty much an honor system. Though you are allowed to move subsequently, if you are unable to provide a reasonable explanation as to why you are doing so should the school finds out and inquires, the school retain the right to reassign your vacancy to others in the waiting list.

There have been cases as highlighted earlier in this thread where people were caught red-handed taking advantage of the system without proper explanation. The punishment is severe and embarrassing for the parents and children involved. Again I say that no school is good enough for parents to resort to such means of getting a school for their children.

Yes, MOE has a \"standard reply\" for similar queries. In fact, when we wrote to MOE, we only had a query about whether there was a minimum time prior to registration as we were wondering how far ahead to plan when we should buy and move home but they came back with the LONG reply about using your rental address etc. I suspect MOE knows that there are parents who rent short term for the purposes of P1 registration and want to discourage that without openly saying so under their guidelines.

In fact, it was only when we wrote the 2nd time to clarify what they meant by \"temporary\" that MOE came back to insist that one must stay the full six years. I guess when push comes to shove and they are put on the spot, they feel this is the appropriate response.

[ChiefKiasu]

workingmom:

Yes, MOE has a \"standard reply\" for similar queries. In fact, when we wrote to MOE, we only had a query about whether there was a minimum time prior to registration as we were wondering how far ahead to plan when we should buy and move home but they came back with the LONG reply about using your rental address etc. I suspect MOE knows that there are parents who rent short term for the purposes of P1 registration and want to discourage that without openly saying so under their guidelines.


In fact, it was only when we wrote the 2nd time to clarify what they meant by \"temporary\" that MOE came back to insist that one must stay the full six years. I guess when push comes to shove and they are put on the spot, they feel this is the appropriate response.

Actually, we should just accept it as a fact that there is NO regulations regarding the time parents must be staying at the registration address, at least at this point in time, and be thankful that MOE is not being too rigid in its rulings. It would be terrible if they change the ruling such that no parents with Primary school children can move house, just because of some bad eggs.

[hunnylemon]

Thanks so much for finding out for me... think in this case, I better seriously look for a good property to buy near the school.


Erm... side-track abit and to ask bluntly..... for those schools which accept \"donations\" so that kids are more or less given a space in school without having to go thru the stressful balloting procedures.... how to ask the school how much they want? And any idea.... how much is a good sum? Sorry... quite blunt but juz curious.

[deardear07]

hunnylemon:

Thanks so much for finding out for me... think in this case, I better seriously look for a good property to buy near the school.


Erm... side-track abit and to ask bluntly..... for those schools which accept \"donations\" so that kids are more or less given a space in school without having to go thru the stressful balloting procedures.... how to ask the school how much they want? And any idea.... how much is a good sum? Sorry... quite blunt but juz curious.

definitely in terms of thousands of dollars, some even way into 5digits... will burn a hole in ur pocket...