Thanks for your reply. My girl just finished her last paper today, so I thought either she didn’t get selected or the school didn’t want to release it yet.

Was it out today? Does every child get a notification letter regardless of whether he/she is selected?

Are the 2nd round results expected this week? My child has not received yet.

When my son was in PN last year, there was only one enrichment for PN, English speech and drama. I sat in one of the sessions, I was not impressed by the course provider and did not continue after 1 term, so I think no loss there.

As far as I know, parents who send their kids to Chiltern House are eligible for MCYS’ working mother subsidies, therefore, I thought they are a child care centre, even though I understand they only offer half day programs.

babylamb:

My girl was just offered a place in nanyang for 2014 pm session.. but she was also offered a place in chiltern AM session.. Thinking hard which to enroll her in.. Anyone has any advice??

NYK and Chiltern House are very different schools. NYK is a kindergarten, school is 3 hours daily and they run AM and PM sessions. Chiltern House is a child care centre (?), a very popular one which I've heard many good things about. NYK feels quite \"traditional\", before school starts, they will sing the national anthem, say the pledge (in Mandarin I think) and sing the school song.

NYK's pre-nursery and nursery is 100% Chinese, bilingual program starts from K1. Chiltern House, I think, is bilingual from the start.

As for AM and PM session, it depends on your child's preferred routine. For NYK, it is possible to change from PM to AM (and vice-versa) but you have to wait for a vacancy to come up. The advantage of the PM session is that the optional enrichment classes start at 3.15pm. So PM session kids can move on to enrichment immediately after school ends at 3pm.

NYK follows the MOE terms and holidays. So expect 1 week holiday in March and September, 4 weeks in June and about 6 weeks in Nov/Dec. To keep your child occupied, you have to find holiday programs during those breaks. NYK typically organize a holiday program during the 1st week of June and year-end holiday, which lasts 3-5 days, at an extra cost. Since Chiltern House is a child-care centre, you don't have to organize additional programs during school holidays.

When I registered my first born, he was wait-listed #167. We have no \"connections\" nor priority placement, simply joining the queue. We were offered a PM place in term 4. He was at Pat's Schoolhouse for 9 months before joining NYK. It is a quite a large kindy so vacancies do come up, just be patient.

I wonder if any parents send their children to the enrichment classes organised by Nanyang Kindergarten? My child is in Nursery next year and I’m thinking of "Sketch & Splash" and "Gymnastics". Would appreciate if you could give me some feedback on these classes.


He currently attends the English speech and drama enrichment on Tuesday and I attended one of the sessions a few weeks ago and was not impressed by the way the class was conducted so I’m unlikely to continue with that.

I spoke with my son’s school and expressed my concerns about the price increase as I may eventually put 3 kids at Pat’s.


Apparently, I’m one of the first few parents who called the school. So woodstock has a point, if parents are concerned, they are not letting the school know, as of now, at least.

The reasons given to me were:

1. Rental (this is the main reason for the difference in cost between branches. Centrally located branches like Claymore are more expensive than suburban branches for example).

2. Retention of teachers - they need to match the salaries paid to teachers as they are losing experienced teachers to their competitors.

3. Other operating costs like utilities and groceries are smaller factors but add to overall costs of running the branch.

When I told my friend I was going to call the school about the price increase, she told me not to as she was afraid the school may treat my child differently, ie. the child with the mum who likes to "complain". But I’m sure there is a way to do it without coming across as aggressive.

At the new fees, including $300 subsidy and 7% GST, I will be paying roughly $1250 per month or $15000 a year. Assuming each child goes to Pat’s for 4 years, without factoring future price increase, that is already $60,000 per child. I have 3 kids, so multiply that by 3? That is a scary sum.

Anyway, I think the point about letting the school know about concerns over price increase is very valid. I work in the consumer sector and whenever we attempt to increase price for our products, we consider the severity of the customer’s reactions and one of the way to gauge that is how they responded to the last price increase.

Just imagine if you are the management of Pat’s Schoolhouse considering the next fee increase, if there were not many negative response from the last increase, would they not think twice about the next fee increase? Ultimately they are a for-profit education business. However, if there were many parents who raised concerns, if the concerns are serious enough and made it to the press (hypothetically), if there are lots of noise in the internet forums resulting in potentially negative reputation of the school, would the school not think harder about the next fee increase? Collective action definitely helps.

Of course at every point, the price increase will result in parents seeking a cheaper alternative. For me, I’m at that crossroads, so I will be looking at cheaper alternatives either for my younger children or all 3 of them.