Tiong Bahru blocks to be painted brown after criticisms over purple makeover
Tiong Bahru blocks to be painted brown after criticisms over purple makeover
SINGAPORE - The 14 Tiong Bahru Housing Board blocks, that had ignited much debate and discussion after residents found out the buildings were going to be painted in purple, are now going to be painted a new colour - brown.
The decision on the new colour scheme comes after the views of residents were sought through a poll held from May 26 to 28.
A notice by the Tanjong Pagar Town Council on May 30 showed that 40 per cent of the Boon Tiong Road residents who voted selected the 'taupe' colour scheme from four different options.
The initial purple paintjob had come under the spotlight earlier in May, after parts of the exterior of Block 9A Boon Tiong Road was painted several shades of purple, including a dark plum which some residents said looked gaudy.
Residents were upset as they said their views were not sought.
Following the uproar, Tanjong Pagar GRC MP Foo Cexiang had decided to do a poll after residents told him they wanted a choice over the colour scheme.
Two of the options were variations of purple. The 'classic purple' option, which had more white portions and shades of light purple, garnered 17 per cent of votes.
Another option, called 'lightened purple gradient', had more purple sections. It received 13 per cent of votes.
The other option, a yellow colour scheme, got 30 per cent of the vote.
A resident, Ms Nicole Lau, felt the winning taupe colour scheme was acceptable, she hoped that the classic purple option would be chosen as she liked the finished paint job at Block 2A Boon Tiong Road, which sported shades of lilac.
'The lilac colour looks quite soothing. What I didn't like was the dark purple shade,' said the teacher who is in her 40s.
'Are we going to be called the Milo blocks now?' she added, referring to the chocolate malt beverage.
A resident at Block 2A, who wanted to be known only as Mr Chen, said he was disappointed with the results as his block would have to undergo another round of painting.
'The purple colour is nice, I don't understand why there was a huge fuss over it. Now, residents at Block 2A will have to be inconvenienced again,' said the 60-year-old IT consultant.
He said the block's purple makeover took about a month and was completed in early May. It was previously off-white with shades of light orange.
Mr Foo told reporters on May 17 that the purple colour scheme was selected to reflect the purple-blossomed bougainvillea planted along Boon Tiong Road as part of a community event in 2015.
The idea came from a discussion between Ms Indranee Rajah – who was previously adviser to Tanjong Pagar GRC Grassroots Organisations – as well as residents and architects, he said.
Ms Indranee was MP for Tanjong Pagar GRC from 2001 to 2025 before moving to head the PAP's team in Pasir Ris-Changi GRC for the 2025 General Election.
As to why voting was not done earlier, Mr Foo said there is no protocol on how advisers should conduct the repainting process.
He said painting will start about three to four weeks after the colour scheme is chosen.
Isabelle Liew is a journalist at The Straits Times. She covers housing issues in Singapore, with a focus on public housing.
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Straits Times
25-07-2025
- Straits Times
‘Do you kill children?': Even before independence, S'pore has always loved its over-the-top campaigns
Find out what's new on ST website and app. This 1947 anti-spitting hygiene drive is indicative of the heavy-handed language of the era's campaigns. SINGAPORE – 'Do you kill children? If you spit, you do.' This was the stark slogan printed on 10,000 posters plastered across Singapore's buses, coffee shops, factories and offices in 1949, as part of a public awareness campaign by the local Anti-Tuberculosis Association. While this anti-spitting campaign might be brutally direct by today's standards, such language was typical of campaigns at the time. Before 'Keep Singapore Clean' became a national refrain, before anyone was urged to be like The Thoughtful Bunch's Hush-Hush Hannah or Bag-Down Benny on public transport, pre-independence Singapore was already experimenting with the campaigns that would become an essential part of the island's urban DNA. A dive into The Straits Times' archives reveals dozens of these campaigns – tackling everything from reminding pedestrians to use road crossings and promoting birth control to teaching residents how to fight fires in kampungs and encouraging blood donation. Singapore's pre-independence campaigns reflect the living conditions of the colony at the time. PHOTO: ST FILE One 1947 campaign appealed to the colony's Chinese community for blood because the group was 'on the debit side of the Blood Bank', stemming from cultural apprehension towards blood donation. Campaigners used a variety of tactics to entice people to give blood during the post-war shortage. Top stories Swipe. Select. Stay informed. 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Campaigners rolled out philanthropist Lee Kong Chian, one of South-east Asia's richest men, as an example of a blood donor. This may be one of the earliest examples of influencer marketing on the island. Singapore's early blood donation campaigns aimed to reduce prejudice towards the life-saving medical intervention. PHOTOS: ST FILE Such tactics were commonplace at the time. Come down for a free chest X-ray, proclaimed one anti-tuberculosis campaign. Worry not about the mosquito-killing efforts, argued one official in defence of the colony's anti-malaria strategy. 'Some of these ideas have just been honed and sharpened,' says Dr Donna Brunero, a senior lecturer at the National University of Singapore's (NUS) department of history. Drawing parallels between the giveaways for public health drives in the 1940s and how modern apps like Healthy 365 gamify healthy behaviour, she adds: 'People are responsive to these types of 'for the greater good, but at the same time, you might be able to benefit as well' initiatives.' Experts speaking to The Straits Times say these movements are indicative of an enduring fixation with public awareness campaigns as a tool to reshape life in Singapore – and offer a fascinating window into the anxieties of the young colony. 'Asiatics are not the only offenders' Traffic safety has long been a preoccupation of Singapore residents, with safety-first campaigns being one recurring tool to address it. PHOTO: ST FILE The first recorded mention of a call for a road safety campaign in ST's archives came in 1935, when the paper's motoring correspondent called for a 'Safety First campaign' after 49 people died in motor accidents the previous year. For context, the colony had just 15,000 motor cars in 1940 and a population of under a million, according to the 1947 census. The roads were proportionally deadlier than today's Singapore, which recorded 142 road traffic casualties in 2024 with over 600,000 cars and station wagons. Back then, road safety concerns were different. Beyond motorist collisions, accidents also involved people falling when 'alighting from moving trolley buses' and 'pedal cyclists' losing control and crashing into motorists. 'One has only to stand outside the Capitol Theatre building for a few minutes to observe how consistently pedestrians ignore the automatic signals,' reads one 1936 newspaper report. 'Asiatics are not the only offenders in this respect,' it continues. 'People who should know better are frequently seen to cross the road against oncoming traffic.' Singapore's safety-first campaigns started as early as 1939. PHOTO: ST FILE The years 1939 and 1945 saw the island's earliest safety-first campaigns – the latter taking place after the end of the Japanese Occupation and the post-war return of British rule. Dr Ho Chi Tim, a senior lecturer at the Singapore University of Social Sciences specialising in the history of South-east Asia, says the post-war years accelerated efforts to introduce more regulation and support that were already under way in the 1930s. After the humiliation of the Japanese Occupation, health services, welfare, education and other bread-and-butter issues came to the forefront due to a need to showcase the effectiveness and legitimacy of colonial rule, says Dr Ho. These campaigns – by military authorities, civil police and the department of education – pulled out all the stops. One safety-first campaign reminded motorists to keep to their lanes while driving. PHOTO: ST FILE This meant new signage, thousands of stickers and posters in four languages flooding the city, the introduction of a 'safety week', radio broadcasts, kerbside lectures by mobile police and even a song taught to schoolchildren: 'Look to the left and look to the right. Then you'll never, never get run over.' Again, campaigners got creative. A cinema slide screening titled Traffic With The Devil was shown at cinemas, alongside a car that was wrecked in a real road accident. It was also towed around the city to 'bring home the disastrous consequences of bad driving'. 'Can you stand the burden of having so many children?' Singapore's early family planning campaigns were blunt. PHOTO: ST FILE While modern campaigns might tiptoe around sensitive topics, their colonial predecessors charged ahead with little care for subtlety. ' The funny thing is, I feel like people in Singapore were actually more squeamish later on,' says Dr Jinna Tay, a senior lecturer at the NUS Department of Communications and New Media. 'The early campaigns got quite gritty. They didn't shy away from harsh language and realities.' One slide screening shown in local cinemas by the Singapore Family Planning Association (FPA) depicted a weary Chinese mother with six children, holding empty rice bowls. The accompanying text asked: 'Can you stand the burden of having so many children?' The solution – birth control – was presented in capital letters, followed by instructions for married women to visit a clinic for advice. In response to concerns over the use of contraception, one family planning advocate argued that the risk of harm was far less than the risk of injury or death from abortion, according to an ST report from 1949. Such directness – often using harsh and moralistic language – was a hallmark of pre-independence campaigns because of both the scale of the problems and the audiences they were addressing. Singapore had a literacy rate of just 52.6 per cent in 1960 and universal education had only just begun to take shape, so campaigners reckoned that simple and memorable messaging was needed. A true blue ground-up initiative These campaigns took shape against a backdrop of inequality and poverty. Dr Ho s ays Singapore's early family planning campaigns emerged in a time of overcrowding, women's health issues, children being sold and widespread child malnourishment in the post-war years. At the time, the colonial government introduced child feeding centres that aimed to give every child at least one nutritious meal a day. However, the women who volunteered at these centres frequently had to turn children away due to food shortages. This meant the mostly women volunteers behind the FPA were tackling a problem they saw every day. 'These women didn't have time for niceties – (they wanted to) just get the message out and worry about it later. 'The FPA was one of the true blue ground-up initiatives from sectors of Singapore society,' he says. 'Although, you could argue that section of Singapore society was also the social political elite.' The FPA's efforts helped to arrest Singapore's birth rate by the 1950s and 1960s , before the organisation 'went completely kaput' in 1966 after such family planning initiatives became the purview of the Government . 'After that, you see the Stop-at-Two poster campaigns you are familiar with,' he says. In 1966, the National Family Planning Campaign was launched and the Government embarked on a Stop-At-Two policy. This Two-Girl Poster, as it was called, was meant to highlight that two children, of either sex, were enough. PHOTO: NLB Why campaigns matter The importance of campaigns comes down to the need for community buy-in, says Dr Olivia Jensen, lead scientist at NUS' Institute for the Public Understanding of Risk. She argues that many individual behaviours, even in contemporary society, generate negative societal impact – littering, spitting, wasting water – which are difficult to monitor and enforce against without some form of public awareness of the harms. Singapore's early water campaigns took place against a backdrop of shortage and rationing. PHOTO: ST FILE The water campaigns of the early 1960s saw thousands of 'Don't Waste Water' posters put up across Singapore, alongside dire newspaper headlines like '27 days of water in stock'. 'Water scarcity was at the forefront of these campaigns and of course was so severe that water conservation was inadequate and rationing had to be imposed,' says Dr Jensen. Back then, threats to water security stemmed from inadequate rainfall and inadequate storage, she adds. In contrast, Singapore's water issues in the post-independence years would later become political in nature. While campaigns remain useful today, community buy-in was especially important back then. Dr Edgar Liao, a historian of South-east Asia, notes that the 1940s and 1950s also saw the colonial government preoccupied with the reconstruction of Malaya and Singapore after the destruction of World War II. 'Manpower and funds were scarce, so it was necessary to rally and mobilise the support of the community to address social needs and different sorts of problems – like water shortages, public health crises and so on,' he says. The nation-building project that would emerge in the 1950s and 1960s also aimed to instil a sense of civic-consciousness towards Singapore and Malaya – during a time when many were animated by nationalism towards their ancestral homelands. The changing face of empire The educational – and at times, condescending – tone of Singapore's earliest campaigns reflects the fast-changing realities of life under empire. South-east Asia historian Edgar Liao argues that the modernisation of colonised societies – and the moral protection of children and women in these societies – were intertwined with imperial rhetoric and prestige. Children, especially, were central to these campaigns. The emphasis on shifting generational mindsets appears to be a defining feature of these early campaigns, says Dr Brunero. This was partly because of the youth factor and paternalistic attitudes by colonial authorities. 'There is the colonial mindset that the British see themselves in a sort of paternalistic or maternalistic role,' she adds. 'All colonies are young compared to the metropole.' The colony's population was also young – with 40 per cent aged 14 and under in 1950, according to data from the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. In 1947, traffic police chief C.J.R. Pembroke told ST during the start of a new safety week that public apathy was the issue: Adults had heard the safety-first message so often that they were indifferent. As such, the police see schools as the most fertile place for road safety instruction. 'The child is the pedestrian of today, the cyclist of tomorrow and the motor driver of the more distant future,' he says. Progressives in Britain and local English-educated middle-class actors were also lobbying colonial governments to do more to protect children and women. Dr Liao says: 'By the 1930s, Britain (especially the Labour Party) had embraced the idea of imperial responsibility for the welfare, protection and upliftment of colonial peoples.' He points to the late 1920s and early 1930s as a period when tens of thousands of children were killed on roads in Britain, inspiring the country to introduce a road traffic act in 1934 and begin educating children about road safety. This likely influenced Singapore's own road safety campaigns. This was just one of many influences of life under empire. Dr Brunero adds: 'From the 1940s onwards , particularly after the war, you begin to have an awareness that rather than just treating people's illnesses, you need to do something preventive.' Anti-spitting campaigns formed just one part of a broad constellation of cleanliness and hygiene campaigns that came into being in the post-war years, which parallel similar public health initiatives at the heart of the empire in London and other colonial holdings. The year 1953 saw the hawkers' union introduce new rules for keeping clean. PHOTO: ST FILE In one 1953 'keep clean' campaign in Singapore, a 3,500-strong hawkers' union laid out five public health rules which included keeping all refuse in dustbins and handwashing before food preparation. As part of this appeal, the union health secretary noted that such rules had been successfully adopted in Hong Kong, another British colony. Naturally, this meant that Singapore should be able to do so too. Even Singapore's status as a green city draws its roots to ideas that were fast gaining ground at the heart of the British Empire. When then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew launched a tree-planting campaign in 1963, these ideas paralleled the rise of the garden city movement in Britain in the early 1900s – which saw greenery as a response to overcrowding and overpopulation in rapidly industrialising cities. Mr Lee's pre-independence campaign sought to plant 10,000 trees a year – half of them by the Government while appealing to home owners to plant the other half. Seedlings were offered at reduced prices from the Botanic Gardens. 'One of the hallmarks of civilisation' In the late 1950s, then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew was a key proponent of hygiene and cleanliness campaigns. PHOTO: ST FILE Perhaps no theme runs deeper across Singapore's campaigns than cleanliness. This took on greater political significance by the late 1950s as Singapore entered its period of initially shaky self-rule and contestation over the colony's future. In 1958, then Mayor Ong Eng Guan asked the city council to approve a $60,000 campaign to ' clean up the slums and kampongs of Singapore ' – which would involve a new anti-spitting drive, as well as pushes against littering and pests. He also proposed prizes for councillors to encourage them to promote the campaign in their constituencies, as well as awards for the cleanest coffee shop, theatre, hawker stall, factory and school. An enormous symbol of the campaign, a 35 sq ft poster, was later hung from the marble columns of the Singapore city council, featuring a crossed-out image of a spitting man. Singapore's pre-independence public health campaigns came with new rules. PHOTO: THE SINGAPORE FREE PRESS Later, when Mr Lee Kuan Yew held a spring-cleaning drive in 1959, this was his rationale. 'Those who pass through Singapore acknowledge that, rich or poor, the people here are clean and tidy and the city is clean,' he told ST. 'This is one of the hallmarks of civilisation. One can be rich and filthy or poor and clean.' 'Cleanliness and tidiness are indications of the level of civilisation of a people,' he added, in a quote printed alongside an image of him hosing down a market. Referring to that image, Dr Tay says: 'I thought that was just hilarious. That's just so classic.' However, she also identifies a deeper political logic at work. This was a time when intense competition between political actors was ongoing over what constituted progress and modernity for Singapore – and how they should achieve it. Colonial discourse at the time often construed Asia as dirty, messy and smelly. In contrast, colonial spaces were seen as clean, proper and organised. Mass rallies and concerts, such as this one from 1958, to raise awareness have always been part of Singapore's approach to campaigns about public morality. PHOTO: ST FILE 'Singapore was striving to be this idealised form of Asian identity, that we should attempt to look like this kind of Western modernity,' Dr Tay says, arguing that public awareness campaigns served as one way to articulate the narrative of progress and modernity to the public. This was also about class aspiration, she adds. Cleanliness in Britain was historically a luxury of the upper classes, while working-class and rural areas remained squalid. 'All of these things become associated and built into ideas of civilisation,' she says. 'And, yes, a lot of this is about persuading people that this is true.' Campaigns were not without criticism Despite their many successes, these campaigns' paternalism had detractors. In 1948, residents complained about finding their letters from the post office stamped indiscriminately in purple ink that read: 'DO NOT SPIT. Spitting spreads disease.' 'The particular letter received in a Straits Times household which prompted this note contained an invitation to dinner,' wrote one irate reader at the time. 'But in any case this does not appear to be a sound form of propaganda.' Dr Brunero says the intense scale to Singapore's early campaigns was like a 'very blunt instrument'. Such criticism from an increasingly educated populace likely meant the need for new strategies over time. These days, there is a greater awareness that there are better ways to reach people, and how to thoughtfully craft campaigns, she adds. There is also the matter of how public morality has evolved. Family planning advocate and municipal lady health officer Mary Tan argued in 1949 that many families in Singapore were infecting their babies with diseases such as syphilis, as well as 'hereditary diseases like insanity, haemophelia [sic] and idiocy'. 'It is generally recognised,' said Dr Tan then, 'that we are now breeding dysgenically, which means that those whose qualities are such that they should be increasing the population very considerably are not doing so, whereas those less gifted are more prolific.' Invoking such eugenicist belief had not fallen out of favour and would later colour some of the newly independent Republic's family planning policies. Experts say that the rise of feminism, secularisation and an increasingly educated populace meant public awareness campaigns increasingly abandoned the language of shame or moral values. As a historian, Dr Ho says peeling back the layers of archival newsprint is a fascinating exercise in seeing how the colony's values evolved over time: 'We see how the vocabulary changes according to our expectations of how we want to be treated, or how we should treat others and even the environment.' An enduring receptiveness Commuters pose for photos with the Thoughtful Bunch mascots at Siglap station, on June 21, 2024. PHOTO: ST FILE Many of these pre-independence campaigns have clear continuities with their counterparts in post-independence Singapore. 'Keep Singapore Clean' was among the first national campaigns to be launched in independent Singapore in 1968. It would later evolve alongside the garden-city tree-planting drives to become 'Clean and Green'. From anti-tuberculosis awareness to anti-Sars, and from water security to water conservation with the Public Utilities Board's Water Wally, early campaigns show that many of Singapore's long-held anxieties have deeper roots than people might think. Many of these campaigns pioneered tactics still in use today. In Dr Tay's view, what has remained constant through the years is an enduring receptiveness to public awareness campaigns. 'We've actually inherited a very colonial framework of communication with the population, and it hasn't actually changed that much,' she observes. 'The subject of these campaigns has changed, but essentially, the way that we approach these things is pretty much the same.'
CNA
04-07-2025
- CNA
I visited the Milo factory in Jurong – here are 5 things you may not know about the iconic drink
Milo has long been a staple in Singaporean households – whether it's the memory of a warm cup in the morning before school, waiting in line for an ice cold cup from the milo van during sports day, or a casual order of "Milo peng" at the kopitiam. This year, it's celebrating 75 years of growing with Singapore, evolving with and feeding generations of Singaporeans. Initially launched in Singapore in 1950 as a nutritious beverage, Milo has expanded its reach from local significance to global influence. Today, the Nestle Jurong factory produces 15,000 tonnes of Milo for Singapore and other overseas markets. But beyond the distinctive green packaging and familiar malty flavour lies a world of science and careful development that most of us never see. I recently had a rare chance to step inside Nestle's Research and Development Centre to uncover the magic behind Singapore's favourite drink – and here are five surprising things I learnt: 1. BEFORE MILO POWDER, IT'S BAKED AS A BRITTLE In a laboratory, the Milo team took us through each phase of the making of milo powder. It starts with three simple ingredients: Cocoa powder, milk, as well as malt extract, a sticky, thick and sweet liquid with the texture of honey, obtained from barley. The ingredients are then combined with a certain ratio into a dark brown batter, which had hints of the Milo taste but not quite with its distinctive flavour yet. This batter is then spread thinly onto a baking sheet – which requires quite the arm strength due to the malt extract hardening – and then baked in the oven. The baked product – a yummy brittle that dissolves in your mouth upon consuming, this time, magically with all the signature flavour notes of the iconic drink. The brittle is then crushed and finely milled, which becomes the iconic powder. 2. DIFFERENT RECIPES FOR DIFFERENT COUNTRIES Yes, it is true – Milo sold in other countries are made to taste different than those sold in Singapore. The main difference? The ratio of the malted barley, milk and cocoa. This is to appeal to different tastes and preferences specific to the country. For instance, Joy Lee, senior brand manager at Milo Nestle Singapore said that in Australia, Australians tend to drink their Milo with milk instead of water. Thus, the powder manufactured there was adapted to cater to their consumption methods. Besides supplying locally, Joyce Lee, the application group manager of the Milo Nestle Jurong Factory explained that the local factory exports Singapore Milo to other countries. 'There are countries that request for Singapore's Milo to be sold so if you can see the label 'Made in Singapore' or the HCS (Healthier Choice Symbol) on the Milo product overseas, I can guarantee that it tastes the same (as the products in Singapore),' said Joy Lee. Singapore also produces a lot of other countries' Milo recipes for overseas markets. As for our Milo, it is a dedicated and customised recipe for Singaporeans. Variations of the drink have been made to appeal to local tastebuds. For instance, Milo Gao Siew Dai, which launched in 2017, is more cocoa-forward, has a more intense flavour with 50 per cent less added table sugar. Milo Gao Kosong, which launched in 2018, is the world's first Milo powder with no added table sugar. The recently launched Milo Van sachets also aim to bring a sense of nostalgia to Singaporeans. This product is also developed with a special technology that allows the powder to dissolve easily in cold water instead of the usual hot water. 3. SINGAPORE SUPPLIES MILO'S MALT WORLDWIDE But what exactly gives Milo its distinctively rich, chocolatey taste? As it turns out, there's one secret ingredient that sets it apart – the signature malt. This special malt is extracted from high-quality barley, which is heated using proprietary techniques to bring out its unique flavour. Interestingly, Singapore is the largest producer and home ground for the manufacturing of this special malt. It's then exported to factories around the world for use in their local versions. 4. THEY'VE GOT IN-HOUSE TASTERS To ensure every tin, packet and sachet is consistent in taste, each batch produced in Jurong is taste-tested and approved by trained Singaporean panellists who taste up to 20 samples daily. Many of them have also had a say in new innovations such as Milo Gao Siew Dai and Milo Gao Kosong to meet evolving tastes and preferences. Singaporeans may, for instance, start to appreciate a richer mouthfeel and less sweet profile. 'If there is any deviation being detected, it will not be released to the consumers,' Joyce Lee explained. 'We have stringent requirements and we train our panellists to make sure that they are sensitive enough to be able to pick up all deviations across the different Milos.' 5. BOOKING A MILO VAN ISN'T AS SIMPLE AS YOU THINK Want to book the coveted Milo Van for a special event you have coming up? You may need to tick a few boxes first. According to the Milo Singapore team, all vans are deployed on a sponsorship basis and are meant for public consumption. 'So if there are people not part of your event and they see the Milo Van, we would usually like it if they could have the Milo too,' said Joy Lee. She added that the vans are also usually for sporting or community events and part of the CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) that Milo Singapore does. Events must meet the appropriate crowd size as well since the Milo in each van fills up to 3,000 cups and has a three-hour time limit due to milk in the drink. Interested parties can email milovansponsorship [at] () for van sponsorship requests, which is subject to availability. Milo Van's Milo is also made fresh and cold directly from their Jurong factory.
Straits Times
01-07-2025
- Straits Times
Returning Singaporean students can, from July 10, apply to join local schools
Singaporean students who are relocating back to the Republic can apply from July 10 for admission in the 2026 academic year. PHOTO: ST FILE SINGAPORE - Singaporean students who are relocating back to the Republic can from July 10 apply for admission to a secondary school, junior college or Millennia Institute (MI) in the 2026 academic year. They will sit centralised tests under the School Placement Exercise for Returning Singaporeans (Spers) and receive a list of schools they are eligible for based on their performance, the Ministry of Education (MOE) said in a press statement on July 1. Those seeking admission to Secondary 1 to 3 in 2026 will have from July 10 to 23 to apply for admission, and will sit their Spers-Sec tests from Sept 1 to 5, which will comprise tests for English and mathematics. Application for junior colleges and MI will open from July 10 till Oct 17, and the Spers-Sec tests will be held on Nov 6. Applicants will receive their posting results in December, and join the schools at the start of the school term in 2026. As Secondary 4 and Pre-University 2 are national examination years, returning Singaporeans generally do not enter the school system at these levels, MOE added. Those wishing to join a secondary school in Singapore in 2026 but are unable to take the Spers-Sec tests in September can instead take tests in December under the Supplementary Placement Exercise (SPE). Application for the SPE will open from Nov 4 to 17, and the SPE tests will be held on Dec 3. SPE applicants will receive their school posting results in February 2026 for admission in the same month. Returning Singaporeans who can return by September 2025 are advised to apply for Spers-Sec instead of SPE, as this would allow them to start school in January 2026 alongside their peers. Alternatively, students can apply for a place in a primary or secondary school near their homes in Singapore through the Assured School Placement (ASP) service. Instead of centralised tests, the prospective school may conduct school-based assessments and an interview to determine the appropriate level and class for the child, MOE added. Those who wish to find out more about the placement exercises can visit Join ST's WhatsApp Channel and get the latest news and must-reads.
