Education minister Christine Choi on Wednesday said that keeping under-enrolled primary schools would not be optimal for the education system, and a merger would allow schools to make long-term and sustainable planning.

A record 15 primary schools have been barred from running a primary one class next academic year because they failed to enrol at least 16 pupils.

The Education Bureau announced earlier that under-enrolled schools are allowed to merge.

"The merger period usually requires three years. It allows students of the same grade to finish their studies in the same school and gives schools time to iron out things – such as the curriculum, teaching manpower, student classes, group divisions, etc," she said.

"We set up this three-year period to work around the transitional period."

The Education Bureau said if two schools merge in the coming academic year, they would be given one year's grace period within three academic years following the merger to run a primary one class regardless of the class size.

But they would eventually have to go private or shut down if they still cannot take in 16 pupils beyond that point.

Among the 15 under-enrolled schools, four are located in Eastern District – the most among all 10 affected districts.

Choi explained why this was the case.

"There used to be relatively more schools in Eastern District. Due to an ageing population and well as the lack of new housing estates, we can see that there is a relatively large fluctuation to the number of school-age population or the number of students," she said.

Cheung Yung-bong, honorary chairperson of the Hong Kong Aided Primary School Heads Association, said on the same show that the education sector was sad about the situation, but not surprised about the number of under-enrolled schools, as several institutions have been on the verge of shutting down due to a lack of students.

He noted that schools would have more incentives to merge with others, as they can get up to HK$1 million in subsidies to support additional expenses following the merger.


Edited by Tony Sabine