ENG-2014 — Page 160

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Education

Providing free kindergarten education is one of the priorities of the current-term government and the Education Bureau set up a committee in April 2013 to make specific proposals on how to implement this. The committee will submit its report in 2015. The government has accepted the short-term measures recommended by the committee in December 2013 and increased the voucher subsidy under the PEVS by $2,500 per year on a one-off basis in the 2014-15 and 2015-16 school years, and lifted the fee remission ceilings from the weighted average fees of PEVS kindergartens to the 75th percentile of the school fees of the respective kindergartens.

Primary Education

Six years' free education is provided to students in public sector primary schools. Primary education starts when a child is aged around six. In September 2014, a total of 266,153 children were enrolled in 452 public sector primary schools (34 government schools and 418 aided schools). In addition, there were 21 Direct Subsidy Scheme (DSS) primary schools offering 15,909 school places and 53 private primary schools offering 35,095 school places.

Admissions to Primary 1 (the first year of primary education) in public sector schools are administered through the centralised Primary One Admission System, divided into two stages: the Discretionary Places Admission (DP) stage and the Central Allocation (CA) stage. Each primary school will earmark about 50 per cent of its Primary 1 places as discretionary places. During the DP stage, parents may apply to only one government or aided school in or outside the school catchment area (or 'school net, as it is known in Hong Kong) in which they reside. The remaining 50 per cent of Primary 1 places are for CA and 10 per cent of these are for Unrestricted School Choices. Parents may choose up to three schools from any school nets for their child. The remaining 90 per cent of CA places are for Restricted School Choices. Parents should select primary schools in their school net in order of preference.

Secondary Education

Six years' free education is also provided to students in public sector secondary schools. In September 2014, a total of 302,110 children were enrolled in 395 public sector secondary schools (362 aided schools, 31 government schools and two caput schools (which are subsidised according to the number of students admitted). In addition, there were 61 DSS secondary schools offering 57,828 school places and 23 private secondary schools offering 7,474 school places.

Under the new academic structure implemented in September 2009, all students can now benefit from three years of junior secondary and three years of senior secondary education. leading to the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination.

Subsidised Secondary 1 (the first year of secondary education) places are allocated through the Secondary School Places Allocation (SSPA) System, divided into two stages: the Discretionary Places stage and the Central Allocation (CA) stage. All participating secondary schools can reserve not more than 30 per cent of their Secondary 1 places as discretionary places and parents may apply for their child direct to not more than two secondary schools participating in the SSPA System in any school nets. After the deduction of repeater and discretionary places, the secondary schools' remaining places are used for CA. Of the CA places, 10 per cent are for

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