Schools Encouraged to Establish Clear Expectations on Availability and Work Hours

We appreciate Mr Samuel Chng's acknowledgement of MOE's efforts to support teacher and student mental well-being ("Execute ways to boost mental health and well-being for meaningful, lasting changes", Dec 15), and we assure Mr Chng that our teachers' well-being is important to MOE. This includes ensuring that the measures we implement to improve well-being are meaningful and effective.

Teachers are at the core of our education system. We recognise that they must first be able to care for themselves before they can tend to their students. Schools are encouraged to check in with staff regularly and establish clear expectations on teachers' availability and work hours. Teachers are not expected to reply to emails or text messages outside of work hours unless the matters are urgent and important in nature, for example, pertaining to safety issues. We will work together with schools to minimise non-critical communication outside office hours.

Admittedly, this pandemic has increased workload for the education system as we do our best to keep schools open for students to learn and grow in safe communities. Our teachers have been valiant in rallying to our mission. We recognise the exceptional demands placed on our teachers over the past two years and are appreciative of their continued efforts to support our students' learning. We will continue to give schools flexibility to pace the implementation of selected initiatives to manage staff workload. For example, full subject-based banding will be rolled out to secondary schools by 2024 in phases, based on schools' readiness to come on board.

MOE is committed to looking after the well-being of all teachers and will continue to explore ways to enhance the support given to our teachers in this area.

Chua-Lim Yen Ching (Mrs)
Deputy Director-General of Education (Professional Development)
Ministry of Education