Sixth year boys attending St Clare’s College will as of next year join girls at Pembroke secondary to form Malta’s first co-educational State school, Education Minister Evarist Bartolo announced yesterday.
If a college wants to go co-educational, or focus on vocational training, or work to other strengths, we want to help it
The conversion of the Pembroke school into a co-educational facility will take place over a five-year period, with next year’s cohort of 160 students – roughly 80 of each sex – gradually rising through to form five.
Primary students graduating from St Clare’s College face distribution problems, with them being dispersed around schools in the college’s Pembroke, Gżira, St Julian’s, San Ġwann and Sliema catchment area.
Creating a co-educational school in Pembroke would solve these fragmentation problems while also ensuring long-term sustainability in an area with sharply declining birth rates, Mr Bartolo said.
“We considered refurbishing some existing schools, but we wanted a long-term solution. At least four independent schools have successfully adopted the co-educational model,” the minister said.
Although he did not exclude other colleges going down the co-educational route in the future, Mr Bartolo made it clear the Pembroke school was not a pilot project for nationwide co-educational schooling.
“We don’t believe in a one-size-fits-all, top-down approach to managing colleges. We want to give colleges the room to develop in their own way. If a college wants to go co-educational, or focus on vocational training, or work to other strengths, we want to help it,” he said.
The co-educational Pembroke school will also introduce the ‘middle school’ concept which has long been present at independent schools San Anton and San Andrea.
A middle school essentially splits forms one and two from superior years, serving as a transition period between primary and secondary school.
Teachers had voiced some genuine concerns which would be tackled, the minister said. In line with their wishes, classroom size would be kept to 20 students each and parts of the existing school would be upgraded.
He indicated that boys and girls at the Pembroke school might be separated for PE and personal and social development classes.
Any necessary infrastructural changes will be carried out over the summer holidays and a new school block will have to be built in three years’ time to accommodate additional students.
While some teachers had shown some apprehension, parents had been broadly supportive of the idea and simply asked for more information, Mr Bartolo said.
A special committee made up of the school head, assistant head, education ministry director-general and a representative for teachers, parents and the teachers’ union has been set up to oversee implementation of the co-educational project.