TOP boys school Raffles Institution and Raffles Junior College (RJC) will merge in January to strengthen their six-year integrated programme and make it more seamless.

The merged school will be called Raffles Institution (RI) and it will be among the biggest in Singapore with 4,600 students.

It will be headed by the current RJC principal, Mrs Lim Lai Cheng, who will be supported by six deputy principals.

RI's current principal Bob Koh will take up a senior appointment at the Education Ministry.

The two schools which sit on adjacent campuses in Bishan, have been running an integrated programme since 2004 with Raffles Girls' School (Secondary).

The programme sees RI and RGS students skipping the O levels and taking the A levels at RJC at the end of six years.

RGS will remain a separate school but will work closely with the merged school.

At a press conference at RI's campus on Monday, Justice Judith Prakash who heads RGS board of governors, said the school has built its own identity in the last 130 years as a premier girls school offering a first class education and leadership training to young women and would like it to stay that way.

'We feel it is important that for part of secondary education, the girls are taught in their own institution. It does a lot for a girl's confidence because in an all-female institution they naturally assume leadership. Sometimes girls tend to be a bit diffident when there are boys around.'

RI's board chairman Prof Tan Ser Kiat said the plan to merge the schools has been in the works for the last few years and the schools have already been working to streamline programmes and administrative processes. Monday's announcement was to formalise the procedures, he said.

The students will not be affected initially as the programmes will continue to run as they are. The merger is more a strategic move which will affect the schools' decision makers in their planning, said current RI principal Mr Koh.

To allay parents' concerns, school representatives said the merged institution will continue to admit students in Secondary 3 and JC1 with the proportion of students coming from outside the Raffles family remaining the same.

The merged school will also enable more mentorship opportunities, said current RJC board chairman Cham Tao Soon.

'Having older students as a role model is very important. When I entered Sec 1 in RI, I was inspired by the top students and the rugby captain,' he said.