The University of Hong Kong (HKU) admitted more than 1,200 first-year students from outside the city this autumn, a 50 per cent increase over the number for the 2023-24 academic cycle, with about half of them hailing from mainland China.
When asked whether the proportion of mainland students would affect the university’s goal of becoming an international institution, HKU said on Thursday the percentage had remained stable in recent years and its latest batch of non-local students came from about 60 different countries and regions.
The government doubled publicly funded universities’ quota of non-local students from 20 to 40 per cent this year as part of the efforts to turn Hong Kong into a global hub for postsecondary education.
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Professor Bennett Yim Chi-kin, HKU director of undergraduate admissions and international student exchange, said the university would have to balance its goal of selecting the best students based on academic merit with its aim to increase diversity.
“Mainland students being much closer to Hong Kong, they have a much better understanding of the University of Hong Kong and what we can offer. So, I think it is not surprising to see that quite a lot of our students come from mainland China,” he said.
“But, our goal is always to continue to increase our diversity, so right now we are putting in a lot of effort into going everywhere in the world to try to promote Hong Kong.”
This year’s enrolment of non-local students represents a rise from about 800 last year while the proportion of mainland students to those coming from other areas remains the same.
According to statistics from the University Grants Committee, which is responsible for allocating funds to tertiary education institutions, the number of first-year undergraduate students admitted to HKU in the 2023-2024 school year was 4,065.
Yim said the university had enough dormitory rooms to accommodate the latest non-local first-year students, but he hoped that in the long term, the government would provide more support for accommodation and scholarships to help attract the best and brightest.
“This issue is beyond our ability,” he said. “We cannot just build a dormitory if we want to, so we need a lot of support from the government.”
The grants committee previously said efforts to admit more non-locals would be gradual and take into account the capacity of each institution.
Prior to the quota increase, the proportion of students from outside the city was 26.8 per cent at HKU, 23.7 per cent at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and 22.3 per cent at Polytechnic University.
The increased quota increases the number of public university undergraduate spaces open to non-local students from 15,000 in 2023-2024 to about 30,000 for the new academic year.
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