China's education authority has vowed to support Hong Kong
universities in running cooperative projects in the Guangdong-Hong
Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA), a strategy that experts said could
further utilize the advantages of Hong Kong education's international
vision and high-quality teaching.
The Ministry of Education (MOE)
supports qualified Hong Kong universities to undertake cooperation in
running schools in the GBA and establish more high-quality cooperative
institutes and projects, the Beijing Daily reported.
The MOE will
support the excellent higher education resources of Hong Kong to be
imported to the mainland and encourage universities from both sides to
cooperate in different ways to serve the nation's strategic needs. The
Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou) has been
approved and is preparing to build such a program, said the MOE.
The
project, located in Guangzhou, capital of South China's Guangdong
Province, will support talent in data science, robotics, autonomous
driving, biomedicine, artificial intelligence and other areas, reported
thepaper.cn.
The ministry also will further open the doors of schools in the mainland to Hong Kong students.
Statistics
showed about 16,200 Hong Kong students are now studying in the
mainland, among whom almost 8,000 are in Guangdong. As of July, 380
mainland universities were qualified to enroll students from Hong Kong,
Macao and Taiwan.
The MOE will also actively support primary and
high school students from Hong Kong and Macao to be educated in the
mainland. Beijing, Shanghai and Guangdong have announced detailed rules
on educating the children of Hong Kong and Macao residents.
The
MOE and other departments will make it more convenient for Hong Kong
youngsters to study, work and live in the mainland, "enhancing their
sense of security, belonging and gaining in developing in the mainland,"
read the report.
Tam Yiu-chung, a Hong Kong's deputy to the
National People's Congress Standing Committee, told the Global Times
that there is a huge need for Hong Kong's educational resources in the
mainland.
Opening branches in the mainland will be a great
opportunity for Hong Kong universities. Hong Kong and the mainland could
support one another in this area, Tam said.
Compared with their
mainland peers, Hong Kong universities are more internationalized, which
can help them attract students from the mainland. Meanwhile, the
mainland is politically safer compared with Hong Kong, Tang Fei, a
principal at Hong Kong's Heung To Secondary School, told the Global
Times. "It is like bringing Hong Kong's internationalization and
openness to the mainland."
Tang noted that since the riots last
year, there has been a surge in Hong Kong students applying to
universities in the mainland. More and more students have begun to show
an interest in studying and understanding the mainland.
Eric
Lam, 24, a Hongkonger who just graduated from Renmin University of China
in Beijing, told the Global Times that he chose to study in the
mainland because he believed Hong Kong would lean closer to the mainland
in the future, and it is necessary for Hong Kong youngsters to gain
more understanding of the mainland, and build personal connections here.
Lam
said his interaction with some students from the mainland had also
pushed him to make this decision. "Before I decided to study in the
mainland, I talked to several students from Renmin University of China.
They impressed me with their knowledge and perception of the world."
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