Representative of Morrison Hall Students' Association 馬禮遜堂宿生會代表 Chu Sin Bo 朱善保

In canteens and lecture theatres, students in non-yellowish races and speaking in unfamiliar

languages exchanging ideas are not uncommon scenes nowadays. It is beyond doubt that

HKU, leading tertiary institution in Asia, is gradually walking to the globe.



A university is supposed to be a big education institution that is for local residents only

because it is just a small-scale city organization. Nevertheless, in order to strengthen the

links among other foreign famous universities as well as maintain our University image,

since 1999, the intake of non-local students has surged substantially. Non-local students,

generally defined as those originated from the mainland and overseas, are set to be a

maximum amount, i.e. 20% of the total intake quota, with reference to the admission policy

in the government organization. Underlying this policy, the government hopes to allocate

the resources wisely among the local, overseas and mainland students. To put in this way,

does this policy set to a critical level?



Though, in cultural context, it can bring a lot of stimulation of ideas through discussion

among the people with various traditional, cultural, religious and academic backgrounds,

the cultural conflicts often occurs and it can even cause racial discrimination, like labeling

PSP and NDS on mainland students. On the other hand, the intake of non-local students is

alternately making some competent and potential, less clever local residents lose their

chance to enjoy this honorary tertiary education. Some of the non-local students, after

finishing their degrees, will choose to go back to their own homeland, leading to the

decrease in professions in the Hong Kong market.



The University’s resources are very limited. Take hall place as an example. Each permission

for a new non-local student will deprive a local resident of the sleeping place and long hours

of travelling and the involvement of large opportunity cost. As a result, people living in 2-

hour distant districts are going to 4 hours for travel just for a 50-minute lecture. The

presence of the absolute need system, which each hall needs to admit at least a proportion

of absolute need students and the separation of need and contribution scores can somehow

alleviate the above problem; however, the University cannot offer similar sleeping place to

local students in an inexpensive fee.



Non-local intake quotas are increasing these years. We should review on the effect of the

non-local students to our beloved school, the HKU.