Who benefits from the HK$5 billion pledged by Carrie Lam for Hong Kong’s education sector?
Everyone seems to want a slice of the cash cake, and each group has a different wish list
From the spate of student suicides in recent years to the heavily criticised Territory-wide System Assessment and the dismal approval ratings of schools minister Eddie Ng Hak-kim, education has taken some of the biggest hits under the current administration.
But after the initial fanfare, and with Lam set to take office on July 1, both questions and criticisms are starting to surface regarding how the money should be spent, with almost all stakeholders wanting a piece of the cash cake.
Following recent discussions, it was revealed that Lam plans to use some of the money to help secondary school leavers who have to take costly self-financing degree programmes owing to insufficient publicly subsidised university places.
Among her other initial proposals were to increase the number of teachers in primary and secondary schools and to make permanent a pilot scheme under which a teacher was deployed to coordinate matters relating to special education needs.
These initial measures would cost around HK$3.6 billion, educators who met Lam cited her as saying, with the sector hoping funding would be approved by the Legislative Council before its July break so proposals may be implemented by the start of the new school year in September.