Studying abroad

British universities to maintain top billing with Hong Kong students, says professor

Tertiary education offered by British universities will continue to be the most popular option for Hong Kong students planning to study abroad, says Arthur Francis, dean of the Bradford School of Management in northern England.

Professor Francis made the comments on the eve of his flight here to confer degrees on 100 Hong Kong-based Bradford MBA and Bsc graduates at the Langham Hotel in Mong Kok next Saturday.

'Language tuition and assessment is clearly one factor,' said Professor Francis. 'Another is that, after the United States, Britain has the largest number of MBA programmes and students and many of these have been running for many years and are accredited by AMBA [Association of MBAs] and Equis [European Quality Improvement System]. Bradford has been delivering management education since 1964 and has both accreditations. For a long time Britain has had a robust national quality assurance regime in higher education which underpins the quality of the educational experience,' he said.

He said Britain's educating role in Asia and Hong Kong will develop in a number of ways. Many students will continue to go to Britain to study full-time at universities. An increasing number of students will probably study for degrees at a distance from Britain either at partner institutions or in wholly or partly owned campuses of British universities located in Asia and Hong Kong. And increasingly, certain countries within Asia, possibly including Hong Kong, will act as educational hubs for the region and so students will locate to Hong Kong or, for example, Singapore, to study for a British degree delivered by a partner institution in that country.

The Bradford MBA programme began in Hong Kong in September 2002 and the undergraduate programme a year later. A total of 169 students have graduated. The MA programme began less than a year ago.