There's no better person to reminisce about the history of the Hong Kong certificate of education examination than Wan Tak-wing.
The Form Five public exam, also known as the HKCEE, ended this year, with the last batch of candidates to take the exam due to get their results next month.
Staged by the government since 1968, the exam was taken over by the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority in 1978, a year after the authority was set up.
Wan, who joined the authority in 1990 and is now assistant general manager, was among the first batch of students to sit the exam in 1978.
Having seen at first hand its development over more than three decades, Wan said today's candidates had a better time of it than when he sat the exam.
'We couldn't use calculators then,' he said. 'We needed a series of tools like four-figure tables and big plastic rulers to draw circles and curves,' said Wan who sat nine subjects in 1978.
He said a lot of new elements were added to the exam over the years.