My Take | Hong Kong’s universities should look beyond the mainland

When I taught a journalism course at a local publicly funded university around the time of the Occupy protests, one thing I found most disturbing was the barely disguised antagonism on campus among some local and mainland students.

I have been told that it happens in other local universities as well. One factor behind the problem is no doubt the rising anti-mainland sentiments in recent years, especially among young people. This is further encouraged by radical localist politics. I can’t help but think, though, that it was also partly created by the myopia or “short-termism” of university administrators in the past two decades.

Like our business leaders in the tourism and service sectors who have bet the farm on mainland tourists, they have banked on mainland students to fill their foreign student quotas and coffers. This has created a misperception of “us vs them”, that somehow, mainland students are taking away academic places and resources from the locals.

Don’t get me wrong. I am all for integration with the mainland, and I welcome mainland tourists as well as students. But this does not mean translating “international” into all things mainland. A basic investment rule is diversification – don’t put all your eggs in one basket.

Unfortunately, our universities don’t really have a foreign-student population. According to the government auditor last year, more than three out of four non-local students enrolled in the eight public universities are from the mainland.