My Take | Lesson to be learned from DSE giveaway
The fact that Paul Chan Mo-po and education officials did not anticipate a general exam fee waiver would be open to abuse shows a certain cluelessness
The official U-turn on waiving fees for those taking the Diploma of Secondary Education exam is a sad commentary on the state of our education system.
Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po originally introduced the one-off waiver for everyone taking the DSE next year as part of the government’s effort to give back some of its massive HK$138 billion fiscal surplus.
But soon after the announcement, professional tutors advertised they would take the free exams to prove their academic prowess. In anti-government and other online forums favoured by young people, pranksters threatened to disrupt the exams or take them just for fun.
They might or might not mean it, but parents and teachers were justifiably concerned. After all, DSE results determine the chances of students to enter a university of their choice, or not at all.
To address the concern, the waiver will now be restricted to school students, so private students still have to pay. Almost 60,000 students are expected to take the DSE. Of these, 51,675 are school candidates, with the rest being private students.
