An elite government-aided school in Happy Valley has given its first public response to complaints over its plan to participate in a subsidy programme that critics say may price less well-off families out of sending their children there.
St Paul's Secondary School insisted the consultation it held with parents, alumni and teachers on its decision to join the Direct Subsidy Scheme had been sufficient.
The Catholic girls' school also sought to give assurances that it would continue to be open to every pupil, regardless of their wealth or family background.
"Everyone can be a pupil at our school, as long as the pupil is committed to learning and improving," it said in an advertisement taken out in the Ming Pao newspaper yesterday.
"[Our Direct Subsidy Scheme plan] has nothing to do with the pupil's family background, wealth or class."
St Paul's is the second school - following the highly regarded St Stephen's Girls' College and its subsidiary primary school - to meet resistance to its direct-subsidy plan in recent months.