Speech at Ground-breaking Ceremony of the Community College Building - City University of Hong Kong

Speech by Mr Raymond H C Wong, JP

Permanent Secretary for Education

at Ground-breaking Ceremony

of the Community College Building - City University of Hong Kong

on Monday, 7 January 2008

Mr [Shui-ming] Chung (Council Chairman), Professor [Richard] Ho (Acting President), Mr [Vincent] Chow (Chairman of Community College’s Board of Management), Ms [Jennifer] Ng (Principal of Community College), Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

I am honoured to join you today for the ground-breaking ceremony of the City University ’s Community College Building.  

The City University of Hong Kong is one of the leading pioneers of sub-degree education in Hong Kong .  Founded as the City Polytechnic of Hong Kong, it started off with about 800 sub-degree students in 1984.  Expanding gradually over the years, CityU now has a total enrolment of about 7,000 sub-degree students.  Roughly speaking, one in every three associate degree students in Hong Kong is studying in CityU.  It is therefore befitting to say that without the significant contribution made by CityU, we would not have been able to achieve the policy objective of enabling 60% of our secondary school leavers to have the opportunities to receive post-secondary education.

CityU’s dedication and commitment in providing quality sub-degree programmes on a self-financing basis has been amply borne out by the establishment of the Community College in mid-2004.  Since then, the College has established a solid foundation and has created successfully a learning ambience conducive to whole-person development of the students.  The excellent track record of its graduates in both employment and further studies speaks well for the remarkable progress made by the College over the past short four years.  

Today’s ground-breaking ceremony marks the commencement of the construction works for a teaching block purposely designed for the College.  I am glad that the Government has played a supportive role in this meaningful project by providing an interest-free loan of about $600 million.  Both teaching staff and students will no doubt be earnestly looking forward to enjoying the enhanced facilities to be provided in the new building.  I am sure that with this new campus and your continuous efforts, the College will be able to scale new heights in the years ahead.

On this memorable occasion, may I wish the College all the best in providing quality post-secondary education for our young generations.

Thank you.