Sir,
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DRAFT SPEECH BY HON MRS SELINA CHOW, JP
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL
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23.1.85
Education Commission Report No. 1
First of all I would like to express my appreciation
to the Education Commission for making a good start in charting
the course for our future education development in a most
objective and effective manner. Our community should be encouraged by the responsiveness of the Commission in awarding such priority to the very subjects which we all consider most important and urgent.
Having voiced my concern a number of times in this
Council over the JSEA as well as having repeatedly advocated
its abolition, I am relieved to learn that the Commission has
recommended that the JSEA be phased out eventually. I am
however, somewhat disappointed that the phasing out process
should take as long as six years.
The Commission has acknowledged that in principle the
JSEA should end, and seems to accept the grounds put forward by
the public as contained in para 2.10 of the report. It has
also recommended a package of measures under para 2.38 to be
taken to lead up to and follow from the termination of the JSEA.
I support these recommendations as the long term solution to the problem. However I feel not enough urgency is being attached to the issue. After all we are talking about
75,000 15 year-olds being subject to pressures of public
examination for administrative rather than educational reasons
for another 6 years. It is certainly worth our exploring other ways, and even to pay a small price, in order that we are rid of this unwanted hurdle in the school career as soon as
possible.
To bring about the early phasing out of the JSEA there
are other measures that could be taken.
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