VII.
SOCIAL SERVICES.
EDUCATION
Government expenditure on education has risen from $9 million for the financial year 1947-8 to $13 million in 1948-9. It is estimated that $19 million will be required for the year 1950-1. For the academic year 1949-50 the Government made its usual grant of $1,500,000 to the University. During 1950 fees payable in Govern- ment and grant-aided secondary schools were raised from $120 to $240 per annum. Primary school fees remained unchanged.
The University
The University of Hong Kong, which developed from the Hong Kong College of Medicine founded in 1887, was incorporated in 1911 and formally opened in 1912.
By ordinance the Governor of Hong Kong is Chancellor of the University of which the governing body is the Court presided over by the Chancellor and including, apart from nominated and ex-officio members, certain life members among whom are some of the University's principal benefactors. On the Council, which is the executive body, the Deans of the Faculties, the Colonial Secretary, the Financial Secretary and the Director of Medical and Health Services and prominent members of the community as appointed by the Chancellor are represented, and in the Senate the Director of Education is an ex-officio member.
The academic year 1949-50 was in the main devoted to the planning of a development programme involving the institution of forty-two new senior teaching posts, provision for Honours courses in the Faculties of Arts and Science, additional accommodation for staff and extensions to accommodation for teaching in the Main Building and in the Science and Medical Buildings, the establishment of new Departments of European Languages, Architecture, Social Medicine, Medical Research Statistics and Social Study, development of present teaching arrangements into full Departments of Philosophy and Geography and the institution of post-graduate studentships. Proposals were drawn up for the enlargement of the Great Hall and the building of a new Students' Union and Dining Hall. This programme was submitted to the Inter-University Council for Higher Education in the Colonies and the Universities Grants Committee, after a satisfactory visit by two representatives from the United Kingdom. The estimated cost of implementing the provisions of
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