EDUCATION
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The present development programme has also led to the re-equipping of the university's laboratories. This has resulted in a significant updating in the Departments of Science and Engineering and the consequent use of the latest teaching equipment.
Work to extend the Main Library is also in progress. The university has one of the best-equipped libraries in Southeast Asia. With over 800 reading places, the Main Library contains more than 650 000 volumes, including the invaluable collection of Chinese works in the Fung Ping Shan Library. Other specialist libraries form an important part of the Faculties of Dentistry, Education, Law, Medicine and Music. The university also has its own publisher and bindery.
The Department of Extramural Studies offers a wide variety of vocational and profes- sional courses, and courses of general and cultural interest which are attended by nearly 25 000 students each year.
Research projects continue through the university's various departments, the Language Centre, the Centre of Asian Studies – which serves as a focal point for multi-disciplinary research on China, Hong Kong, East Asia and Southeast Asia -- and the Centre for Urban Studies and Urban Planning.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong
The Chinese University of Hong Kong was inaugurated in 1963 as a federal university and a self-governing corporation which draws its income mainly from government grants. The campus occupies more than 110 hectares of land near Sha Tin.
The university comprises three colleges - New Asia College (founded in 1949), Chung Chi College (founded in 1951) and United College (founded in 1956). A fourth college, the Shaw College, named after its donor, Sir Run Run Shaw, is expected to become operational in 1988 at the northern part of the campus.
Since its inception, the university has adopted a curriculum structure based on a combination of the credit unit system and degree examination system. Students admitted to the undergraduate programme after six years of secondary education are granted a Bachelor's degree upon completion of a number of course credits and the passing of a degree examination assessed by external examiners from home and abroad.
The university started a comprehensive curriculum review in 1983 which resulted in the adoption of a new curriculum structure for its undergraduate studies, based solely on the credit unit system. The new curriculum is applicable to students admitted in 1986–7 and thereafter. Under this new structure, general education is strengthened, language standards are emphasised, minor programme becomes optional and degree examination is replaced by course examinations with the external examiner system retained.
In 1986-7, the university offered full-time undergraduate students 32 major subjects and 34 minor subjects through its 47 departments grouped under five faculties, namely, arts, business administration, science, social science and medicine. The first four faculties offer four-year programmes, leading to the Bachelor's degrees.
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The Faculty of Medicine, which produced its first graduates during the year, runs a five-year programme with two years of pre-clinical studies followed by three years of clinical work. Clinical teaching is conducted mainly in the university's teaching hospital the Prince of Wales Hospital in Sha Tin. The university emphasises bilingualism; most courses are taught in Chinese, but English is also widely used.
At the postgraduate level, there are 53 academic and professional programmes leading to the degrees of Doctor of Medicine, Doctor of Philosophy, Master of Philosophy, Master of Business Administration, Master of Social Work, Master of Divinity, Master of Science,