509

1 children.

sitting

ui school side

us wide with boatpeople's children. to separate provision for the school. ing of boat children has ever free. called for in

people

such a

Hongkong by the -

themselves. For do I think

step advivaire. A separate school for boat children would - only mast 12.

L

4.

as

pariahs and

interfere with the process of social absorption which is happily going

* I have taken great pain in compiling reasonably reliable statistics as to the number of boat-children attending school in the above mentioned places. The figures in the annexed tables, so far as they refer to boat children, must be understood to refer only to those known to the teachers to undoubtedly belong to the boat population. The number of schools (38) in existence at Shaukwan, Aung Gaum, Sai Ying Pun, Mongkoktsui, Yaumati, Tsimsatsui, and Aberdeen, affording accommodation for 8519 children, appears to me to be a satisfactory response to the educational demands of all those villages. The Grant-in-aid system stimulates that demand and is perfectly capable of supplying it step by step as it expands. The total number of boys (890) in average attendance in those 38 schools appears to me also satisfactory. But the number of girls (225) under instruction in those places indicates a sad defect. There ought to be as many girls as boys, therefore at least 600 to 750 girls.

"I have escaped the education...

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