7
20.
21.
The opening sentence of G.R. Para. 57 attributes to
local employers of engineering labour the suggestion that
the University's course in Mechanical Engineering might
with advantage be made more practical. We have just
remarked in Para. 12, above, that the Engineering courses
of this University are already more "practical" than
those of most other Universities.
The University is not
a factory, and students cannot obtain here "practical"
experience under commercial conditions. Beyond the
courses in the Workshop, the Mechanics Laboratory, the
the Materials Laboratories Prime Movers Laboratory, the Electrical Laboratory, no
further work of a "practical" character can very well
be provided.
But in any case the business of this or any other
University is to provide, not "practical" engineering,
but a training in those fundamental principles of pure
and applied science upon which the enlightened practice
of engineering depends. This is stated quite clearly
and fairly in G.R. Paras. 38 and 39.
22.
SECTION B.
Criticisms of the Value of our Graduates in Engineering.
The principal criticisms of the value of our
Engineering Graduates, contained in the Government Report,
are quoted from Messrs. John Swire & Sons, Ltd.
As recorded in G.R. Para. 32, this firm was, in 1909,
enthusiastically in favour of the founding of a Univer-
sity in Hong Kong, and gave a generous donation of £40,000 to establish a department of Engineering.
No mention was
then made of a Technical or Trade School. Also in 1912
the University Court declared that "higher education in
applied science" was to be one of the main objects of the
P.T.0.
2.3