11
LABORATORIES.
16
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(not craps)
The re-equipping of laboratories at first
threatened very long delay, but negotiations
have shown that apparatus and appliances for elementary teaching
in the basic sciences may be made available in England for dis-
patch in time to reach Hong Kong at some time in Soptember.
Until a long term policy has been approved, that is, until it
is known what kind of University is to be establishod and what
its scope, ro-oquipment must be limited to the minimum require-
ments for elementary Chemistry, Physics, Botany, Zoology. There
is little hope of securing in Hong Kong before the early months
of 1947 the necessary equipment for the Departments of Physiology,
Anatomy, Bio-chemistry and Pathology.
SPATE: The gravest difficulty however, arises in the 17
hotcreps
recruitment of Staff.
Seventeen senior tenchors
of the University have retired or have died. A great number
of the Chinese members of the Stuff worked in China during the
Japonese occupation of Hong Kong and they wish to continue thors.
Limiting the survey to senior staff only, the University lus a
Registrar, a Librarian, a Professor and a Lecturer in English,
a Professor of Economics, a lecturer in Physics, a Professor of
Physiology, a Professor of Gynncology, a Lecturer in Mechanical
Engineering. Ten out of twentyseven senior posts are fillod:
and even if all were filled, pre-war experience shows tant
Several Departments would still be dangerously understaffed
even to keep the University going on the unsatisfactory pre-war
scale. Recruitment of University teachers for posto in the
United Kingdom has probably never been so difficult as it is at
prosent The difficulty of recruitment to Colonial posts wil!
be very much greater. Further, it is impossible to hope to gut
good mon to take the risk of accepting appointments to a place
so far from the centre as liong Kong unless they can be assured
of work that will interest them.
251