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Comment in Shanghai Newspapers
FALSE ECONOMY
S.C.M.P.
11/6/17
The North China Daily News com- ments upon Hongkong's University under the caption "False Economy." The report of a committee ap- es pointed by Sir Andrew Caldecott, then g Governor of Hongkong, to inquire into 1. the affairs of the Hongkong University has recently been published, and fol- lowing the action of similar committees in other places advocates the plying of the economy axe. Indeed perusal of the report conveys the impression y that the committee went about its work with the preconceived idea that d economies had to be effected and it was only a question of where that could be done. The twenty-five years' dexistence of the Hongkong University has been one long struggle from hand to mouth. There have been numerous occasions when some anxiety has been e expressed as to whether it would be able to carry on, but by various means it has been possible to continue the good work which Sir Frederick Lugard inaugurated in 1912, and which has steadily grown in proportions and importance. With an income of just under $1,000,000 and outgoing a few thousands over that figure, the affairs of the University, according to the $Report, present no occasion for panic, but taking the long view the Com- mittee considers the financial position unsatisfactory. They then proceed to consider how that can be rectified and the result is not too pleasing. y Looking back over the University's history it now seems apparent that the source of the trouble was that it า was allowed to grow too rapidly and to take upon itself more than it real- ly should have been expected to do. That resulted from initial enthusiasms ) and a very profound faith in the 1 mission which the institution was to 1 carry out in bringing British university f education to the very doors of China. That mission was an enduring one; it exists now as it did from the com- mencement and there is no indication that it will ever come to an end. The question therefore arises as to whether the University shall continue on its present hand-to-mouth existence, or whether there shall be retrenchments calculated to improve the financial position, and provide a happier future for the University.
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The Original Aim
The Committee consider that the University does not obtain, and in fact does not require professors of such exceptional academic attainments as might claim emoluments
on the scale paid for the leading professorial posts in the United Kingdom. Over that issue must be taken with it. It was the aim of the founders of the University, and it has up to the pre- sent been secured, that the University should offer just as good an education as that to be obtained from any similar institution in the United King- dom. If at any time it should fail to do that it will have betrayed the pledges given to those who in the past have liberally helped the University in the matter of endowments, and will have robbed the University of its raison d'etre. Let there be no mis- take about it: unless the Hongkong University provides an education equal to that obtainable in England the sooner it ceases to exist the better.
CHINA
MORNING POST. 11·6·37
Such an education can, obviously, only be provided by men of the same calibre as those who direct studies in the British Universities and there is not the slightest doubt that the men teaching in the Hongkong University fulfil the requirements of the highest educational standard. To substitute for them, either suddenly or gradual- ly, professors of somewhat inferior attainments would immediately react upon the quality of the education given by the University, and would impair the high regard in which it is held and might eventually bring it into some degree of disrepute. For the University has either to be the institution contemplated by its found- ers, or cease to be a university and descend to something akin to a fairly high grade technical college. That would mean that all the excellent work which has been done for a quarter of a century would be com- pletely lost, and the high ideals which inspired the founding of the institu- tion would be completely betrayed, as would also be the cause of British education in the Far East.
British Education
Uf
The Hongkong Government gives very valuable assistance to the University in the shape of an annual subsidy from public funds amounting to $350,000, a by no means un- generous amount, especially in view of the charge which education in general makes upon the revenues the Colony. Endowments bring in a further $440,000 while fees represent an additional $200,000. Some 360 students are, from evidence obtainable in the report itself, taught at an average cost of about $120 a month each in return for which they pay a monthly average of $47, so that some $73 a month has to be found from the endowments and the subsidy. The ratio between fees paid and the amount so expended does not seem unreasonable, and there is little to suggest that much could be done in the matter of raising the fees; indeed were such a step taken it might militate against the effectiveness of the University. It might be possible in time to bring about some reduction in the size of the professorial staff, and to effect other economies, but as has been pointed out such a step as the first is attended by grave dangers. Such an outlook gives small comfort to those who are concerned with the future of the institution's finances, for it would seem that for some time at least it will be obliged to carry on along the same uncertain lines which have been noticed in the past. That would be infinitely better than to take any step which would impair the position of the University in the British educational system. It is not the only institution of its kind that has had, in its early years, to get along as best it could, awaiting the slow growth of the endowments until eventually they reach adequate proportions and if the colonial govern- ment is called upon to increase its grant, it may not like doing so, but will have to remember that the hand having once been put to the plough as it was twenty-five years ago, now
hot
is hot the time to take it away British prestige requires that there shall be no diminution in the status and authority of the University.
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