CO129-593-6 Rehabilitation of Hong Kong University. For extracted photographs see CN 3-45- Advisory Committee papers 1-1-1939 - 31-12-1946 — Page 68

HONG KONG UNIVERSITY ADVISORY COMMITTEE.

Confidential,

NO. HKUAC

28.

63

Extract from a letter dated 2yın February, 1946, from Professor Roxby of the British Council in China

to Miss Ruston (See also HKUAC.5)

Since I wrote out my views on 30th August, I have kept my ears well open for Chinese academic commente and have recently had a talk with the Bishop of Hong Kong. Nothing that I have heard leads ine to revise any of the opinions expressed in my little memorandum. All the chinese professors with whom I have discussed the question seem to welcome the revival of the University but hope that it will be more intimately linked with the Chinese Universities and that there will be a larger number of Chinese in the staff and more interchange. The Bishop thinks that the proportions of British and chinese on the staff should be about 50/50 and that the number of students should be raised to at least 1500. The development of a university at singapore or in the Malayan region would make Hong Kong more dependent on its supply of students from China proper and necessitate either a lower standard of living or else a large number of bursarships and grants-in-aid.

The more I probe into the difficult problem of raising the standard of English teaching in China the more I feel that the Education Department of Hong Kong University can render a great service on the lines of the London Institute of Education – as a place to which lecturers and teachers of English from chinese universities and Middle schools can go for intensive courses of longer or shorter duration and become acquainted with modern methods of English instruction.