TNAG-1072-FCO40-1322-Policy-of-the-Government-of-Hong-Kong-on-education-1981 — Page 66

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be fully fitted out for use, nor could the college afford the air conditioning equipment for it, thus showing lack of co-ordination between the budget for the buildings themselves and commissioning of them as an effective teaching resource.

ACADEMIC DEVELOPMENT PLAN

Except that the College had agreed to embrace the 2-2-1 programme under the Post-Secondary Colleges Ordinance, CNAA failed to gain any information about the planned academic development of the College or the matching of its development to its resources. One of the problems was that the dependence on alumni for support of various kinds, and the desire to keep the traditions of the College rooted in the former Lingnan University; while CNAA understood that this was naturally seen as a valuable inheritance, it seemed to inhibit the College from making any vigorous approach to the needs of Hong Kong in the 1980s. So far as the College felt able to respond to recruitment of students, it was anticipated that the departments of Languages and Business would grow, and the College had some thoughts on expanding its computer section. It seemed to members that consideration of expansion of the computer support was extremely tentative and in no way thought through at this stage. Although Music was a Faculty of the College, it was learned that only 6 students in Hong Kong took "A" levels in Music in 1980 so that there was little potential for growth. Nevertheless, 20 of the Lingnan students would be taking Music "A" Level in 1981.

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8.1

THE CONSTITUTION

The Constitution of the College was based on a model constitution supplied by the Department of Education, and it had been the formal instrument of the College since 1976. CNAA attempted to explore the extent to which the Board of Governors, the Academic Board and its Sub- Committees were effective, and how far those which had formal terms of reference operated so as to discharge their responsibilities. It proved difficult to establish whether the Library, Syllabus and Examination Sub- Committees of the Academic Board had been set up, and while the Admissions Sub-Committee did seen to have been established, there was difficulty on the part of the staff in recalling in the meeting the name of its Chairman or of the members. Clearly the sub-structure only existed in embryo form; there was no such difficulty in establishing the membership of the Academic Board for which a full list of members was tabled.