TNAG-1073-FCO40-1323-Policy-of-the-Government-of-Hong-Kong-on-education-including-1981 — Page 191

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education was to be further strengthened, the school curriculum enriched

and the facilities and support services available to schools improved.

2.7

In the 1970s particular emphasis was placed on the balanced

development of general, practical and cultural subjects in the school

curriculum, and in order specifically to strengthen and develop practical

and technical education prevocational schools were established and their

numbers increased. Five technical institutes were built and equipped to

offer a wide range of disciplines, and the Hong Kong Technical College

became the nucleus of the Hong Kong Polytechnic, which by the end of the

decade was providing places for about 26,000 full-time and part-time

students. There was thus a continuous link between vocational and

technical education throughout the secondary system, leading to a

technological outlet in tertiary education.

2.8

Concurrent with plans for the development of the senior secondary

and tertiary system in the late 1970s was a comprehensive policy on

rehabilitation in the 1977 White Paper Integrating the Disabled into the

Community: a United Effort, which included a co-ordinated plan for the

development of special education, training and related services.

Plans

for the development of personal social work among young people in Hong

Kong were also formulated and were presented as an integral part of the

1979 White Paper Social Welfare into the 1980s.

2.9

Plans for the future qualitative and quantitative development

of education are described in the policy documents referred to very

briefly above: a more detailed summary of the development of education

policy during the period 1963 - 1980 is to be found in appendix A.

A

The

1978 White Paper pointed out that "no statement of policy should seek to

impose a fixed pattern on future development.

Education policy must be