TNAG-1073-FCO40-1323-Policy-of-the-Government-of-Hong-Kong-on-education-including-1981 — Page 377

8.3

(k)

4

No problems are foreseen in reaching the target of

12,000 full-time equivalent students in the Polytechnic

by 1983/84: within this total the Polytechnic hopes to

start offering some courses at degree level and to increase

the number of students on higher level work.

Reaction among unofficial members of the Legislative Council

to the education section of the Governor's Address and to his report of an

upsurge in juvenile crime (see paragraph 8.8) reflects the extent of the

general concern with the present state of education and with the

direction of future policy. This concern is also reflected in the

wide terms of reference of the Committee to Review Post-Secondary and

Technical Education.

Current concerns

8.4

There is bound to be a substantial body of criticism within

the community of a system which provides for more than 1.4 million

children in school (some 27 per cent of the total population) as well as

supporting a widely diversified post-school educational sector, and no

review of the system, however searching, could possibly take into account

every facet of that criticism. There are nevertheless certain themes

which are common to the voiced opinions of many individuals or groups

with otherwise divergent views on various aspects of education, and these

are summarised briefly in this section as indicators of current general

concerns,

8.5

In the field of higher education the University and Polytechnic

Grants Committee (UPGC) has advised that the maintenance of a growth rate

of 3 per cent (revised in the interim to 4 per cent) per annum for the

universities and a ceiling of 12,000 full-time equivalent students at