ENG-1988 — Page 150

EDUCATION

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of the numbers of students who have graduated from the Masters programme over the 10 years since it was instituted, the numbers of applications for research degrees (M Phil and Ph D) in education continued to rise. There were 14 enrolments in 1987–8, and the Faculty intends to increase the numbers of places available for study at this level in the next few years.

A major recent innovation undertaken by the Faculty of Education has been the provision of a wide range of In-service Teacher Education Programme (INSTEP) courses of varying length aiming to cater for a wide diversity of needs in the education community. Sixty-five courses were taken by 1 082 students in 1987-8.

Education Research

Members of the Faculty of Education at Hong Kong University are engaged in over 50 research projects in education, ranging from pre-primary to tertiary level and from broad issues of educational planning and curriculum development to studies of particular learning contexts. The faculty has continued its active co-operation in research with the Education Department, and is gradually extending its work with colleagues in China.

The Chinese University of Hong Kong

The Chinese University of Hong Kong was inaugurated in 1963 as a federal university and a self-governing corporation which draws its income mainly from government grants. The campus occupies more than 110 hectares of land near Sha Tin.

The university comprises three original colleges - New Asia College (founded in 1949), Chung Chi College (1951) and United College (1956). A fourth college, the Shaw College, named after its donor Sir Run Run Shaw, became operational in 1988 at the northwest part of the campus.

Since its inception, the university has adopted a curriculum structure based on a combination of the credit unit system and degree examination system. Students admitted to the undergraduate programme after six years of secondary education are granted a Bachelor's degree upon completion of a number of course credits and the passing of a degree examination assessed by external examiners from home and abroad.

The university started a comprehensive curriculum review in 1983 which resulted in the adoption of a new curriculum structure for its undergraduate studies, based solely on the credit unit system. The new curriculum is applicable to students admitted in 1986-7 and thereafter. Under this new structure, general education is strengthened, language standards are emphasised, minor programmes become optional and degree examinations are replaced by course examinations with the external examiner system retained.

In 1988-9, the university offered full-time undergraduate students 33 major subjects and 36 minor subjects through its 47 departments grouped under five faculties, namely, Arts, Business Administration, Science, Social Science and Medicine. The first four faculties offer four-year programmes, leading to Bachelor's degrees. The Faculty of Medicine runs a five-year programme with two years of pre-clinical studies. Clinical teaching is conducted mainly in the university's teaching hospital - the Prince of Wales Hospital in Sha Tin. The degrees of MB ChB conferred by the university are recognised by the General Medical Council of the United Kingdom and the Medical Council of Hong Kong for the purposes of provisional and full registration of medical practitioners. The university emphasises bilingualism. Students have to be proficient in both Chinese and English on admission, and both languages are used in teaching.

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