ENG-2000 — Page 213

EDUCATION

Adult Education

Opportunities are available for adults to study in their spare time, either for personal development or to update knowledge and skills relevant to their work. Private schools offer various courses such as languages, business and computer studies. During the year, the Education Department provided formal education courses at primary to senior secondary levels for adult learners. It also subvented a variety of adult education programmes operated by NGOs.

Student Finance

The Student Financial Assistance Agency administers several publicly funded schemes that ensure no students are deprived of education for lack of financial means. It also administers privately funded scholarships awarded on the basis of academic merit. These schemes are described below.

Student Travel Subsidy

The Student Travel Subsidy Scheme provides a subsidy, on a means-tested basis, to full-time students aged 12 or above who have not yet completed their first degree- level studies and who live more than a 10-minute walk from their places of study. Needy students who pass the means test will receive a subsidy for home-school travel during term time. With effect from the 2000-01 academic year, there are two levels of subsidy, namely full-rate and half-rate of the average unit fare on public transport between students' residence and the location of their schools. In the 1999-2000 academic year, $284.6 million was disbursed to 196 899 eligible students.

Needy primary students aged below 12 attending government or aided primary schools outside their residing Primary 1 Admission Nets and who live more than a 10- minute walk from their places of study are also provided travel subsidies for home- school travel on a means tested basis. In the 1999-2000 academic year, $22.6 million was disbursed to 16 957 eligible students.

Textbook Assistance

The School Textbook Assistance Scheme provides cash grants, on a means-tested basis, to eligible Primary 1 to Secondary 7 students in public sector schools and local schools under the Direct Subsidy Scheme for the purchase of essential textbooks and miscellaneous school-related expenses. In the 1999-2000 academic year, $271.7 million was disbursed to 319 156 students.

Fee Remission

Needy Secondary 4 to 7 students in public sector schools may have their tuition fees waived under the means tested Senior Secondary Fee Remission Scheme. In the 1999-2000 academic year, 98 685 students were granted fee remissions amounting to $362.2 million. Secondary 5 and 7 students granted full fee remission are also eligible to apply respectively for remission of their examination fees for the Hong Kong Certificate of Education Examination and the Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination. In the 1999-2000 academic year, 9311 students were granted examination fee remissions amounting to $9.6 million.

Eligible kindergarten pupils may apply for tuition fee remission through the Kindergarten Fee Remission Scheme. Such assistance is in the form of 50 or 100 per cent of the weighted average of fees charged by non-profit-making kindergartens or

169