Education | 153
development centres. There are also industry-wide training schemes and a trade-testing and certification scheme.
Altogether, over 160 000 full-time and part-time places were available in the 2006-07 academic year for both school leavers and working people.
Three skills centres run by the VTC prepare people with a disability for employment, or provide vocational education and technical training. Together, they offered 660 full-time places in the 2006-07 training year.
Technical Training
Funded by industry levy, the Construction Industry Training Authority (CITA) provides pre-employment training for school leavers and adults and in-service training for construction workers. In the 2006-07 training year, CITA offered about 1 800 full-time and 54 300 part-time training places. It also conducts trade tests for construction workers to assess the standards of skills achieved, and certification tests for operators of construction plants.
The Clothing Industry Training Authority (CLITA) provides training courses for the clothing and footwear industries with funding from industry levy. It offers both full-time and part-time courses at technician and craftsman levels and skills upgrading courses for in-service workers. In the 2006-07 training year, CLITA offered about 540 full-time and 6 100 part-time training places.
Post-secondary Education
At the start of the 2006-07 academic year, some 300 full-time accredited self- financing programmes were offered by 20 post-secondary institutions, providing about 26 000 full-time intake places at below or above degree level. These are in addition to some 7 600 publicly-funded intake places at sub-degree level offered by City University of Hong Kong, the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, the Hong Kong Institute of Education, the VTC and the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts.
Higher Education
Hong Kong has 12 degree-awarding higher education institutions, eight of which are publicly-funded through the UGC. The other four are the publicly-funded Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts and the self-financing Open University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Shue Yan University and Chu Hai College of Higher Education. Hong Kong Shue Yan University became the first local private university in Hong Kong on 19 December 2006 upon approval from the Chief Executive in Council.
The UGC is appointed by the Chief Executive to advise on the development and funding of higher education and to administer public grants to the eight higher education institutions. It comprises non-local
comprises non-local academics, local academics, professionals and community leaders. Its secretariat is mainly staffed by civil servants.
The UGC also plays a major role in quality assurance and the promotion of international competitiveness. Its major initiatives include the Performance and
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