ABSTRACT
Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) became part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1997 when Hong Kong, a former British colony, returned to the Chinese sovereignty. At the end of 2011, it had a population around 7.15 million (Census and Statistics Department, Hong Kong SAR Government, 2013, p.4) in an area of about 1,104 km2 (‘Hong Kong’, n.d., ‘Geography and Climate’, para. 1). In the 2011–2012 financial year, the approved estimate for recurrent government expenditure on education was HK$54.5 billion (about US$ 7.03 billion), accounting for about 22.5% of all recurrent government expenditure, while the total estimate for government expenditure on education made up about 18.2% of total government expenditure (Information Services Department, Hong Kong SAR, 2012c, p.150). As regards the number of educational institutions from the pre-primary, primary to secondary levels, there were 861 local and 96 non-local kindergartens; 455 local, government and aided primary schools; 394 local, government and aided secondary schools; 73 other local primary schools (e.g., Direct Subsidy Scheme and private schools); 96 other local secondary schools (e.g., Direct Subsidy Scheme and private schools); 61 local and international special schools; 41 international primary schools; and 29 international secondary schools in 2012 (Census and Statistics Department, Hong Kong SAR Government, 2013, pp.341, 359). In terms of student enrolment in 2012, there were 164,764 kindergarten students; 317,442 primary school students; 418,787 secondary school students; and 8,021 students enrolling in schools of special education and special classes in ordinary schools (Census and Statistics Department, Hong Kong SAR Government, 2013, pp.341, 359). For the number of teachers in the teaching profession in 2012, there were an overall 11,817 kindergarten teachers comprising 3,907 trained and 362 untrained kindergarten teachers with university graduate or equivalent qualification, as well as 7,328 trained and 220 untrained teachers, respectively, who were non-university graduates. There were 22,173 primary day school teachers, which included 20,221 trained and 777 untrained teachers with university graduate or equivalent qualification, as well as 1,053 trained and 122 untrained teachers, respectively, who were non-university graduates. There were 29,981 secondary day school teachers, which included 27,968 trained and 1,456 untrained teachers with university graduate or equivalent qualification, as well as 488 trained and 69 untrained teachers, respectively, who were non-university graduates (Census and Statistics Department, Hong Kong SAR Government, 2013, p.349). As regards pupil-teacher ratio in 2012, kindergarten was 9.3, while the overall ratio for primary day school and secondary day school was 14.4 and 14.2, respectively (Census and Statistics Department, Hong Kong SAR Government, 2013, p.351).
