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South China Morning Post
17-04-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
Hong Kong sees 15% drop in students seeking overseas education since 2012
The number of Form Six graduates in Hong Kong who are seeking further studies outside the city has decreased by 15 per cent compared to the previous year. This trend marks the second consecutive year of reaching record lows since the government began conducting an annual survey in 2012. A student consultant and the owner of an agency connecting pupils with overseas universities both attributed the decline to an increase in available spots at local institutions and a number of students having already gone abroad to study. Education trends in 2024 The figure came from the 2024 Secondary 6 Students' Pathway Survey published by the Education Bureau on Wednesday. About 42,900 school graduates were contacted for the poll, with 41,385 opting to take the survey. According to the poll, 94.5 per cent of respondents chose to continue pursuing full-time education last year, slightly higher than the 94.3 per cent logged in 2023. Among those opting for further education, 92.2 per cent had decided to study in Hong Kong, up 3 per cent from 2023 and an increase of 6.5 per cent from 2022. The remainder, or 7.8 per cent, opted to study in jurisdictions such as mainland China, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and the United States. Why so many Hong Kong teens are skipping school and how to help these students The number of students pursuing further education outside Hong Kong in 2024 stood at 3,061, a 15 per cent decrease from the 3,609 logged in 2023. Last year also marked the second straight year of record lows since the annual survey was launched in 2012. The number of students leaving the city to continue their studies peaked in 2020, when about 6,000 Form Six graduates decided to depart Hong Kong. The city at the time was wrestling with the Covid-19 pandemic and the aftermath of the 2019 social unrest. The Beijing-imposed national security law was also introduced on June 30 of that same year. Shifts in study destinations A breakdown of the number of students heading overseas by destination showed that Canada had registered the largest drop at 35.8 per cent. Other locations that saw significant declines in interest included Taiwan at 29 per cent and the UK at 23.2 per cent. But the US was the least popular among the top destinations, with a record low of 67 students planning to study there – a drop of 23 per cent from 2023. The mainland remained the most popular destination for those choosing to study outside Hong Kong. Canada registered the largest drop in Hong Kong students at 35.8 per cent. Photo: Shutterstock The survey found that 1,339 students planned to go to the mainland to continue their education. It also recorded the smallest drop in interest, at 6.4 per cent, among all the major destinations covered. While the total number of students studying on the mainland was lower than in 2023, its share of the percentage among all destinations crept up from 39.7 per cent to 43.7 per cent. Impact of declining student numbers Ng Po-shing, a student guidance consultant with youth-focused NGO Hok Yau Club, said that as many families had immigrated overseas in recent years, their children were more likely to be already studying at secondary schools in those jurisdictions rather than in Hong Kong. The general decrease in student population in Hong Kong also meant that pupils who wished to stay in the city were more likely to get places at local universities, he said. Between 2019-20 and 2022-23, more than 80,000 kindergarten, primary and secondary students withdrew from schools in the city, according to the Education Bureau. Two peak school years in terms of student losses were 2021-22, when 33,600 withdrew, and 2020-21, when 30,500 left. Samuel Chan Sze-ming, founder of Hong Kong-based Britannia StudyLink, echoed the sentiment, noting that local universities had been 'less selective' in recent years. 'We've had a lot of Hongkongers leave Hong Kong, [so] these spaces need filling, and universities are therefore prepared to be a little more flexible to attract graduates,' he said. Hong Kong international school student numbers tripled in the last decade Chan said his agency had witnessed the decline in interest first-hand, noting the number of clients looking to study in the UK in 2024 had dropped by about 30 per cent from the previous year. But since the introduction of the UK's BN(O) visa scheme for Hongkongers, he had seen a new market emerge among secondary students already in the country who were applying for universities in the US, he said. 'That market was non-existent before,' he said. Lawmaker Chu Kwok-Keung, who represents the education sector, agreed that the declining student numbers in recent years had created more opportunities for those studying locally. Chu also highlighted that more than 40 per cent of those studying outside the city were opting to head for the mainland, which showed students were 'seizing the development opportunities' available across the border. 'Coupled with the impact of the recent Sino-US trade war, I believe that the number of people studying on the mainland will continue to rise and that this will become a trend,' he said.
South China Morning Post
07-04-2025
- Politics
- South China Morning Post
DSE: 61% of eligible candidates get into Hong Kong public universities, down from 70%
Government statistics show that the success rate of eligible candidates who sat for Hong Kong's university entrance exam has fallen from 70 per cent in 2023 to 61 per cent. This number is despite changing the liberal studies core subject, which allowed more students to meet the minimum entrance requirements for the city's publicly funded universities. According to figures recently submitted by the Education Bureau to the Legislative Council, 19,262 candidates who took the Diploma of Secondary Education (DSE) last year met the minimum requirement to get into the eight local universities. But only 61 per cent – or 11,837 candidates – received offers from varsities via the Joint University Programmes Admissions System (Jupas), a centralised system for those hoping to pursue full-time undergraduate programmes. The success rate for those eligible students dropped by 9 percentage points compared with 2023 – when 70 per cent of DSE candidates were offered places in the city's government-funded universities. 75% of non-local students at Hong Kong universities are from mainland China About 50,000 candidates sat the DSE in both 2023 and 2024. Last year, 1,356 more students met the minimum entrance requirement than during the previous year. There was a drop in the number of places available at the eight universities through Jupas, from 12,592 in 2023 to 11,837 last year. Liberal studies became one of four core subjects of the senior secondary school curriculum in 2009. It was replaced by citizenship and social development in 2021 – two years after the 2019 anti-government protests – following accusations that the curriculum was radicalising youngsters. Last year's DSE exams saw the first batch of students taking the new core subject, which only has two classifications in terms of grades – either 'attained' or 'unattained'. The new syllabus focuses on national security, identity, lawfulness and patriotism. Under the revamp, schools allocated more lessons for other core subjects, and students chose an additional elective. Non-Chinese students photographed after receiving high marks in the 2024 Diploma of Secondary Education exams. Photo: Sun Yeung Last year, the new core subject had a high attainment rate of 93.7 per cent among all candidates, a requirement by all public universities. In contrast, only 89.6 per cent achieved level 2 in the previous liberal studies subject, a minimum requirement to get into universities under the exam's seven-level grading scale. Ng Po-shing, a student guidance consultant of Hok Yau Club, said the new subject was generally considered easier than liberal studies. He said the lower success rate for eligible students to enter universities was mainly due to the scrapping of liberal studies, which freed up time for students to study other core subjects such as Chinese, English and mathematics. Ng said statistics from authorities showed more students achieved level 3 or above in Chinese and English, and level 2 or above in mathematics, which are requirements by the eight universities, resulting in more students becoming eligible to compete for places. 'It means students have to get better grades than before to secure places in the universities that they wanted, as more students now attained the benchmark,' he said. 'Only getting the minimum requirement did not help students to enter university [amid greater competition].' DSE 2025: English reading and writing exam surprised students with celebrity topic Ng added that universities would be 'definitely happier' as the academic performance of those seeking admission was better than before. Meanwhile, 146 non-Chinese students were admitted to the eight publicly funded universities via Jupas in the 2023-24 school year, a slight decrease from 149 the previous year. Starting from the 2024-25 academic year, the enrolment ceiling of non-local students at the eight universities for undergraduate programmes doubles, equivalent to 40 per cent of the number of places for local students. Under the new policy, the universities received roughly 82,000 applications for the current school year, a 15 per cent jump from the last one. Only 7 per cent of applicants were admitted. Of all applicants, 85 per cent were from mainland China, 12 per cent were from other parts of Asia, and 3 per cent were from other regions – figures similar to previous years.
