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There is a general rise in the pass rates of nearly all major subjects in Chinese-medium (CMI) schools, according to a preliminary analysis of Hong Kong Certificate of Education Examination (HKCEE) results by the Education and Manpower Bureau.

"The first cohort of students admitted to Secondary One upon the introduction of the MOI Guidance in 1998 have sat for HKCEE this year," the Principal Assistant Secretary for Education and Manpower (Education Commission and Planning), Mrs Fanny Lam, said today (August 5).

Starting from the 1998/99 school year, about 300 secondary schools have adopted Chinese as MOI at their junior levels, while 112 English-medium (EMI) schools continued to adopt English-medium teaching.

"In drawing a preliminary comparison of schools' HKCEE performance in 2002 and 2003, we find that there has been a general increase in the proportion of high and medium ability students obtaining five subject passes or more in CMI schools, including those schools which switched from EMI to CMI in 1998," she said.

Speaking on individual subjects, Mrs Lam said that in general there was a rise in the pass rates of nearly all major subjects.

"The rise is observed in Chinese, History, Geography, Chemistry and Mathematics in all ability groups. For Economics, Biology, Physics and Chinese History, there is an increase in the pass rates in the high ability group and no change in the medium ability group, except for Physics," she said.

For English, there is an increase in the pass rate among the top 10 per cent but a drop among other ability groups.

"The finding is understandable as the Firm Guidance on MOI was first implemented in 1998/99 during which necessary support measures were in early stage of development, including the availability and choice of textbooks in Chinese, adaptation by teachers and schools as well as enrichment strategies supporting English language education. However, we are pleased to note that some CMI schools have seen their support programme begin to bear fruits, with a remarkable increase in the pass rate of English," Mrs Lam explained.

"It shows that the adoption of CMI does not necessarily imply a drop in English proficiency if there are support and teaching strategies to ensure adequate and quality exposure to English. Nevertheless, the drop in the overall English language performance in this year's HKCEE suggests that there is a need for us to reflect and improve on the learning and teaching of English language."

In 2001, 12 of the CMI schools have chosen to adopt English to teach all non-language academic subjects at Secondary Four (S4) and Secondary Five (S5). There is a general drop in the proportion of their students obtaining five passes or more.

On the contrary, for those CMI schools which continue to use Chinese as MOI at S4 and S5, there is a general increase in the proportion with five passes or more in all ability groups.

Mrs Lam stressed that it was not appropriate to draw direct comparison between the performance of CMI and EMI schools as the ability and background of student intakes are different.

"More time is needed for a more detailed assessment of the interface between the MOI policy and this year's HKCEE results. The detailed analysis will serve as one of the reference tools for a working group under the Education Commission to review the Secondary School Places Allocation System and the MOI Policy in 2003/04," she added.

End/Tuesday, August 5, 2003

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