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Following is a question by the Hon Cheung Man-kwong and a written reply by the Secretary for Education, Mr Michael Suen, in the Legislative Council today (June 25):
Question:
Will the Government inform this Council if it knows:
(a) the respective amounts of subsidies or loans provided by each University Grants Committee ("UGC")-funded institution for its community college or continuing education arm ("CC/CEA") to operate self-financing sub-degree programmes in each of the past three years; the specific usages of the subsidies or loans, the administrative costs and the interest payable for the loans;
(b) in each of the past three years, the respective amounts of money handed over ("hand-over payments") to the UGC-funded institutions by their CCs/CEAs operating such programmes, the amounts of the administrative costs therein, the percentages of hand-over payments among the total tuition incomes of the CCs/CEAs for the relevant year, and percentages of the hand-over payments among the profits or losses for the relevant year;
(c) how UGC-funded institutions utilise the hand-over payments mentioned in (b);
(d) the criteria adopted by UGC-funded institutions for deciding whether subsidies or loans will be provided to their CCs/CEAs, whether prior approval from UGC is required for such decisions and whether upper limits have been set for the annual amounts of subsidies or loans; and
(e) whether UGC has monitored the provision of subsidies or loans by UGC-funded institutions for their CCs/CEAs to operate self-financing sub-degree programmes; if it has, of the details; if not, the reasons for that?
Reply:
President,
(a), (d) and (e)
Funding provided by the Administration to the University Grants Committee (UGC)-funded institutions through the UGC should only be used for supporting UGC-funded programmes and activities. Accordingly, UGC-funded institutions can only make use of their non-UGC funds to provide subsidy or loan to their community colleges or continuing education departments for the purpose of operating self-financing sub-degree programmes. Apart from ensuring that funds provided by the UGC are only used for supporting UGC-funded programmes and activities, UGC-funded institutions may decide on their own how to put available resources to best use. The Administration and the UGC fully respect the autonomy of the institutions in this regard.
According to information provided by UGC-funded institutions, none of them have provided subsidy or loan to their community colleges or continuing education departments for operating self-financing sub-degree programmes in the past three academic years from 2005/06 to 2007/08. The UGC-funded institutions have not laid down any criteria in this regard.
(b) and (c)
According to information provided by UGC-funded institutions, their community colleges or continuing education departments have not remitted profit, if any, to the institution proper. Details of administrative fee levied on the community colleges or continuing education departments that operate self-financing sub-degree programmes are set out at Annex. The administrative fees are generally used to cover the cost of various administrative units of the institutions in providing ongoing administration and academic support for the provision of such self-financing sub-degree programmes.
Ends/Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Issued at HKT 16:06
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