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The Permanent Secretary for Education, Mr Raymond Wong and the delegation continued their visit to San Francisco, the last leg of the US visit today (May 6, San Francisco time).
In the morning, Mr Wong visited Foothill College which offered 70 associated degree programmes and 39 certificate programmes and met with the Chancellor and President of the College. He saw a presentation by a group of Hong Kong students studying in the College and shared with them their experience in learning abroad. He was glad to learn that they were enjoying their campus life there and some students had shown interest in returning to Hong Kong for work upon their graduation.
Mr Wong visited the Stanford University in the afternoon and met with the senior management and admission officers there. Mr Wong took the opportunity to brief the officers on the international recognition already enjoyed by the Hong Kong Diploma Secondary Education Examination (HKDSE) and the measures taken to enhance Hong Kong as the regional education hub through internationalising and diversifying the higher education sector as well as facilitating the development of self-financing tertiary institutions.
Apart from visiting the Stanford University, Mr Wong visited the University of California (UC), Berkeley yesterday (May 5, San Francisco time) and met with the President Mark Yudof and the admission officers of the UC system to brief them on the unique features of the HKDSE.
Before visiting the UC Berkeley, Mr Wong visited the Department of Education of California for a mutual exchange of views on the education system of the two cities.
Mr Wong then proceeded to call on the Office of Chancellor of Community College System of California which administers the largest higher education system in the nation comprising 110 colleges and enrolling more than 2.9 million students. Community Colleges provide basic skills education, workforce training and courses to prepare students to transfer to four-year universities and is a popular pathway for HK students.
Concluding his visit in the US, Mr Wong said that the visit was most fruitful as his promotion of the international recognition of the HKDSE Examination and the effort by the HKSAR Government in developing Hong Kong as a regional education hub was well received by his counterparts and the tertiary sector there.
Mr Wong ended his official visit in the US today (May 6, San Francisco time) and will be back to Hong Kong on May 8.
Ends/Friday, May 7, 2010
Issued at HKT 14:28
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