Ordinary Gweilo

ESF Subvention finally abolished (in 2029)

Jun 8, 2013

It has been apparent for at least 10 years that the government had no wish to continue subsidizing the ESF. The real surprise is that it has taken so long to make this decision – and it will only start to take effect three years from now, with some subsidy remaining in place for another 13 years (until the last pupils admitted to ESF primary schools in August 2015 complete their studies).

The SCMP has two news stories and one opinion piece:

Decision to end ESF subsidy a lesson in Machiavellian ruthlessness

South China Morning Post | Saturday, 08 June, 2013 | Alex Lo

Shock and horror! Fees for schools under the English Schools Foundation from 2016 will be at least 23 per cent higher as the government phases out the public subsidy.

But you would expect that. The die was cast once the Education Bureau announced it would phase out the current subsidy. You want to know how much ESF parents will eventually have to pay? Just check out the fees of other international schools.

The decision to end the subsidy after freezing payment for a decade may go down in history as one of the most ruthless made by this administration. But before you pick up your pitchfork and bay for blood, it's not entirely the fault of Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying and his education secretary, Eddie Ng Hak-kim. Of course it is their fault for allowing it to happen. But I am actually not sure they know what they are doing with the ESF in the sense they almost certainly did not come up with the policy decision – those immediately below Ng within the bureau did.

There is an almost Machiavellian elegance to the decision – if you discount its irresponsibility, unfairness and immorality. You can be sure our clueless Mr Ng would never come up with something so clever; this is reserved for the senior administrative officials within the bureau, not a few of whom – I bet – are, or were, ESF parents.

Let's see what this decision really means. Taxpayers' money will be saved. The ESF is certain to prosper, as it will be able to charge high fees and million-dollar debentures on a par with other international schools. The government can claim it is helping to boost international school places without lifting a finger. It is also a populist decision as many local families resent the real or perceived special treatment given to the ESF as an old colonial institution.

But it is never explained why it is no longer the government's responsibility to support affordable education for non-Chinese-speaking children of residents or permanent residents. Nor is it clear why local families should be left to their own devices once they leave the local system and join the international school sector.

But the reality is that these families are on their own unless they can pay the high school fees.

The government’s official reason for ending the subvention is that it "flies in the face of the government's policy of not providing recurrent subsidy to schools mainly running non-local curriculum."

It’s the word “mainly” that appears to be the crucial one. Schools operating under the Direct Subsidy Scheme (DSS) are allowed to have 49% of their students in an “international” stream that leads to qualifications such as IGCSE and IB Diploma, but must have 51% studying for local exams.

It would be a huge change to the ESF to be able to satisfy the DSS rules, and so the ESF Board has accepted the government decision but they have arranged meetings with parents to get their views. Expect these meetings to be lively, and ESF management will be heavily criticized, but current parents are not the ones who will lose the most from this decision, and it’s not possible to consult with parents of future ESF students.

On Friday, the HK Standard quoted Secretary for Education Eddie Ng Hak-kim on the lack of international school places, saying that “international schools [should] consider devising an allocation mechanism such as a certain proportion of places being earmarked for children whose parents are recruited or relocated from outside Hong Kong." So it seems clear the government wants the ESF to operate as an international school, offering priority to expats - and there is no doubt that the ESF can be successful operating in that way.

The losers here are local parents who can’t afford higher school fees, but the government doesn’t care about them.
Pay as you read

Apr 23, 2013

Interesting piece from Gweipo about newspapers:

Buy a newspaper – save a journalist?

I've been subjected to a barrage of emails of late by the IHT. And the Wall street journal. And the NYT. [..] Why did I resist? A few main reasons. I just hate all that paper coming into the house – even if I'm now living in an area that professes to recycle and even will reward me for doing so through their "Grin" Scheme. (Honest, they don't have to, my guilt to the environment is enough to keep me recycling forever and forever amen). Then there is that thing of other waste – as in, I subscribe, but some weeks I'll read the paper every day, and sometimes weeks on end go by with the paper piling up, in it's little plastic bag against the rain (double guilt, double waste) unopened until I separate the paper and the plastic and throw them all out. And finally the fact that it's available online and on air. Oh, and they don't have suduko (the saving grace of the SCMP – honest, ask any expat wife, they all start with that section). And their comics are pathetic – old fashioned, boring and irrelevant to an international audience.

You see, the best thing about my IHT subscription to be honest, was unlimited access to the NYT. And, in the days that I didn't get to read the newspaper, I could skim through my daily email from the NYT and click on the articles that were interesting. Now, I can still do that. I'm limited to 10 articles a month – but, often that's enough. And it's a kind of rationing – do I really like that journalist enough to click through or is it going to be a same old same old?

The article generated a response from Joyce Hor-Chung Lau, an editor at the International Herald Tribune (writing in a personal capacity):

I do pay for online content — I feel responsible to do so. One pet peeve are people (not you) who say, "I love your paper, but I get annoyed when I get blocked after 10 articles." I want to shake them and ask why they expect content to come for free? And these are not poor people — mostly HK professionals. One was my dentist. It was hard for me to retort, w/ the metal instruments in my mouth. But I wanted to ask him if he had qualms about asking me to pay for my dental care!

It would be nice if the media industry made it easier to buy a la carte articles. Often, I see one article I'd like to read — and would be happy to pay a few bucks if I could click one PayPal button. But then I'm asked to buy a whole year's subscription or have to fill in some form, and I give up.

Yes, the ‘micro payments’ model ought to work, but how much would people pay per article? Would it be worth collecting the money?

It’s interesting that the SCMP has stuck with charging for its website for so many years, whilst other papers have either stayed free or have tried different approaches to charging, usually without much success. SCMP.com now allows access to a certain number of articles free of charge (the same as the New York Times and the Financial Times, but unlike The Times) and the website is much better than before. Unfortunately the content (of the newspaper and website) is getting worse – and reduced revenue must be one reason.

People may be reluctant to pay for web access, but apparently they will pay for content on iPad and Kindle. I do. I happily pay about US$0.60 per day for The Guardian on the Kindle, but I hated their iPad app. The Kindle experience is less than ideal for magazines, but at little more than US$1 per week (each) for The Spectator and the New Statesman I’m not complaining. The question is whether this will be enough to save newspapers and magazines.
Learning English?

Apr 22, 2013

I think I may have noticed a theme to these “Dean Fung English” articles" in the Hong Kong Standard:
Cheese

Apr 21, 2013

They had another one of those International Cheese Festivals at Hullett House in TST.

The problem is that the cheese market is in a tiny room. I had to wait in a queue before I was allowed in, but there were still too many people inside. I did manage to try the only Scottish cheese they had (from Barwheys Dairy), and so I bought some of that, and a couple of French cheeses before I gave up. Not cheap at HK$55 per 100g, but I’d have bought more if it had been better organized.

From there I went to the Shangri-La, which had this rather puzzling dish in its buffet:

Yes, that’s shepherds pie.
Spotify – in Chinese, of course

Apr 20, 2013

I’m obviously not paying attention, so I only found out from Spike that Spotify is now available in Hong Kong.

There’s the usual pantomime with a default page that is only in Chinese, and no obvious way to change to English. Google Chrome makes it easier by translating it (rather badly), otherwise you would be left with having to know the Chinese characters for English. No, me neither.

The good news? It’s only HK$48 per month (compared with $9.99 in the US and £9.99 in the UK).
Warped

Apr 4, 2013

Why is the SCMP still printing these tedious letters from Pierce Lam? As well as attacking the ESF (yawn) he is now trying to defend the “designated schools” scheme:

Why officials should end ESF subsidy

South China Morning Post | 2 April 2013

Simon Osborn rightly recognises that the English Schools Foundation’s "old policy" discriminates against native Cantonese-speaking children but wrongly claims its new policy will offer equal opportunity ("ESF’s new policy offers equal chance", March 25).

As the new policy gives priority to siblings and children of alumni, it perpetuates non-Chinese speakers’ preferential admission.

Non-Chinese children of non-permanent residents now account for 30 per cent of the ESF’s student population, but constitute less than 2 per cent of the city’s population.

According to ESF CEO Heather Du Quesnay, the new system would not "reduce the number of non-Chinese students at ESF schools" ("ESF ends priority for non-Chinese speakers", February 5). The ESF’s selling of nomination rights and questionable test on "parental commitment" won’t moderate the warped effects of its old policy.

Betty Bownath is right about the importance of non-Cantonese speakers’ "integration into mainstream public schools" and "full immersion with extension or support classes for Chinese being the fairest and best option for ethnic minorities" ("Segregation still confronts ethnic students", March 22). But she misunderstands The New York Times article of March 10 and wrongly criticises Hong Kong’s "designated schools".

Under Hong Kong’s 12-year compulsory education, every school-aged child is guaranteed a school place. But, as the city is demographically 96 per cent Cantonese-speaking, the average public school isn’t well prepared for the special needs of non-Cantonese speakers. Designated schools are mainstream schools which have joined a government scheme whereby they receive additional funding for the purpose of implementing school-based measures to help non Cantonese-speaking students.

Ms Bownath has overlooked the encouraging experience of Talwinder Singh, a designated school student who features in The New York Times article. He said he was glad to be in a designated school and would feel alone in a mainstream school. He said his teachers knew how to deal with minority students. He is thinking of universities after graduation this summer from a "designated school" where he studies alongside the school’s Cantonese-speaking students.

The government should cut the ESF’s subsidy because of that institution’s practice of segregation based on linguistic discrimination, and divert such funding to help more mainstream schools develop the capability of designated schools and serve all ethnic minorities, native English speakers included, equally.

Pierce Lam, Central

The problem with Pierce Lam is that he decided a long time ago that the ESF was a dastardly plot by the evil colonial administration and nothing could possibly convince him to change his mind. So, even when they abolish the priority for non-Cantonese speakers (that he has been complaining about for years) he argues that nothing has changed.

On the other hand, when the government claim that their “designated schools” scheme is a serious attempt to cater for non-Cantonese speakers, he is convinced that this must be true. Because of course, the Hong Kong government can be trusted, unlike the wicked witch Heather Du Quesnay and the rest of them over at the ESF.

Here’s another article which comes to a similar conclusion as the one in the New York Times:

Racism in the classroom?

Time Out Hong Kong | 25 Oct 2011

Li Sing Tai Hang School in Causeway Bay, is one of 28 designated schools in Hong Kong that receive additional funds and resources from the government to help minority students. During the central allocation process, where the Education Bureau divvies up pupils according to the ‘school nets’ they are located in, most minority students end up being assigned to a designated school even if it isn’t located within their net. According to the Education Bureau, at present, among some 12,000 non-Chinese speaking students, about 60 percent are studying in designated schools.

“It’s racial segregation,” says Fermi Wong Wai-fun, executive director of Hong Kong Unison, a non-governmental organisation focusing on helping minority groups. Wong says up to 80 percent of minority students attend designated schools – but, she claims, some Hong Kong parents become unwilling to choose these schools for their children. “They [minority students] have been living and studying in a very narrow social circle and have become disconnected with the mainstream society. It will harm social integration,” says Wong.

But I have probably “misunderstood” this article, just like Betty Bownath did with the one in the New York Times, and really it is a fantastic scheme.
Fruit of the gloom

Mar 26, 2013

Does anyone really know the difference between Satsumas, Clementines, Tangerines and Mandarins?

Or the Mikan, sometimes imported from Japan or Korea? Yes please, but they are more expensive.

Honey Murcott anyone? No thanks, or at least not the ones from Bangladesh in Park’n’Shop.

For the last couple of years, Park’n’Shop have been importing Spanish satsumas, but this year they have been disappointing – dried up.

Just recently they have started importing Sunkist Satsumas and Mandarins from the USA. No, I don’t think I can tell the difference, even though they are carefully labelled up as different products

Here are some of the fruit on display in my local Park’n’Shop

And here’s a lovely fresh apple:
Madness

Mar 20, 2013

I wrote about the Championship merry-go-round shortly after Michael Appleton had become Blackburn’s third manager of the season in mid-January. Now’s he’s become the 32nd manager to be fired this season. Where would Blackburn be without Venky’s and their global football adviser, Shebby Singh? Don’t answer that.

It was only a few weeks ago that Appleton was quoted as saying that “if Shebby Singh is global advising, he’s not advising me”. Now it seems that Singh has had the last laugh by getting rid of him.

Alex McLeish? He lasted just 39 days as Nottingham Forest before leaving by “mutual consent” (which for once seemed not to be just a polite way of saying that he had been fired). He left shortly after the peculiar business with George Boyd “failing a medical” on deadline day.

Anyone else? Ah yes, Simon Grayson was sacked by Huddersfield Town after a run of twelve matches without a win, though his successor has not been notably more successful.

And in the Premier League, Reading demonstrated that they could be every bit as ungrateful to a manager who had got them promoted as Southampton had been a few weeks earlier, by firing Brian McDermott.

It’s all madness, I tell you.

Wolves remain in turmoil and face second successive relegation

Some decisions have been unfathomable. Sacking Mick McCarthy last February and replacing him with his assistant, Terry Connor, was madness. The appointment of Stale Solbakken in the summer was another error of judgment. Unveiled in May as the man to take Wolves back to the Premier League with a more refined style of play, Solbakken was sacked eight months later following a humiliating FA Cup defeat at non-league Luton Town. By that point, the players had long become exasperated with the Norwegian’s methods.

Eager to get rid of "the Mick McCarthy culture", Solbakken felt the best way forward was to empower the players. Standards dropped, discipline disappeared – Bakary Sako went unpunished after reporting late for one game – and training lost its competitive edge, with some of the drills regarded as ridiculously basic. Johan Lange and Patrick Weiser, the assistant manager and first-team coach Solbakken brought in to work alongside him, had little authority.

When things started to go badly wrong on the pitch, Solbakken was reluctant to read the riot act, prompting Roger Johnson, whose own time at Wolves has been little short of a disaster, to confront the manager in the changing room during the run of three straight league defeats before the Luton game. Johnson, along with a few other players, felt that Solbakken needed to adopt a tougher line and urged him to point the finger. Solbakken, keen to avoid confrontation, refused.

If Solbakken’s departure was inevitable, Saunders’s arrival represented a surprise, in part because of the speed with which things happened but also because he was the only person interviewed. Sean O’Driscoll, who had been harshly dismissed by Nottingham Forest, was available, yet he never got a look in. O’Driscoll went on to take over at Bristol City, where he has picked up 17 points from his 11 games in charge. Saunders has eight points from the same number of matches.

Though, to be fair to Wolves and Dean Saunders, they did win last Saturday.
Pierce Lam is an idiot

Mar 13, 2013

As pslhk might say, I am too busy to read the SCMP myself, so thanks to Bruce for pointing out that Pierce Lam has hit back:

Make better use of subsidy given to ESF

Andrew Nunn's reply ("'Educational apartheid' hitting expats", March 1) to my letter ("ESF admission policy smacks of segregation", February 19) is premised on the allegation about local schools' reluctance to admit non-Cantonese-speaking children.

He claims that English Schools Foundation schools' preferential admission of non-Cantonese-speaking children is a remedy for native-English-speaking children sandwiched between extortionate international schools and unreceptive local schools.

However, according to the Education Bureau, it is "committed to assisting all non-Chinese-speaking students in adapting to the local education system and integrating into the community as early as possible".

In 2011/12, there were 30 "designated schools" each receiving a recurrent annual grant of HK$600,000 for the implementation of school-based measures for non-Chinese-speaking students.

If ESF schools' annual subsidy of HK$283 million is applied for this purpose, half of our local schools can be converted into "designated schools". This will be an equitable solution if the only alternative is to perpetuate Hong Kong's perverse tradition of educational apartheid.

In A Theory of Justice, the seminal work on fairness, the late Harvard philosopher John Rawls proposed that we should determine what is fair from the "original position". It's like a blindfold test where people who do not know their own ethnicities have to choose what is a fair social arrangement.

Given Hong Kong's demographic reality where there is a 98 per cent chance that one belongs to either the non-English-speaking minorities or local Cantonese-speaking populace, it will be a logical impossibility for anyone to consider preferential education for native English speakers as a fair arrangement.

Pierce Lam, Central

Is that what Andrew Nunn was advocating? He actually said that “we should have a "one size fits all" subsidised education system – one that accommodates everyone, whether it be local Chinese, mainland Chinese, Westerners, ethnic minorities or other foreign expatriates.”

Interestingly, there was an article about "designated schools" in the New York Times this week (I read it in the International Herald Tribune), so we have a chance to consider Pierce’s cunning plan:

Caught Between Hong Kong’s Two Systems

HONG KONG — Talwinder Singh considers himself a “Hong Kong citizen” and a native son of the city where he was born. Though he is an Indian passport holder, he has been to India only once. But, unlike most Hong Kongers, he goes to what is called a “designated school,” in which 95 percent of students are, like himself, from ethnic minorities, mostly with South Asian or Southeast Asian backgrounds.

[..] The designated schools were meant to help those who fell into the gap between ethnic Chinese — who make up 94 percent of the population — and the mostly Western expatriates who can afford English-language internationals schools.

It was also after the handover that Hong Kong implemented its “mother-tongue teaching policy,” in which more than 300 secondary schools switched from English to Chinese. Of the remaining 114 secondary schools allowed to continue teaching in English, most were expensive private schools, or elite public schools that are extremely difficult to enter. The spots for minority children were drastically reduced.

“The move was too sudden. The teachers were not well-equipped to teach these minority children,” said Tahir Nadeem Khan, an English teacher and head of community relations at the Islamic Kasim Tuet Memorial College, a designated school. “Many minority students suffered from the policy change.”

“It is racial segregation,” said Fermi Wong, executive director of Hong Kong Unison, a nongovernmental organization that helps minority groups. “Students study in narrow social circles, and they are largely disconnected from the society. Because of the poor quality of education in these schools, they end up not being able to read and write Chinese,” she said. “Their inability to learn the language affects their education opportunities and, subsequently, their employment.”

Well, I am starting to wonder if Pierce Lam knows anything about these "designated schools".

“The reality for many of these ethnic minority children is that they come from low-income families, and they cannot afford to go to the international schools,” said Lam Woon-kwong, chairman of the Hong Kong Equal Opportunities Commission and a former head of the Education Bureau. Hong Kong students leaving the sixth grade have to apply to get into secondary school the next year. The system is based on exam scores, including one on Chinese language ability.

“The competition is keen because local Chinese parents desperately want their kids to get into elite schools to study English, too,” said Mr. Lam, who added that very few minority students made the cut. “It is easy to say minority students are lazy. But they are not slow learners. Many of these students are very talented. Yet no matter how good they are at English and mathematics, they often perform poorly at the primary level due to the Chinese requirement.”

In an ironic twist, ethnic minority students with poor Chinese test scores would not get into the elite schools that teach in their native English, meaning that they ended up back at the Chinese-language schools that failed them in the first place.

It was because of that problem that the designated schools were created [..] but lobbying groups, like Hong Kong Unison, have long argued that a better solution would be to allow more schools to use an alternative curriculum — with English as the first language, and Chinese as the second — and reduce the number of schools in which minority children are separated out.

“The government needs to stop the expansion of designated schools and get these students back into mainstream schools, with the condition that these schools receive effective support,” Ms. Wong said.

So, Pierce Lam’s solution is to take money away from the ESF and use it to establish more schools that provide poor quality education. He’s an idiot.

I can scarcely be bothered to deal with his other point that “it will be a logical impossibility for anyone to consider preferential education for native English speakers“. He’s just not listening, is he?
Pierce Lam vs. ESF (one more time)

Mar 3, 2013

Thanks to James for pointing out that Pierce Lam is still at it.

ESF admission policy smacks of segregation

The English Schools Foundation’s intended change of its admission system is procedural and not substantive. ("ESF to end admission priority for non-Chinese speakers", February 5).

Its current admission system is designed to favour "children who do not speak Cantonese and/or read and write Chinese characters". However, in practice, it has failed the policy objective of giving priority to non-Chinese-speakers. In the words of ESF chief executive Heather Du Quesnay: "It’s pretty difficult to test if the child cannot speak Cantonese. We have never been able to do it. That’s one of the reasons the system didn’t work very well."

In order to better achieve the foundation’s objective of running its schools primarily for non-Chinese-speakers, the ESF will test the children’s English proficiency in stringent interviews and verify "the parents’ commitment to an ESF-style English-medium education through a parental statement and interview".

Instead of bracketing Chinese-speaking applicants as auxiliary candidates to fill places not taken by non-Chinese students, ESF aims to ensure segregation more effectively by adopting a personalised approach based on subjective appraisal of applicants and their parents. It is Ms Du Quesnay’s belief that the new admission process would not reduce the number of non-Chinese students at ESF schools. In fact, it may even reduce ESF schools’ Chinese enrolment.

In education, diversity means an equal opportunity to take part in different education experiences. It differs from segregation, which restricts students’ education experiences according to their socio-racial backgrounds. The ESF’s intended change is not meant to rectify its divisive education policy, but to strengthen its function as a bastion of colonialism that promotes segregation and perpetrates unwarranted privileges for non-Chinese and non-residents based on perverse discrimination.

The HKSAR government must withdraw from the colonial practice of offering two segregated systems of subsidised English-medium education – one for Chinese and the other for non-Chinese. For sustainable long-term development, we must respect our local schools and demand that expatriates who wish to partake in our city’s opportunities respect the system where our own children receive their education.

In Japan, if expatriates want public education, they have to send their children to local schools. It’s time expatriates in Hong Kong learned to respect our local schools which, both in language standards and in the various academic measures, are generally considered superior to schools in Japan and in most of our expatriates’ home countries.

Pierce Lam, Central

‘Educational apartheid’ driving away expat families

I refer to Pierce Lam’s letter ("ESF admission policy smacks of segregation", February 19). I agree with Mr Lam’s argument about segregation in Hong Kong’s education system, and would even go so far as saying that this city is currently plagued by an "educational apartheid".

I share his view that the practice of offering two segregated systems of subsidised English-medium education – one for Chinese and the other for non-Chinese – is long out of date and no longer relevant in post-colonial Hong Kong. I wish to add that, instead, we should have a "one size fits all" subsidised education system – one that accommodates everyone, whether it be local Chinese, mainland Chinese, Westerners, ethnic minorities or other foreign expatriates.

Mr Lam insists that we must respect our local schools, and further states that in Asian countries like Japan, expatriates who want public education for their children have to send them to local schools. He even boasts about Hong Kong’s local schools supposedly being "superior" to schools in Japan and in most of our expatriates’ home countries.

I would like to ask Mr Lam one question. If our local schools really are so superior to schools in other places, why are we seeing so few non-Chinese members of our society sending their children to these schools?

One answer to that I can give is that local schools are reluctant to take on non-Chinese or non-Cantonese speaking children.

On the one hand, Mr Lam criticises the English Schools Foundation for promoting educational segregation, but on the other hand, he fails to acknowledge the local schools’ contribution to this dilemma. So, because of this, the choice given to the city’s expatriates is loud and clear: extortionate international schools, the ESF, or leave Hong Kong.

As many of us are aware, due to limited places at international and ESF schools, many expats are left with only the third choice. As your correspondent correctly points out, we hear about expats in other cities in the region sending their children to local schools with seemingly little trouble.

I’m sure that this is another reason why many foreigners are leaving Hong Kong, as they search elsewhere in the region for better schooling opportunities for their children.

If this city is supposedly Asia’s world city, why is our "superior" education system failing to adopt a similar approach to those of other parts of the world?

Andrew Nunn, Tai Po

Then in the online comments to Andrew Nunn’s letter we have Pierce Lam trying to defend himself. As James correctly points out, it’s where we really see his true colours. What he appears not to understand is that you can’t win this type of debate by insulting your opponents and blindly repeating your own arguments – you have to engage with them.

(more…)

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