Some time ago I noted that banks continued to prune branches while the local education industry continued to spawn new universities, and if these trends continued it would eventually be easier to find a university here than an outlet of the bank whose branches used to be proverbially “as common as rice shops”.
We’re not there yet, but we’re close. HSBC is now down to 20 branches while the number of universities has officially risen to 12. This does not include the mysterious University of the Built Environment, which announced its promotion in the Standard recently, but apparently is domiciled in the UK. There are eight recognised post-secondary colleges waiting in the wings. So lots of choices.
Unfortunately this expansion of opportunity has coincided with a drastic drop in the proportion of the population in the late teens and early 20s, whether in the workforce or the general population. Why this has happened – the trend seems to have picked up after 2019 – I leave to your imagination.
Meanwhile, in a possibly unrelated development, the government has increased the proportion of students which the universities it funds can take from outside the territory. The upper limit has now reached 40 per cent. Many of these people are paying through the nose. This is what economists count as an invisible export of services.
So it is a Good Thing. But like all Good Things it comes with costs and one of these has now surfaced. Hong Kong students traditionally solved their accommodation problems by living at home. This is the system still followed in Scotland, though not in England, where leaving home to go to Uni is an important life landmark, albeit an increasingly expensive one.
The usual Hong Kong arrangement when I started teaching was that the parents provided room and board, while the student worked part time to raise fees and spending money. The more well-off universities had “halls of residence” which made no attempt to fit in the entire population, but aimed to provide a taste of communal life for those who wanted it.
We now have the prospect of a severe shortage of accommodation for students from outside Hong Kong. This has not gone unnoticed and last week the permanent secretary (the senior real civil servant, not the DAB apparatchik) in the Development Bureau announced a pilot scheme. The government will relax some planning requirements and procedures for property owners who wish to convert into student housing their hotel or office block.
The secretary, Doris Ho Pui-ling, noted – perhaps tactlessly – disappointing demand from tourists, and high vacancy rates in some commercial offices. Ms Ho said that action on this matter was necessary to support the “Study in Hong Kong” brand and the government had set a quota, as governments do.
Whether it will be met remains to be seen. Real estate people were doubtful, citing conversion costs of $1,500 to $2,000 a square foot, as making it difficult to devise profitable schemes.
The Standard (which has dropped the Mary Ma masquerade and now calls its editorial an editorial, as a respectable newspaper should) opined that student needs should not be met at the expense of tourism; the territory’s hotels were 80-90 per cent full, and the number of overseas tourists was rising.
Well I agree with Ms Ho. If the government wants to have lots of students from other places it needs to provide somewhere for them to live. From my time as a bit of student representative grit in the smooth machinery of university management a few observations.
Conversions of factories and offices are really difficult. They usually feature large floor spaces. The bosses take the spaces round the outside with windows and the peasants work in a big open space in the middle which has no natural light or ventilation. Short of digging a big hole in the middle of the building to provide a light well, or a change in student expectations – do you really need a window? – the floor plan is a problem.
Hotels do not have this issue. Actually many UK universities are happy to let out empty student rooms to budget tourists in the summer. It’s a good deal. The room is simple but you also get the use of a kitchen and a laundry, a boon for travellers on the cheap. I would have thought a basic hotel could be switched to student use with little change.
The price of conversion should not be regarded as fixed. In my experience architects can be quite creative if told firmly enough that their first draft is unaffordable.
There will usually be opposition. I find this a bit surprising but some people think student residences will bring noise and disorder, or depress nearby property prices. No doubt the Standard will not be the only defender of the tourism industry’s interests.
I hope, though, to hear no more of the Standard’s suggestion that students who are studying at Hong Kong universities should live in Shenzhen. It is a curious fact of life that students, who cheerfully waste their time in interesting ways, will not tolerate a long commute.
When the University of Lancaster was planned it was assumed that students would live in nearby Morecambe, a moribund seaside resort with lots of cheap holiday accommodation. This did not happen. Students hated the idea. Readers who have had the misfortune of visiting Morecambe in the winter may find this unsurprising, but it held in other places also.
The “Study in Hong Kong” brand will not long survive the discovery that your student is regarded as a sort of reverse vampire, welcome in Hong Kong only in the hours of daylight.
tim's experiment 