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Jennifer Cheng
Hong Kong students who consider the International Baccalaureate and Diploma of Secondary Education unsuitable pursue a third course in their free time or at private study centres.
Man Wai-ho may be severely intellectually disabled, but he can steer a flying carpet - at least in 3D virtual reality using a program that recognises body gestures. The Interactive Sensory Program for Affective Learning (InSPAL) was developed three years ago specifically to help students like Man with severe intellectual disabilities.
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Cross-border pupils are finding that going back and forth between Hong Kong and the mainland every day is an experience that can also be stressful. That's why a partnership of two non-profit organisations, one in Shenzhen and one in Hong Kong, has been helping them adjust to school life here.
Not every child can express verbally what is in his or her heart, but parents can learn a lot through playing or reading a book with their child. While parents can do this at home, Cheryl Shanahan, an early childhood therapist at the Southside Family Health Centre, says it's sometimes necessary to consult a professional if a child needs guidance in development or to overcome an obstacle.
With his sporty clothing, love of basketball and gentle yet firm voice, Louis Yip does not fit the stereotype of a reclusive secondary-school dropout. But the 19-year-old once quit his classes and spent a full year as a recluse, playing video games at home. He joined a growing army of jobless school leavers who are not engaged in education or training - the so-called "non-engaged youths".
When Nong packed her bags for a trip to Hong Kong in 2009, she knew she would miss her three young children and husband in Thailand but felt a short break would do her good. But just hours after she arrived in the city, Nong (not her real name) was plunged into a nightmare that involved kidnap, rape, and threats to her family back home.
Justice officials will record and map cases of sex trafficking, enforced labour and abuse of domestic helpers in the fight against what Director of Public Prosecutions Kevin Zervos has described as "modern-day slavery".
The idea initially was to help children get in touch with their emotions - joy, anger, sadness and fear. "We want to teach the children how to use words rather than actions to express themselves," principal Hilda Pang Mei-ling said.
A leadership crisis at the Independent Commission Against Corruption was tackled by the Legislative Council's Security Committee yesterday. As the anti-graft agency tackled accusations levelled at some of the most powerful people in the city last summer, it found itself in the "less than ideal situation" of having to bring someone back from retirement in order to fill a vital position.
Mui Wo residents have doubled a reward for a suspected poisoner after a fifth dog died an excruciating death in the Lantau town. A pedigree Scottish terrier owned by local resident Lynn Charleston convulsed and died yesterday, after apparently consuming poisoned bait while on a walk with its owner that morning.
You couldn't pay most people in Hong Kong to cut someone else's ear hairs or toenails. But there is one woman who has been performing this service for the elderly and hospital patients for the past 27 years - for free. Jenny Law Chun-heung, 62, transforms the quiet halls of Grantham Hospital in Wong Chuk Hang into a hair salon every second Thursday of the month.
The Hong Kong travel agency accused of leaving mainland tourists to sleep in their coach overnight had its licence revoked yesterday. But it could be operating again in nine months. Emerging after a 6 ½ hour meeting with the Travel Agents Registry, Wong Wing-kin, the owner of 3A Holidays, said the registry had made the decision due to public interest.
In Lan Kwai Fong on Friday, a monk dressed in an orange robe was seen begging for alms by tapping men on the shoulder.
One police source familiar with a rising trend of bogus Buddhist monks visiting Hong Kong as "professional beggars" said they may be violating their three-month visitor visas.
The world's largest sailing ship in operation paid a visit to Hong Kong for the first time yesterday. The Sedov, a 92-year-old Russian windjammer, sailed into the harbour and to its berth at the Ocean Terminal in Tsim Sha Tsui, where the public will be able to see and board it.
Manchester United fans queued for hours for tickets to a game this summer in Hong Kong, only to find that even the most expensive seats available were in the corners of the stadium.
Hongkongers seeking a good living are being offered the chance to become "seed planters, not bean counters" in a university programme aimed at encouraging entrepreneurs. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) account for about 98 per cent of the city's economy and provided 47 per cent of total employment - excluding the civil service - at the end of last year, according to the Trade and Industry Department.
The story the audience gathered in a University of Hong Kong lecture hall heard was chilling - how a woman was sexually abused as a child in Hong Kong by a family friend while her parents socialised in the living room. The story was part of the global One Billion Rising campaign - which yesterday attempted to draw out a billion people to protest against violence against women.
This year the campaign is promoting "One Billion Rising" - an effort to get a billion people around the world to protest against violence against women. The billion figure also refers to a UN finding that one in every three women will be beaten, coerced into sex or otherwise abused in her lifetime.
Htoi Awng and two other Kachin students in Hong Kong shared their experience at a fundraising concert for Kachin refugees last week, raising over HK$5,000 for the Relief Action Network charity.
