Brain drain in Hong Kong education sector an ‘imminent issue’, warns top adviser to city leader
- Executive Council convenor Bernard Chan says Hong Kong faces problem over movement of pupils and teachers, with some leaving for family reasons
- Recent survey of 140 secondary schools found they had lost almost 4,500 pupils and 1,000 teachers in last academic year
The Hong Kong Association of the Heads of Secondary Schools’ survey found 60 per cent of the pupils who dropped out left for overseas countries, mainland China or Macau, while the number of teachers who emigrated marked a sevenfold increase year on year.
Addressing a panel meeting of the Yidan Prize Summit on “creating a better future through education”, Chan said Hong Kong faced a problem with the movement of teachers and students.
He pointed out that some local institutions had lost teachers who left Hong Kong for “family reasons” or had switched to other schools.
“I think the issue of talent retention is perhaps quite an imminent issue,” Chan said.
He also touched on the problems facing expat international school teachers who had been separated from their families overseas for quite some time because of Covid-19 travel restrictions. The problem was even worse if couples were teaching in the city’s international schools.
