- Education Bureau says schools can resume study tours to mainland or overseas in updated guidelines
- Secondary Five students are required to visit mainland as part of citizenship and social development, but educators ask whether trips can be postponed
Updated health guidelines released by the Education Bureau on Friday said schools can resume mainland study tours, but principals have called for them to be temporarily waived or shortened. Photo: May TseEducational authorities in Hong Kong should waive the requirement that senior students take part in study trips to mainland China or shorten the duration of such visits as the Covid-19 situation on both sides fluctuates, principals have suggested.
Under updated health guidelines released by the Education Bureau on Friday, schools can resume mainland and overseas study tours, which ground to a halt when the coronavirus began to spread in early 2020.
“Schools should take into account the government’s anti-epidemic measures, the operation of schools, the anti-epidemic requirements of other regions and other relevant conditions, in planning their exchange tours to the mainland and overseas.” the guidelines stated.
Cross-border parents’ group fears chaotic return to in-person classes in Hong Kong
As recently as November, the bureau said schools should not arrange overseas exchange tours, except for competitions, due to the risk of infection. The U-turn came after the government last week dropped almost all Covid-19 measures as it prepared to fully reopen its border with the mainland this month.
Secondary Five students are required to join study tours to the mainland as part of liberal studies, which is now called citizenship and social development after the bureau revamped the subject last year following accusations by the pro-Beijing camp the curriculum was radicalising youth.
The subject, introduced in 2009 to enhance social awareness and critical thinking skills, now focuses on encouraging national identity, awareness of national security, and the need to respect the law.
Should schools make study tours mandatory?
Lee Yi-ying, chairwoman of the Subsidised Secondary School Council, said she hoped the mandatory trips could be shortened as much as possible due to the fluid nature of the border reopening and the rising number of infections.
“The trips are aimed at letting students have an experience of looking at the mainland’s development. It is not part of an assessment. Why not keep the trip as short as possible?” she said.
Not only did the schools find it difficult to care for students who became infected with Covid-19, parents also worried whether they should allow their children to take part in such trips, according to Lee.
Out of 21 possible routes and itineraries the bureau provided in July, eight lasted two days, 10 took three days, another ran four days and the remainder spanned five days.
But school heads said the bureau did not follow up with them after they submitted forms showing which tour they intended to join and the possible dates of departure.
Lin Chun-pong, chairman of the Hong Kong Association of the Heads of Secondary Schools, called on authorities to entirely scrap the requirement for Secondary Five students to join mainland tours considering the time for making arrangements was now extremely limited.
“We hope the government will give an exemption to the first cohort of students studying the subject under an approach of special arrangements for special circumstances. We need to manage the risks of the trips as the local daily caseload keeps rising,” he said.
Lin added educators already had their hands full familiarising themselves with the new subject. To also become responsible for their safety on the mainland when the health risks were changing so quickly would be a difficult burden, he said.
He passed the suggestion for an exemption to the bureau last week but officials only said they needed time to work out their plan, he added.
As for overseas study tours which had been suspended for three years, Lee said schools would adopt a prudent approach in arranging them for the next summer vacation.
“Teachers cannot offer any medicine to students as we are not health experts and do not know whether they are allergic to specific drugs,” she said. “I think schools, at most, would only hold short trips to Southeast Asian countries and it would just last for a week.”
Lin said schools would not be keen on arranging overseas study trip at this stage as the pandemic situation all over the world had been fluctuating. But he said it would be possible for schools to arrange for a handful of students to join overseas exchange programmes led by overseas institutions and professional agents.
An Education Bureau spokeswoman, when contacted by the Post, said it would announce the updated arrangement concerning mainland study tours at a suitable time in view of the pandemic and the overall border-reopening situation.