2020.02.04
In order to prevent the spread of the covid-19, the Education Bureau (EB) announced that classes of all schools will be suspended, with classes to be resumed on March 2nd at the earliest. These class suspensions have major impacts on school operations and on students in many aspects. DAB Legislative Councilors Horace Cheung, Vincent Cheng, Holden Chow and Kwun Tong District Councilor Frankie Ngan held an emergency meeting with Secretary for Education Kevin Yeung on February 4th to urge the bureau to deal with home studying, class resumption, public exams and fee payment procedures properly to allay the worries of parents.
Vincent Cheng demanded the government to provide guidelines for schools on providing exercises through electronic platforms. In regards to school fees, the government should consider to pay within limits the school fees, transport fees, lunch and extracurricular activities of government aided schools and Direct Subsidy Scheme (DSS) schools to ease the financial burden on parents. The government should also provide support to kindergartens under operational pressure. Vincent Cheng also proposed to extend the application deadline for the $2500 student subsidy to two weeks after the class resumption. These proposals received proactive responses from the EB.
Frankie Ngan was concerned if supplies of anti-contagion products in schools are sufficient, and urged the EB to enhance the promotion of their free online educational resources.
Horace Cheung said that currently parents are very worried about the arrangements of the DSE and SSPA. The government should carefully evaluate the development of the epidemic and inform parents contingency arrangements after careful study of different options with the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority.
EB said that it may be impossible for students in Primary 6 to take the final SSPA in time if the date of class resumption is too late, and their SSPA scores will only come from the first two exams combined. The government should quickly announce how it will deal with this discrepancy and the DAB will follow up on this matter very closely.
Media Inquiries:
DAB Legislative Councilor Horace Cheung 9681 8757
DAB Legislative Councilor Vincent Cheng 6373 1979
DAB Kwun Tong District Councilor Frankie Ngan 6600 2511