Guangdong can inspire SAR to better serve poorest students

A week after the Guangdong provincial government announced it will provide 300,000 poor students with data packages for e-learning, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region followed in its footsteps on Friday by announcing assistance for needy students to purchase mobile computer devices for the same purpose.

While the difficulties of disadvantaged families in facilitating e-learning of their children should have been factored in while announcing territorywide school closure and follow-up measures in Hong Kong, it is hoped that this policy initiative, though it came in a little late, will be not too little.

Even before the Guangdong government had distributed 30-gigabyte data packages among the province's needy students, it had offered more than 9,200 poor students tablets for e-learning.

According to media reports, the province will also expand free broadband services in the homes of teaching staff and students. This apart, in a clear directive, Guangdong's education department requires the educational authorities to pay close attention to students with no television and internet access as well as left-behind children.

It is certainly heartening to see the government of a neighboring province keeping in mind the needs of poorest students even in times of unprecedented crisis and accordingly formulating need-specific policies.

The aim of universal education is that no child should be left behind, and every time a government takes affirmative action, it translates into more than material benefits - it creates opportunities and encourages even the most left-behind child to rise above his or her circumstances. There is no greater development accelerator than benevolent governance.

Hong Kong, which has a post-intervention child poverty rate of 16.8 percent (as per the Hong Kong Poverty Situation Report 2018, released in December 2019), should have acted sooner when encouraging schools to shift to distance learning for the duration of an epidemic-induced closure.

Teachers and private educators working with Hong Kong's poorest children were apprehensive that such children would be left behind as many came from households that lacked Wi-Fi or the ability to purchase devices compatible with e-learning needs.

As such, the latest initiative of the HKSAR government will be very welcome. "Having regard that many students need to use their own mobile computer devices for e-learning at home during the class suspension period, all public sector schools implementing e-learning can submit applications to the Education Bureau for subsidy under the CCF programme for their students meeting the relevant eligibility criteria," reads a press release issued by the SAR government on Friday. CCF refers to Hong Kong's government-operated Community Care Fund, which has been tasked with implementing the assistance program.

To be fair, the SAR government has taken a number of steps to alleviate the burden of parents across the spectrum. In a written reply in the Legislative Council on Friday, Secretary for Education Kevin Yeung Yun-hung noted, with reference to spending in Hong Kong dollars, "a funding of about HK$900 million ($116 million) is allocated from the Anti-epidemic Fund newly set up by the government to provide an additional HK$1,000 for each recipient of the Student Grant, i.e. an increase from HK$2,500 to HK$3,500 for the 2019/20 school year, benefitting some 900,000 students, including KG students studying in both Scheme-KGs and non Scheme-KGs."

Also, he noted in the same written reply, "In order to help schools replenish their epidemic prevention equipment, clean their school premises and pay for other expenses related to epidemic prevention, the EDB will deploy the existing resources to provide a one-off Special Anti-epidemic Grant to all schools", involving additional spending of HK$42 million, benefiting some 2,200 schools.

The SAR government's heart is in the right place. But unless targeted remedies are administered along with broad-spectrum action, the virus of poverty and resultant lack of opportunities will continue to inhibit Hong Kong's poorest children.

There is a big lesson to be learned in benevolent governance from Guangdong.