Hong Kong Anglican Church to "consolidate" schools by establishing education department, board of directors include three CPPCC members including Paul Kwong and Canon Koon, church members fear governance unification

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(1 Aug)The Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui (SKH) [or the Hong Kong Anglican Church] presently runs 32 secondary schools, 60 primary schools and 30 kindergartens, bringing the total to more than 120 schools altogether. They include traditional elite schools like Diocesan, Heep Yunn, St. Paul's Co-Educational College. These schools under the SKH may undergo some changes in management. Paul Kwong, the Archbishop and Primate of the Province of Hong Kong who will soon retire, stated that the SKH will establish an "education department" to consolidate the currently separate management teams of secondary and primary schools and kindergartens into one "to serve as the only voice of opinion for external communication". He indicated that establishing the education department was not to govern the schools but to provide assistance and cohesion. However, the education department will have a double-layered hierarchy.The board of directors in the upper layer willonly be open to those with official posts in the church, including the archbishop, secretary general and the chancellor. At present, Archbishop Paul Kwong, secretary general Rev Canon Peter Douglas Koon and Chancellor Dr Moses Cheng all hold positions in the National or Local Committee of Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. Some senior church members expressed worry that facilitating patriotic education would diminish diversity in Hong Kong's schools.

A senior church member indicated that the SKH had wanted to establish an education department ever since the Occupy Central movement but the right time to do it came now. He believed that under current social circumstances, the education department's role as the sole mouthpiece would make it difficult to avoid influencing the diversity of schools. "The SKH's educational traditions are diverse. Plus, the [present] school-based management allows each school to have their individual approaches and perspectives on different events. An example is how they dealt with students' strikes and students wearing yellow sashes... but once the future CEO of the education department has announced their position and the SKH spokesperson has publicised [SKH's] stance, it will be difficult to not enforce their values."

This church member used the example of the [pro-Beijing] Alliance for Peace and Democracy, which set up a whistleblowing hotline during Occupy Central in 2014. It exposed and divulged information of the students who participated in strikes to their schools. Ronnie Cheng Kay-yen, the principal of the Diocesan Boys' School Principal responded at the time, "Diocesan boys' matters and Diocesan school matters are our own matters. We appreciate your concern but you need not worry." He pointed out that this was the advantage of diversity in school management. Another church member and former school principal stated that under current social circumstances, it was critical not to centralise. "In times of peace, unifying resources is a good thing and can minimise poor management. It's like enjoying the benefits of working under the same franchise. But if we are unified now, it will be very easy to 'pull us out'." Both of them coincided in their viewpoints in expressing that the Education Bureau had always wanted SKH to have a single mouthpiece to "more easily discuss inculcating patriotic education".

Source: Stand News

https://www.thestandnews.com/politics/聖公會將成立教育部-協調-逾百屬校-鄺保羅等三政協組董事會-教友憂管治統一化/

Translated by: Hong Kong Echo

https://twitter.com/hongkongecho/

#SKH #Education #EducationDepartment #patriotism #NationalSecurityLaw #OccupyCentral