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Yang Yang was facing a difficult choice: Should he attend Tsinghua University in Beijing or Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST)?

As a top student in this year's college entrance examination, the 18-year-old from south China's Guangdong Province received admission notices from both universities. He had been dreaming of studying at Tsinghua since childhood; HKUST, on the other hand, has merely 15 years of history.

After several sleepless nights, he chose to go to Hong Kong, which as a "very painful" choice. In the end, "I admire the history and learning environment at Tsinghua, but I want to experience a more Westernized teaching and learning system in Hong Kong," he said with a timid smile.

Others have made the same choice. In fact, Hong Kong colleges this year are very popular among mainland high school graduates for undergraduate studies.

With a mainland enrolment of 300, the University of Hong Kong has received more than 12,000 applications from mainland students this year, double last year's number; and HKUST, which accepts 160 from the mainland, attracted more than 6,000 students.

Six other Hong Kong universities have also got the green light from the Ministry of Education to recruit mainland undergraduates. They are Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Baptist University, Open University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts and Chu Hai College of Higher Education.

More than 30,000 mainland students have applied for the eight schools, and the ratio of application to enrolment stands at 23:1 on average, according to the ministry.

The applicants are usually "very excellent," said Grace Yang, HKUST Business School's representative in Beijing. She said both Beijing's top science student Yang Huixin and top arts student He Xuan had applied for her school this year.

The minimum marks for HKUST admission in Beijing this year are 657 for science and 625 for liberal arts, almost the same as those of Peking University (Beida) and Tsinghua University, the traditional top dogs on the mainland.

"International," "English teaching," "student-oriented," and "better jobs" are the most frequently mentioned words when students are asked why they apply for universities in the special administrative region.

Ge Li, a girl from east China's Shandong Province with a score of 679 who applied for both HKUST and the University of Hong Kong, said she would have more chances to visit foreign universities or become an international exchange student at a Hong Kong school.

She said she wanted to be a business student, so studying in Hong Kong, an Asian economic centre where a large number of multinational companies are based, would help her future career.

"The curriculum is more internationalized and market-oriented in Hong Kong," she said.

Ge added that she would no longer have to worry about her English, as it is the teaching language in Hong Kong.

"Aha! I don't have to take the boring Band Four and Band Six exams there," she exclaimed. Students at mainland colleges have to pass the College English Test (band 4 and band 6) before getting their bachelor or master's degree.

K.C. Chan, Dean of HKUST Business School, the department with the highest entry requirements in the university, said Hong Kong universities have an advantage in teaching methods over mainland schools.

"We encourage students to be creative and independent," he said. "We offer them more individualized guidance and much more one-on-one communication."

Huang Shengyao, a public relations and advertising major who has just completed her first year at Hong Kong Baptist University last month, said schoolwork was a little hard at the beginning because the teaching methods are so different in Hong Kong. But she soon got used to it and is now "very comfortable with the Western-style learning experience," said the 20-year-old Jiangsu native.

Students from the mainland would have one-year preparatory training before three-years undergraduate study at a Hong Kong school. Huang said the training is based on English language skills and some basic Cantonese to facilitate their daily communication with locals.

Chan also mentioned the importance of the English interview when they decide which student to recruit. Besides exam scores the only enrolment standard for mainland colleges, communication skills, logical thinking, a sound personality and good oral English are all important.

"Students in our programmes will be exposed to all-round training. It is therefore important to evaluate them from different perspectives to make sure that they will fit in well and really get the full benefits of the education experience that we provide," he said.

Interview topics could range from "Shenzhou spacecraft," "ageing society," "environmental protection" to some very detailed questions such as "if no scholarship is offered, will you still come?"

However, eight out of 10 applicants said they would not go to Hong Kong without a scholarship, because they could not afford the high tuition and living expenses, according to a China Daily survey.

Four years of study in a Hong Kong college cost at least 400,000 yuan (US$50,000), but figures from the Ministry of Labour and Social Security show that the average annual income for a mainland worker was less than 19,000 yuan (US$2,735) last year.

In order not to lose out on excellent students, Hong Kong universities are offering a large number of scholarships. Top students may each get scholarships of up to 450,000 yuan (US$56,250) from HKUST, Chan said.

The University of Hong Kong will also offer 100 mainland students either full or partial scholarship based on their overall performances.

But Li Xiaolu, a female student who attended HKUST's interview, said even if she was granted a full scholarship she would not go to Hong Kong.

"I don't fit in there," she said, adding that she was quite introverted and felt mainland universities are better for basic science studies.

She refuted some scholars' claims that Beida and Tsinghua have degenerated into second-rate schools. "They are always the dream for millions of Chinese high school graduates," she said.

Tu Ping, associate dean of Beida's Guanghua School of Management, said the Hong Kong upsurge was actually exaggerated by the media.

"The media are writing free advertisements for Hong Kong schools," he said, adding that Hong Kong schools' recruitment would not affect the student quality in Beida.

Hong Kong universities promote themselves by offering high scholarships, "but they are only to a very limited number of top students," Tu said. "Actually, the top 10 students are not much different from the top 100, or the top 1,000. Even if they have all the No 1 students, we will still have enough good ones."

Many top students who applied for Hong Kong schools also applied for Beida or Tsinghua, because both schools could accept them at the same time.

Tu said that is another reason for the rising popularity of Hong Kong schools. If students apply for two top mainland schools, they are not likely to be recruited by both, although theoretically they can.

Gu Haibin, a professor from the economic management department of Renmin University of China, echoed that the impact of Hong Kong schools will be very limited if they do not increase the enrolment.

Compared to the mainland university enrolment of 2.6 million out of 8.8 million examinees this year, the 1,300 vacancies offered by Hong Kong colleges is too limited.

But Gu said mainland schools such as Beida and Tsinghua should feel the pressure and act to improve their teaching system, as with China's further opening up, many foreign universities may also come to China to recruit students for undergraduate studies.

In response to that, Tu said Beida welcomes competition, and such competition is good for both school and students.

"We've opened some classes to experiment with new teaching methods and we will carry on with that," he said. "And I'm glad that students have more choices."

(China Daily July 25, 2006)