Hong Kong teacher trainer revamps courses to offer joint degrees amid birth rate dip

Hong Kong’s largest teacher training institution will revamp its 11 bachelor’s programmes for educators into joint degree courses to boost graduates’ skill range, as the city braces for the effects of a shrinking school student population.

The Education University of Hong Kong (EdU) has updated course information to show the training programmes will also include non-education elements from the next academic year.

will provide more multidisciplinary courses in the 2025-28 academic years, a university spokeswoman said. Our school combines its past experience in offering dual degree programmes to optimise all bachelor’s degree programmes in education into dual degree programmes and adds multidisciplinary elements to the courses to equip students to develop their talents.

Ng Po-shing, a student guidance consultant with NGO the Hok Yau Club, said the revamp aimed to broaden graduates career pathways in response to a projected decline in the student population.

The Education Bureau published student population projections in April which showed the number of six-year-olds expected to start Primary One would drop from 49,600 this year to 31,500 in 2029, a 36 per cent decrease.

The dual degree programmes can attract students who have not confirmed their future career preferences, while they will be eligible to apply for teaching posts upon graduation.

Low birth rates recorded in 2022 and 2023 also prompted authorities to slash first-year intakes for a government-funded EdU higher diploma course specialising in early childhood education by 20 per cent, cutting the number of spots from the current 330 to 264 for the next academic year.