A publicly listed, multi-national foreign education press has recently announced the result of an international study, ranking the quality of country-wide or regional education. Finland, South Korea and Hong Kong came first, second and third, respectively. That comes as a pleasant surprise to Hongkongers. Even the media, which always tends to report the bad news rather than the good, gave a high profile report about this good news.

Hong Kong is truly honored to be ranked as the second runner up, disregarding the level of trustworthiness of such a study released by this foreign press entity. Hongkongers had never dreamt that the city's education development had unexpectedly overtaken that of Britain and the United States in terms of quality education, but also surpassed its chief regional competitors, Singapore and Shanghai, in terms of educational advancement.

The trustworthiness of the study is not considered an important factor. What matters to most, especially to the Hong Kong Education Department which oversees our education system, is that Hong Kong has been named as a sort of "superpower" in the field of education. No one can accuse the city's educational system of lacking in planning, nor can they complain that its curriculum is out of alignment with the frontline of education.

"Nothing can be the best, but everything can be better". Let's hold onto our leader's motto and continue to excel, by learning from the champion and the first runner-up. First, let's look at South Korea. It is said that South Korea's major educational strengths are national education and ethnic education. The South Korean government has insisted on using its official language, Korean, as the medium of instruction across all primary and secondary schools, despite the fact that the Korean vocabularies maybe insufficient.

The use of students' mother language as the language of teaching not only enhances students' sense of achievement in learning, but also stimulates their depth of thinking and their creativity. Particularly, the use of mother language at primary and secondary stage is critical in nurturing students' sense of belonging to their home country. This is the crucial role of national education. When South Korean National Sports delegates go out to participate in world competitions, their drive and enthusiasm to win and bring glory to the country is a clear demonstration of the success of national education in South Korea.

Certainly, we all know the importance of art, creativity and technology is also equally emphasized in the Korean education system. However, the adoption of Chinese in Hong Kong as the medium of instruction is viewed as outdated. Schools which usie Chinese language are being labeled as second class, if not third class institutions. Parents and students refrain from selecting these schools ... why there is such a phenomenon?

Let's take a look at Finland, which is ranked number one in the survey. As revealed by the data, the most important, distinctive feature of education in the country is "balance of wealth" in the society. This feature has created a supportive environment and is the backbone for the education system. All students are treated equally and respectfully by the educational system. The respective potentials of students also are being recognized and nourished. Teaching as a profession is also highly respected in the society.

Returning to the situation in Hong Kong, we see a significantly different picture. Are talented individuals in Hong Kong willing to commit to a teaching career? Indeed, whenever the higher education and career counseling officers of Hong Kong's secondary schools enquire of talented students, whether they will consider a career in education as their first priority, most say no. Has the HKSAR government proactively looked into this situation?

Another strong element of the education system in Finland is its nursery and kindergarten education. The importance of nursery and kindergarten teachers are equally emphasized and respected, vis-a-vis primary and secondary school teachers. The education and professional qualifications of pre-school teachers and thus their remuneration are also comparable to their counterparts in the primary and secondary schools.

What about the situation in Hong Kong? During the last summer holiday, the writer had the opportunity to visit quite a number of nurseries and kindergartens in Hong Kong. It was noticed that most of the teaching facilities and classrooms are housed within tiny areas, unlike anything seen almost anywhere else in the world. Looking at this phenomenon, I think the society really owes its pre-school and kindergarten practitioners.

"One loses by pride and gains by modesty!" - Hong Kong as the second runner-up in this international education ranking survey, must bear this in mind.

The author is vice-chairman of Education Convergence.

(HK Edition 01/08/2013 page3)