Last Saturday (15th), Kong Academy Da Cheng Primary School in Wong Tai Sin District announced that it will be closing down after the end of the 2025/26 academic year, and students from Primary One to Primary Four will need to transfer to other schools. Principal Yuen Pun Suk-yan and several members of the School Incorporated Management Committee held a press conference at the school yesterday evening, criticizing the decision made by the school organizing body and mentioned they were unaware of the decision made by supervisor Tang Wai-lun in April to close down the school.
Currently, Da Cheng Primary School has a total of 178 students, with around 90 students from Primary One to Primary Four. With Kong Academy’s decision to cease operations, only current Primary Five and Primary Six students will be able to graduate from the school. Supervisor Tang Wai-lun had previously mentioned in an interview with the media that the school had been facing enrollment issues in recent years and was on the brink of closure when they had to organize a class without any students last year, signaling the beginning of the consideration to shut down. The school later allocated nearly HK$1 million to run a “private class,” allowing them to offer a Primary One class this year. The enrollment for Primary One for the 2024/25 school year was also sufficient to open a class.
Tang Wai-lun also stated that he had been in contact with four other primary schools in the district, and currently, students from Primary One to Primary Four can transfer to these schools. Transferring students will receive a scholarship of HK$10,000 to assist parents in purchasing new school uniforms and textbooks. For Primary One students currently studying in the private class, if they transfer to other private schools, they will be provided with subsidies ranging from HK$48,000 to HK$50,000 based on the median fees of private primary schools in the district.
Principal Yuen Pun Suk-yan and several members of the School Incorporated Management Committee held a press conference at the school yesterday evening. Yuen Pun Suk-yan pointed out that six members of the School Incorporated Management Committee had jointly requested Kong Academy to withdraw the plan to close down.
She criticized the other party for ignoring the efforts of the School Incorporated Management Committee and school staff over the years. She questioned the appropriateness of the supervisor’s actions and the lack of communication about the decision to close the school. The School Incorporated Management Committee also questioned why the school management, principal, staff, and parents were unaware of the decision, whereas staff from the four other schools were already informed and promoting enrollment.
She revealed that on December 13th last year, the supervisor called her to discuss signing a contract with an organization to convert the school to a private institution. When she requested related documents, it was discovered that the organization involved two former senior officials from the Education Bureau, raising concerns about their involvement in the situation despite seeking help and intervention from the Education Bureau, but “the Education Bureau did not do much to assist us.”
Afterward, she and the School Management Committee representative, lawyer Lau Ka-wah, found “unsafe areas” in the relevant documents, such as subscribing to bonds, and after reporting to Kong Academy’s president Tang On-ka, Tang indicated that they would not cooperate with the organization, instructing them to “handle the school well,” which reassured Yuen Pun Suk-yan at the time.
She mentioned that Tang Wai-lun had communicated with her about converting to a private school and urged to convene a School Incorporated Management Committee meeting to discuss contract matters, but Tang “consistently refused to convene a meeting” and had not mentioned the decision to close down the school. During the period, Tang Wai-lun had asked her to pause enrollment, which she questioned but then resumed enrollment a week later.
On June 11th, Tang Wai-lun mentioned again about converting to a private school, and Yuen Pun Suk-yan once again asked for a School Incorporated Management Committee meeting, but he still refused. Regarding signing a contract, when pressed for details, Tang replied, “not signed, not decided,” and felt that Tang “cannot assume that we were aware of the decision” emphasizing that they were unaware of the decision to close the school.
Yuen Pun Suk-yan cited an earlier statement by Kong Academy, mentioning that since 2023, the school had not received funding from the Education Bureau to open a Primary One class, requiring over a million dollars to maintain operations, posing financial difficulties. However, she noted that the relevant fees were paid from the School Development Fund as urgent expenses, indicating that “Kong Academy did not provide additional financial investment in this matter, contrary to what they had discussed.”
She further stated that Da Cheng Primary School had 23 classes from 2019 to 2022, then assigned a “zero class.” However, just before September, 24 students had applied to join the reestablished class, but Kong Academy decided to close down without consulting the School Incorporated Management Committee, disregarding the enrollment status, which she found puzzling. She mentioned that since taking office in 2013, the percentage of graduates entering secondary schools had increased from 6% to 26%, a testament to the efforts made by both staff and students.
School Management Committee representative Lau Ka-wah stated that the announcement of the closure shocked the School Incorporated Management Committee, who were unable to accept it, questioning why the school organizing body would destroy its own child “without external pressure”? He described the School Incorporated Management Committee as being kept in the dark, with news from other local primary schools being more informed than them. He further revealed that Tang Wai-lun had signed a contract with an organization to operate the school, intending to use the name of a certain UK school to contract the school.
Lau Ka-wah mentioned that they had suddenly received a request from the supervisor to hold a full school meeting with parents and staff, but were unaware of the discussion content. He pointed out that the school organizing body is urgently pushing to close down, bypassing the School Incorporated Management Committee, “We have repeatedly mentioned the need for a committee meeting, but it refuses to convene,” and using “semantic tricks” to claim that the parent meeting is a “meeting” causing concern among parents and students.
Lau Ka-wah stated that they had sent a lawyer’s letter to the Education Bureau after the incident, requesting their intervention, “If our School Incorporated Management Committee is being trampled like this by the supervisor, the Hong Kong government and the Education Bureau must take responsibility for handling it,” urging the Education Bureau to respond. Lau urged the school organizing body to provide “valid evidence” and explain the details of the earlier promise of a HK$6 million fund to support students transferring to other schools.
Parent School Management Committee representative Poon Yim-kwan expressed that the incident has raised concerns among them about their children’s future and re-adaptation, considering the students as victims. She mentioned that they had requested Kong Academy several times not to separate classes and to convene a full parent meeting with a minimum notice of 14 days, but criticized that Kong Academy ignored their demands, providing only a 3-day notice and organizing a meeting in an unorthodox manner, with only 4 parents attending and no staff present.
Teacher School Management Committee representative Mok Yuen-saan mentioned that Kong Academy claimed they would transfer teachers to teach at other schools under their umbrella, despite Kong Academy having only Da Cheng Primary School under them, and only one secondary school. According to relevant regulations, primary school teachers without training are not allowed to teach at a secondary school, questioning if Kong Academy misled the public. ◇