The government will devote additional resources to promoting national education among the younger generation, Chief Executive Donald Tsang announced in his policy address yesterday.

Tsang said the SAR government will offer more opportunities for both teachers and students in Hong Kong to join mainland study trips and exchange programs to enhance their knowledge of the country's rapid development.

"Currently, we subsidize about 5,000 secondary students to participate in such trips and programs each year. We will increase the quota to 37,000 to include junior secondary and upper primary students," Tsang said.

According to a government source, additional funding of HK$20 million will be spent on the expansion of the project.

In addition, the source said HK$5 million will be allocated to the Home Affairs Bureau for launching a National Education Scheme for Young People to support national education activities targeting mainly youngsters.

Meanwhile, the source said the government will increase its funding from HK$3 million to HK$6 million to organize lectures and training programs for teachers and students, and to produce web-based teaching materials on the opportunities and challenges in the country's development.

Commenting on the proposed initiatives to promote national education, Education Convergence Vice-chairman Ho Hon-kuen suggested that such measures should be more forward-looking.

"National education should include the study of national history. But it was not mentioned in the policy address," Ho said.

He added that the current education on Chinese history is incomplete, as it has already been merged into a subject called integrated humanities.

"It will be impractical for students to merely participate in the mainland study trips without fully understanding our country's history," Ho said.

(HK Edition 10/16/2008 page1)