Other than the "historical legacy", there is really no reason for the government to continue subsidizing the English Schools Foundation which operates five secondary schools, nine primary schools and one for students with special needs in Hong Kong.

As Secretary for Education Michael Suen Ming-yeung has said, "ESF's funding issue is a problem arising from a historical legacy, which needs to be resolved."

ESF was established specifically to provide education to expatriate - mainly British - children living in Hong Kong. But in recent years, nearly half the students attending the various ESF schools are children of local Chinese parents, who are convinced about the benefits of an all-English language education.

For these parents, ESF schools are preferred over other international schools because of their comparatively lower fees.

The question is why tax payers' money should be used to subsidize ESF schools which are little different from any other private international school? Instead, the government should consider a program to provide financial help to children of non-Chinese speaking expatriates who cannot afford the lofty fees of the international schools.

Hong Kong parents should realize that their children can excel in learning English at many local schools. A language learning expert in Hong Kong has suggested that there is actually an advantage for local students to learn English from non-native speakers.

That will make the students less inhibited in speaking the language with an accent which, for most non-native speakers, is impossible to eradicate.

Many years ago when I was a student at a local school, my teacher told me that reading was the only way I could improve my English. As I related in one of my earlier columns, the teacher lent me several books, including a few James Bond novels by Ian Flaming, to start me on my reading habit.

Bond may be old school. However, the Jason Bourne series by Robert Ludlum can certainly excite the young minds of your sons as the exploits of agent 007 did to mine.

An intern at our Shanghai office, who is going to graduate school at Harvard University this autumn, told me she has been an avid reader of English language books since she was in junior high school. Her reading ranged from the English translation of the arcane writings of ancient philosophers, the melancholic verses of John Keats to the pulp fiction of love and romance that make teenage girls swoon.

I accompanied her to several interviews with senior expatriate executives, and edited many stories she wrote for the newspaper. She spoke English with confidence and her writings showed little trace of the fact that she was a non-native speaker of the language.

What I want to emphasis here is that she has never spent a day studying at an all English-speaking school. She was never known to be a particularly gifted child of unusual talent. She's just an ordinary girl who has developed a keen interest in reading.

Hong Kong parents who cannot afford to send their children to either the ESF schools or any other international school should not feel deprived. With a little patience and at very little cost, they can help their children master the English language by introducing them to the magic world of books. As my teacher so emphatically said: there is no better way to improve your language skill than reading.

The author is a staff writer.

(HK Edition 07/12/2011 page3)