Students from Hong Kong, the mainland and overseas at a seminar discussion at the Faculty of Engineering, HKU. Provided to China Daily

Hong Kong continues to exert its magical charm, attracting top students from the mainland, who come here in preference to some of the top mainland universities. Kane Wu reports.

Li Taibo does not appear as nervous, or even as curious as his fellow college freshmen. The 20-year-old from Beijing has just arrived in Hong Kong to start his first year at the University of Hong Kong (HKU).

"It is not my first time at HKU," says the spare looking young man, roughly 1.8 meters tall. Apart from his demeanor he doesn't stand out, wearing glasses, a T-shirt with the school logo, sports pants, the standard student look that blends right in. What really separates him the crowd is that Li achieved the top score in the 2010 National College Entrance Exam (science subjects) in Beijing. After what he described as "painstaking" consideration among offers from the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), Tsinghua University and Peking University: all top universities in China, he chose HKU.

"Before I took the college entrance exam, I already had an offer from Peking University in a prior round of selection among top students recommended by their high schools," Li says. The graduate of the High School Affiliated to Renmin University of China, one of the best high schools in Beijing, had won far more prizes and honors than he can recount: top prize in the national maths competition, constant winner of the Olympic Maths Competition in Beijing, president of the Student Union, organizer of Mock UN, just to name a few. Li also attracted attention from HKU in that selection round jointly organized by the two universities.

"My high school life would be so incomplete if I gave up the college entrance exam, so I turned down the offer from Peking U and decided to take the challenge." He relates the story with such casual ease that any among the uninitiated may not understand that Li had turned down an invitation from China's elite university.

It may have seemed like no big deal to Li. He had applications everywhere, Princeton, Yale, Harvard. Those prestige American universities passed him by during their selection process. He was disappointed, but the temporary setback was soon forgotten when he found himself bombarded by soon calls from the media and top universities when he, not surprisingly, was declared the top student in the college entrance exam.

"Tsinghua University called immediately after my score was announced to the public. They invited me to a campus tour in their electronic engineering department, and the department head treated me to a fine dinner," says Li, who is now enrolled in a double-major program at HKU, studying biomedical engineering and business administration.

At the same time, Li got offers from the three top universities in Hong Kong. "I still went through the application and interview rounds. Suddenly I found myself tangled in these choices," Li says. All the universities promised to give him full scholarships throughout the academic years. All promised to grant him whatever he preferred as his major.

"HKUST called and said they were willing to sponsor me on a campus tour before I made my final decision. But I wanted to visit HKU as well, so I bought a plane tickets myself and came here," Li says.

That was at the end of June 2010, with less than a week before he had to make a choice from among the offers he had received Li was overwhelmed by the reception he had at the Hong Kong universities.

"HKU's Faculty of Engineering sent three professors to greet me and took me through the faculty's laboratories. The acting dean of the faculty came and the director of the department," he tells China Daily. Afterwards, he went to the Faculty of Law and the School of Business and Administration. Both faculties sent professors for extended talks with him. "All the talks with professors lasted for more than an hour. Student volunteers also showed me around the campus. I spent an entire day at the HKU campus," Li says.

The very next day he was greeted by the vice president of HKUST, along with the director of the program in which he intended to enroll, and a visiting professor from a top university in the US. "I had never imagined I'd be treated like this. I was thrilled and became even more indecisive," Li says. Eventually he picked HKU, and took his foundation year at Tsinghua University.

"At the time he got so many offers. He said he wanted to come and take a look anyway, so we talked with him and showed him what we have got here," says Professor George Tham, associate dean (undergraduate programs) of the Faculty of Engineering, HKU, who met Li a year ago. "After all, he is such an outstanding student."

"But of course the university didn't force him to make any decision. It was all his choice," he adds.

It happens every summer after the national college entrance examination that the top 100 or 200 students from each province are sought after by the mainland's top universities. Tsinghua University and Peking University land most of them, but the scenario is changing in recent years as more and more top scorers, or the so-called zhuangyuan in Chinese, have chosen to study in Hong Kong.

This year 11 students who achieved top scores in their provinces were admitted by HKU. The university also admitted six city top scorers. The total number of zhuangyuan doubled over last year at HKU. "In fact, we received applications from more than 40 provincial top scorers from the mainland," Isabella Wong, director of China Affairs at HKU, tells China Daily.

According to HKU, more than 100 mainland students admitted this year were among the top three in their respective provinces. More than 10 students enrolled at HKU won gold medals in the national Olympic science competitions. CUHK also proudly announced in July that it admitted some 60 students from the mainland whose scores were among the top five in their provinces. "Almost everyone from the mainland that we admitted this year was among the top 0.1 percent in their provinces," CUHK said in a press release.

On the mainland, the media raised sensational headlines like "why are we losing our top students to Hong Kong" and "why is HKU the top mainland students' first choice". At the same time, reports about top mainland universities using extreme methods to win over top students emerged.

The Southern Weekend, a weekly newspaper in Guangzhou, reported in early July that Fudan University and Shanghai Jiaotong University, the top two universities in Shanghai, were making false phone calls to top students, attempting to persuade students to change their university choices.

The report also revealed that almost every top university on the mainland designates a teacher based in each province, specifically for the purpose of student admissions. As soon as exam results are out, these teachers start calling top students and the provincial education bureaus, trying to lure them into their universities. "It's like an intelligence war," said one of the teachers interviewed by the newspaper.

Li Qingyang, the top scorer in Zhejiang province (science subjects) in 2007, who just graduated from the School of Economics and Finance at HKU, would have preferred Peking University, had the designated teacher there not failed to transfer her application from a Shanghai university.

"I got an offer from the Shanghai university long before I took the college entrance exam, and the admission policy that year in my province dictated that students in that situation were not allowed to change applications after their results were out," the 23-year-old Hangzhou girl tells China Daily.

When her zhuangyuan status became public, a teacher from Peking University called the university in Shanghai and the education authority in Zhejiang that is responsible for student placement many times, trying to move Li to her preferred university in Beijing. But the teacher's attempt failed and Li eyed on HKU, the then top ranking university in Hong Kong, instead. The Shanghai university is highly ranked but its stature still does not match the top schools in Beijing.

Hong Kong universities seem to be winning in the chase of the elites. But unlike their mainland counterparts, they are toning down the zhuangyuan phenomenon.

"We are not trying to 'win' over these top students. We just happen to have them," Professor Tsui Lap-chee, vice-chancellor of HKU, told mainland media in late July. He stressed that the choice between the university and the students was mutual.

"Top students have excellent academic performances but HKU looks for more than only test scores. We will see a student's potential and overall ability. We don't give you an offer just because you are a 'zhuangyuan'," Isabella Wong says. "Every student is equally important to us." HKU declined almost two-thirds of top scorers in this year's selection, according to its figures.

"We don't have any particular strategy to admit zhuangyuan. In fact they all went through the same interview rounds with other students at the same time. We don't contact him in advance," says Professor Tam Kar-yan, associate provost, dean of students, and chair professor of the Department of Information Systems, Business Statistics and Operations Management at HKUST. The university nailed the top scorer in Beijing in science subjects this year, adding the total number of zhuangyuan admitted by the university in the past seven years to nine.

"We always follow the guidelines of the Ministry of Education when admitting students from the mainland. Our policies are very transparent and we make sure that every procedure is carried out as planned," adds Euphemia Chow, assistant director of HKUST's Undergraduate Recruitment and Admission Office. "Our goal is to admit an excellent body of students."

Tam isn't worried about the competition among Hong Kong universities for top mainland students. "Universities in Hong Kong compete for local students as well. HKUST focuses on science, engineering and business. If you want to be a doctor or a lawyer, you should probably go to HKU or CUHK," he says.

"Competitions among universities are natural. HKU has good relations with Tsinghua and Peking U. I think they both are very rational institutions. The competition is benign," Wong of HKU says.

The university even offered to take Li Taibo to HKUST last year when he was touring Hong Kong universities. "I was so surprised that universities here could be so friendly towards each other. They were not competing for me at all," Li says in retrospect.

"The university won't hurt much just because we lose a zhuangyuan. Our reputation is passed on from one generation of students to another," Wong says. "Maybe there is some public relation effect from these top students, but we can't afford to infringe students' interests in order to keep the good image of the university. We can't see them as the university's private assets."

"Of course every university wants to have the best students but Harvard will never brag about recruiting a student who got the top score in SAT. Top universities don't need zhuangyuan to promote their images," Tam says. "Contrarily, we should not take top students who don't fit in. Scores are not everything. We should pick the suitable students and cultivate them to become future leaders of China."

Li Taibo thinks HKU is the most suitable place for his academic and professional development. "My goal in life is to contribute to mankind and share my creative ideas with society. I think engineering is the most practical way to do that," he says. "My personality and ability can find a home here in Hong Kong."

He is busy attending orientation camps before his first semester at HKU starts in September. "Students from previous years are guiding us to getting ourselves around in the campus and make more friends," he says. He almost got lost on his way to the Starbucks at HKU, where he was to be interviewed for this story.

(HK Edition 08/11/2011 page4)