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At the University of Hong Kong, over 4,500 scholarships, with a total value of close to HK$170M, are awarded to talented students each year. Apart from supporting students with their undergraduate and postgraduate studies here at HKU, enrichment scholarships are available to encourage students to broaden their horizons and participate in learning activities outside of Hong Kong. There are also scholarships for students with special educational needs and students who wish to pursue further studies overseas.

One of the schemes which support undergraduate students in achieving their dreams and aspirations is the HSBC Hong Kong Scholarship. Generously funded by HSBC, this scheme recognised 12 outstanding HKU undergraduate students in the academic year 2017-18, with awards of HK$50,000 each. HSBC also sponsors/co-sponsors other schemes that are open to HKU students, such as the HSBC Overseas Scholarships, HSBC Social Work Scholarships, Innovation and Technology Scholarship Awards.

Biographies of the three HKU awardees:

Oliver Tse is a Bachelor of Business Administration (Law) and Bachelor of Laws Year 2 student at HKU. He is the first generation in his family to pursue university education. He has chosen to study law because he enjoys public speaking and presenting arguments. He also wants to be able to help people seek justice. Oliver is particularly passionate about public law and human rights law (such as transsexual cases). He aspires to safeguard rights and drive social changes as a human rights barrister.

Oliver has now dedicated himself to helping underprivileged students by offering free tutorials on English to Form 6 students at his alma mater, Bishop Hall Jubilee School. Apart from teaching study skills, he also explained past papers and HKEAA reports to his students. He even designed his own teaching notes and got his friends to share sample 5** essays. His students found the tutorials useful and insightful.

Furthermore, Oliver borrowed equipment from friends to produce free Physics tutorial videos. Different from other offerings, Oliver’s videos on YouTube focus on the HKDSE curriculum and include detailed explanations on physics concepts as well as exercises. He has produced free downloadable study notes too.

Going forward, Oliver is planning to form a team with his friends to make videos on the subject of law for the public. Oliver believes that law should be accessible to all and so he wants to play a part in public legal education using a relaxed, easy-to-understand approach. He will also explore the possibility of making online videos on other subjects, and working with fellow university students to set up an NGO to provide free tutorials for needy students.

Even Leung is a Year 3 student of the Bachelor of Science programme at HKU.

Although born and raised in Hong Kong, she has always preferred the serenity of the countryside over the hustle and bustle of the city. Even’s love for nature was instilled by her father who studied biology. He started teaching Even about wildlife when she was small and frequently took her to country parks and beaches.

Even’s passion for nature and wildlife has continued to grow after she decided to major in Ecology & Biodiversity. She has not only been able to interact with peers and teachers who share her interest but her studies has also offered her many eye-opening opportunities.

For example, Even was offered an internship at Outdoor Wildlife Learning Hong Kong (OWLHK) last summer. OWLHK is an organization that aims at promoting environmental education and local ecology and biodiversity to the public. Through this internship, Even learned how to organise environmental education programmes. She found it a most rewarding experience as participants who started off with little knowledge about nature turned into conversation enthusiasts by the end of the programme.

Even also got the opportunity to work as a student helper at the HKU Plant Systematics Laboratory. She is helping with the laboratory work of a research on Thismia tentaculata (三絲水玉杯), a critically endangered plant that is only found in Hong Kong and Vietnam. The main objective of this project is to understand the reproductive biology of the species so that conservation plans can be formulated.

Even’s next project will be to help with a research on Thismia hongkongensis (香港水玉杯). She will also continue to actively participate in environmental education programmes and to contribute to the promotion of ecology and conservation in Hong Kong. Even aspires to become an environmental educator and researcher. She plans to pursue PhD studies overseas so that she can bring global perspectives on environmental education and research back to Hong Kong.

Jessie Ho is a Year 3 student majoring in Biochemistry at HKU. When Jessie was little, she was a quiet, avid reader. Her mother’s friends thought that she would go on to study arts and humanities.

However, one day, she proudly showed her mother a sketch of her “invention” - roller skates with contractible rocket boosters and other functionalities. Realising Jessie’s interest in science, her mother bought her related books and patiently went over Jessie’s designs and offered suggestions. Jessie’s interests grew and diversified, from dinosaurs to extreme weather. She was interested in them all.

Even after her father left and the family’s finances tightened, Jessie’s mother never stopped her from exploring the world of STEM. In fact, she offered Jessie more encouragement than before as she believed that poverty should not prevent her children from realising their potential. Jessie’s school was also very supportive and offered her additional opportunities to study biology.

Jessie is now working on her final year project in Dr Alan Wong’s laboratory under HKU’s Undergraduate Research Fellowship Programme. Her project is focused on increasing the number of gene combinations that can be studied on the (CombiGEM)-CRISPR (a genome modification and screeningl) platform, by expanding the technology currently available. This will enable a better understanding of how multiple genes may interact with each other.

Jessie plans to pursue PhD studies as one of the steps towards becoming an academic. She wants to contribute to the development and expansion of new biotechnologies in the area of disease biology. She hopes that new and improved techniques would assist researchers in their studies of complex diseases and devising appropriate therapeutic strategies.

Media enquiries
Communication and Public Affairs Office:
Ms Trinni Choy (Tel: 2859 2606/ Email: pychoy@hku.hk)
Ms Rashida Suffiad (Tel: 2857 8555/ email: rsuffiad@hku.hk)