Hong Kong faces declining primary school enrolments amid rising international and private school demand

The government must seriously reflect on the rising enrolments at international and private schools even as local schools struggle to keep primary one classes filled

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Alice Wu is a political consultant and a former associate director of the Asia Pacific Media Network at UCLA.

Published: 9:30am, 7 Sep 2026Updated: 10:35am, 7 Sep 2026

The vast majority of Hong Kong’s students are back in school now. With traffic expected to be horrendous last week, it was good that the government sounded the warning early, urging residents to allow more time for their morning commute.

The government did more than that, actually. The Emergency Transport Co-ordination Centre was working at its highest operational tier at 6.30am on September 1 to monitor and coordinate public transport and traffic flow. Deployment of staff on the ground ensured that conditions were reported in real-time. Preparedness wins the day and the government deserves good marks for its efforts. It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark, but it was on our first day of school.

For those averse to change, the start of the school year can be comforting because it can be counted on to bring the same disruptions.

Traffic is one thing, but parents of school-going children know that the first week means suffering from information overload, wading through an avalanche of notices and filling out paperwork into the wee hours.

The certainty extends to the news cycle. Bad behaviour at university orientation camps almost always makes headlines every year. For those of us who have had our share of wild days in our youth, the video of a shirtless young man carrying a young woman wearing a bra and shorts at an orientation camp this year may not seem too troubling. But a former university student is on trial facing multiple charges of rape and indecent assault. Predators have no place in our educational institutions. Youth can never be an excuse.

With couples in Hong Kong increasingly reluctant to have children, the dismal birth rate is no longer news. And so just as the sun rises in the east, we can count on the shutting of Primary One classes in recent years. This academic year, 126 Primary One classes have been wiped out, an 8 per cent decrease year on year. The worst, according to a primary school principal, is yet to come.

Whether our government has given up on boosting the birth rate will be revealed in time, with the chief executive delivering his policy address on September 16. We’ll know then whether baby bonuses will be continued and whether the HK$2,500 (US$318) annual student grant will be resuscitated. If there are no efforts beyond handing out money, we will know our government is out of ideas.