University of Hong Kong Museum and Art Gallery

The University of Hong Kong (HKU) is Hong Kong's first and foremost tertiary institution.  It was founded in 1911 on the initiative of the governor of Hong Kong, Sir Frederick Lugard, who negotiated a generous donation from the Parsee merchant Sir Hormusjee Nowrojee Mody.  The University was established to provide a modern tertiary education in the English language, based on the British education system, for both Chinese and expatriate students in Asia.  It incorporated the Hong Kong College of Medicine, which had been teaching western medical science since 1887. 

The University began life with three Faculties: Medicine, Engineering, and Arts.  Before the Second World War most of its students came from Hong Kong, mainland China, and the British colony of Malaya, forming part of an intellectual elite that laid the foundations for Asia's modernisation.  One of the University's proudest connections in its early days was with Dr Sun Yat-sen, the founder of modern China who graduated with a Licentiate in Medicine and Surgery from the Hong Kong College of Medicine in 1892. 

The University admitted its first female undergraduate, the daughter of the then Director of Education, in 1921.  The School of Chinese Studies was founded in 1927, and in 1939 the Science faculty was established as the University's fourth.  In 1941, teaching was suspended due to the Japanese occupation.

Today the University attracts just over 20,000 students and 2,300 academic staff from Hong Kong and internationally.  Around 7,100 students graduate from the University annually.  The main campus houses eight of the University's faculties and features a mixture of colonial and modern architectural styles.  The Faculties of Medicine and Dentistry are based at Queen Mary hospital and Prince Philip Dental Hospital.

 

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