Hong Kong-Bridging the gap between East and West

When it comes to higher education , the first few countries and might be the last few countries which comes to mind is USA, UK, Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore……Hmmmmm that’s it. And we start exploring colleges in these countries. This is the mentality with most of the students and thus the competition is very high in these countries no matter whether the universities are popular or not. I.e. even the low ranked universities in these countries manage to find students. Have you ever thought about hong kong or any other countries apart from these famous SAD (study abroad destinations)?????

Before starting to explain about hong kong and how to apply let me tell you that I have offer letter from HKUST for MSc IC design but unfortunately had to decline because I had already accepted an offer from Germany.

·       Surely not. Why?? Because the first and foremost misunderstanding I found among many students is that they think Hong Kong is a city in china or it is part of china. Guys check Wikipedia or Google it out, Hong Kong is a separate Country!!!!!!!

·       Even if you had known that it is a separate country the next misunderstanding is that Language barrier will be there. Yes you are right but partially. Hong Kong is an English speaking country. If you again Google it out you will find one of its official language is English. Cool !!! But I mentioned you are partially right. It’s because local people speak mandarin and Cantonese. But don’t worry generally people speak English.

     Don't expect life in Hong Kong to be boring. Even though it is Asian it is multi cultural and combines life in west and east together. You can find many pubs,bars and cafeteria to hang out and socialize and night life is just as good as in any other place.

·       Are the universities in Hong Kong renowned and degree from there acknowledged? Well I will call it an odd question.

http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2012-13/world-ranking

There are 4 universities from hong kong making it to the top 200 universities in the world in general ranking.If you check rankings in engineering,business you will find hong kong universities among top 100. Of these the worthy mentions are UOHK (University of hong kong) and HKUST (hong kong university of science and technology) closely followed by city university of hong kong.

http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/asian-university-rankings/2012

And these universities are the best in Asia and English is the medium of instruction in all these universities.

Most of the courses are one year so you can finish your course as soon as possible and start your career fresh. You get one year of visa extension after graduating so that you can search for job. But your career is not just limited to hong kong. I got information from many students through FB,linkedin and twitter that many students (alumni) from HKUST and UOHK are working in USA,Taiwan,Singapore,China and ofcourse hong kong. Opportunities are immense particularly in electronics field since china,hong kong are giant manufacturers of ICs and an Msc in IC design in HKUST will be more than enough to fetch you job in greater china or hong kong. A train from hong kong , and you enter china with visa from hong kong since these two countries have agreements for flow of resources without interrupts. An agreement with Mainland China guarantees the compatibility of Hong Kong and Chinese programs of study. Some universities even allow foreign students to "study abroad" for a year or two in Beijing or Shanghai!

Now tuition fee does matter and so does the cost of living. Tuition fee for 1 year is generally around 7lak INR or 13000USD. In hong kong dollars its around $100000 since HKD is around 7 inr.

Cost of living in hong kong is generally high and you end up spending 50000 INR or around 1000 USD per month.But if you are able to get a room in student hall then it ll bring per month requirement to around 750USD which is cheap.

Schoalrships are generally difficult to get for MSc taught programs but for Research Programs you get a healthy 14000HKD per month stipend .

Currently HKUST is ranked 23 in the world for engineering and UOHK is around 35.But these ranks changes from site to site and year by year.

Application Process:-

I think this is where Hong Kong universities excels over other countries. Applcation process is quite straight forward. Go to the university website you are interested in pursuing your degree. All the universities have their own application portal. Create Username passoword. Fill the form online and just upload the documents which have been asked online and pay the application fee which is around 125HKD. Thennnnnn….that’s it. Yup you read it right. Straight forward and best.