The mission of Wu Yee Sun College is Entrepreneurial Spirit with Social Responsibility, hoping to nurture students’ creativity and impact towards the development of a sustainable society. Our College General Education Programme is designed based on this mission. When our College students graduate from their undergraduate studies, they will realize the College General Education Programme defines the difference between students from the nine unique Colleges.
College General Education is one of the key elements of University education, and an essential aspect of general education. The Programme opens the door for students to appreciate the College’s mission, and cultivate their sense of belonging to the College.
As part of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, the major programme provides students with professional knowledge, while general education takes care of whole person development. Specialization in knowledge makes a significant part in University life, but it does not complete the learning process. While society needs specialists, general education adds values to our students by cultivating abilities in critical thinking and integrating different knowledge. The major programme and general education programme complements one another, shaping the uniqueness of CUHK students.
CUHK is the only higher education institution in Hong Kong possessing a collegiate system, and College general education programmes demonstrate the distinctive features of the nine Colleges. The mission of Wu Yee Sun College is Entrepreneurial Spirit with Social Responsibility, hoping to nurture students’ creativity and impact towards the development of a sustainable society. Our College General Education Programme is designed based on this mission. When our College students graduate from their undergraduate studies, they will realize the College General Education Programme defines the difference between students from the nine unique Colleges.
The College General Education Programme is composed of two main components. The first part is credit-bearing, consisting of the first year course, “Creative Social Responsibility and Sustainable Development” and the final year course, “College Senior Seminar”. “Creative Social Responsibility and Sustainable Development” consists of several themes, at which students could look into social issues from different perspectives, and discuss possible paths for the future development of our society. With their own specialties, teachers will walk students through infinite dimensions of our society, and explore possibilities in contributing to its sustainable development, echoing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) set up by the United Nations. In “College Senior Seminar”, College students will integrate their knowledge, observations and experiences throughout their University life, and form groups to propose a creative way to benefit our society at large. They can also choose to sum up their service-learning experience in the past few years, and bring forth innovative ways to contribute to the community.
The second component is non-credit bearing general education activities, including College Forums, High Table Dinners and various student-initiated activities. Students of different years may take this opportunity to mingle with their peers, learn from each other and deepen their friendship.
Looking ahead, service-learning will be the focus of the College General Education Programme. There are many different aspects of the society awaiting us to explore, and service-learning allows students to step out of the campus and to go into the local and global communities. Service-learning provides students the opportunity to ‘learn’ through ‘serving’. Five key elements contributes to service-learning which include planning, service, reflection, evaluation and acknowledgment. In a series of learning activities, we can reflect upon ourselves the good and bad of our own conditions, learn to appreciate and explore ways to sustain the development of the community. This is the lasting significance of service-learning.
We hope our students could equip themselves in the College General Education Programme to become a knowledgeable person who persevere in their endeavours, and an upright talent who is needed by Hong Kong and the world.
