More Hong Kong students are choosing to study at universities in the Chinese mainland after significant development of its higher education system in recent years.
There were 15,700 Hong Kong students at more than 300 mainland universities as of June, and 361 mainland universities have enrolled more than 7,000 new Hong Kong students for the new semester, according to the Ministry of Education.
This year, students from Hong Kong can apply to 112 universities on the mainland without first taking the national college entrance exam, known as the gaokao.
A special plan started in 2012 allows mainland universities to recruit Hong Kong applicants based on their performance in the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education test, the ministry said.
Since 2012, the number of mainland institutions covered by the plan has nearly doubled, from 63 to 112, with the Central Academy of Music, Central Academy of Fine Arts and Central Academy of Drama among the 10 most recent additions, the ministry said.
Chen Wenju, deputy director of the publicity department at Jinan University in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, said almost 4,000 Hong Kong students applied for places at the university this year, up 12 percent year-on-year.
The university has more than 5,000 Hong Kong students, he said, accounting for one-third of the total in mainland universities.
Chan Ka-sui has been studying at the university since 2013, majoring in television broadcasting.
He and several other students there started a film and TV club when he was a sophomore and went on to set up a film and TV studio in 2016 with the support of the school and professors.
"I have visited many places in the mainland to film different videos and get to know its development along the way," Chan said.
He said many Hong Kong students have biased views of the mainland and thought studying at its universities must be boring and restrictive. But Jinan University has quite a liberal academic atmosphere and has implemented many policies to support entrepreneurship among students, he said.
Zhang Shengqiang, deputy director of the office of Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan Affairs at Xiamen University in Fujian province, said the university started to enroll students from Hong Kong in 1985-becoming one of the earliest mainland universities to do so.
The university now has 251 students from Hong Kong with many majoring in fields such as economics and accounting, he said.
"Students from Hong Kong have been managed in a similar way to their mainland counterparts," he said. "The tuition and insurance fees are similar for Hong Kong and mainland students, and they also study in the same classes and live in the same dormitories," Zhang said.
Zeng Tao, deputy director at the School of Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan Studies at China University of Political Science and Law in Beijing, said the university has 287 Hong Kong students, including 239 undergraduate students, 47 graduate students and one exchange student and has the largest number of Hong Kong students studying law-related majors among mainland universities.
Chan Ho-nam, 18, a second-year student at the university, said people from Hong Kong and the mainland may have some disagreements because they are not familiar with each other. But just like in families, the differences of opinion don't harm the close relations between Hong Kong and the mainland, he said.
More Hong Kong students have chosen to study at mainland universities and more Hong Kong residents have found jobs and live in the mainland, he said, adding they are also working hard to achieve the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
