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Part-time local students had always been important
members of our classes, once comprising nearly
half of our student body. But as the local journalism
industry faced multiple challenges, we received
fewer local applications. From 2022 to 2025 intake,
the number of local part-time applicants was: 9,
13, 7, and 10, respectively. In contrast, we had 36
local part-time applicants for the 2020 intake. retreat in summer 2024
This round of optimization included several
While we could not control the broader trends,
we took some practical steps to encourage and components. First, we removed the mandatory
help locals who still wished to pursue journalism. “Advanced Chinese/English Writing and Reporting”
Starting with the 2023 intake, we established the course from the second semester. Many students
“Scholarship for Hong Kong Practicing Journalists.” had noted significant overlap between the
Local applicants who received our admission first semester “Basic” and second semester
offer and had at least two years of journalism- “Advanced” courses. Moreover, “Advanced Writing
related work experience were eligible. Up to three and Reporting” often meant delving into specific
scholarships were available annually, each worth reporting forms or areas, which was difficult to cover
HKD 60,000, covering nearly half of the total tuition. in a single course. While removing “Advanced,” we
Several local practitioners have benefited from this added several elective courses to provide truly
scholarship in recent years. Though the impact may “advanced” training.
be modest, it has made a difference for several
specific practitioners. This scholarship represents Second, we thoroughly reviewed our elective
our programme’s long-standing philosophy of courses and found that while we had comprehensive
maintaining close ties with the journalism industry, coverage of “medium/expression methods”
especially local media, for mutual development courses (such as feature writing, online news, radio
and support. production, and data visualization), we had fewer
courses on “topical areas/beats” (only financial
reporting and public affairs analysis). Therefore,
Additionally, under the changing social
circumstances described above, we have noticed we focused on adding more of the latter type,
more mainland students choosing to stay in Hong notably a new course covering technology, health,
Kong, joining media outlets like Ming Pao, HK01, and environmental reporting, taught jointly by
Sing Tao Daily, and performing excellently. We are three experienced industry practitioners. This new
pleased with their career development and glad course covers emerging and important reporting
our graduates continue to be active in local media. areas, and in its second year was already fully
enrolled (40 students), demonstrating its appeal
Optimizing Programme Structure to students. We also discussed possibilities for
Over the past five years, a major accomplishment cultural reporting and gender reporting courses,
of the MA in Journalism programme has been the though these have not been implemented yet due
comprehensive revision and optimization of our to practical constraints.
curriculum.
Third, we launched two new courses directly related
to industry practice. One is the practicum course,
This optimization was based on two half-day
retreats we organized in the summers of 2022 and transferring successful undergraduate teaching
2024. All core course teachers participated in these experiences to our master’s programme. In the
retreats, which not only helped everyone become recently concluded semester, students published a
more familiar with each other but also allowed us number of excellent reports on our new practicum
to finalize many important programme matters, platform, “Reporta”. The other is my course “Future
primarily curriculum optimization. of Journalism,” focusing on business models and
news products, aiming to help students understand
ongoing journalistic innovations and potentially
design their own innovative news products.