Vice-Chancellor's Report 1990-93

serving teacher, Dr. Ng has also made important contributions to University administration as dean of arts, director of the Part-time Degree Programmes and in the past three years, as Registrar of the University. Details of such leadership changes are recorded in appendices 1i and 1ii. Improved Facilities To meet the needs of a rapidly growing university, more infrastructure and better facilities have been built on the campus, involving major investments in terms o f financial resources and human effort. Campus Computerization One significant development over the last three years has been the general upgrading of computer facilities and telecommunication systems for the entire campus, something so essential i f the University is to keep pace with a rapidly changing wo r ld in this age of information. First o f all, an office automation project was launched in July 1990 by the Computer Services Centre, with support from various administrative and academic units. By June 1993, major administrative and service units have become f u l ly automated, w i th staff members adequately trained in the operation of computer facilities for administrative work. Supporting such a system are a full range of in- house microcomputer maintenance services and facilities management services provided by the Computer Services Centre. Computer- based education technology services have also been made available to the academic departments, so that faculty members can develop their own academic courseware in the form of computer slides, video or computer animation productions. Workstation support services have also been strengthened to facilitate configuration planning and research involving complicated and extensive computations. At about more or less the same time, some 20 local area networks (LANs) with over 600 access points have been set up on different parts of the campus. Most of these LANs are connected through state-of-the-art optical fibres and telephone lines to a Campus Backbone Network, which is linked to various local and overseas systems, giving members of the University easy access to valuable pools of information and databases worldwide. The link between CUHK and Internet, set up in 1992, is in fact the prime circuit bridging the seven local UPGC-funded tertiary institutions and the rest of the world. By September 1993, a total of 60 LANs in 36 different buildings and three remote sites w i ll have been linked to the Campus Backbone Network, making possible a truly campus-wide electronic mail system and more efficient communication with the international academic community, highly facilitating teaching, research and administrative work. New Buildings This university enjoys many benefits o f a spacious campus, one of which is the capacity to accommodate new buildings to meet the needs o f expansion. Increased student numbers and new academic programmes have made the past three years a very busy yet productive 29