Newsletter No. 2

CUHK Newsletter 3 University News Senate Endorse the Adopt ion of a Flexible Credit Unit System At a meeting held on 22nd December 1989, the University Senate resolved to drop the present promotion-by-year system and move on to a truly flexible credit unit system by September 1991. The revised curriculum with added flexibility will allow students to pace their own studies and graduate within a three-to-six year period. In anticipation of the improvement in A-level courses under sixth form reform, the University is prepared to recognize A-level students' pre-university achievements by granting a given number of credit units to each A-level entrant. With these units, reasonably good A-level students can graduate in three years after fully satisfying major programme and general education requirements. They may however decide to benefit from a broader education taken in four years. Other students may accelerate their studies through attending summer sessions. The University would need to change its existing statute to enable students to graduate in less than four years. It would also strengthen its counselling service to assist students to make rational course combinations, so that they may derive maximum benefit from the new scheme. The new system is expected to facilitate inter-departmental, inter- institutional and international exchanges and there will be checks and balances to ensure that the final product, i.e. the graduates, are up to standard. The Croucher Foundation recently made a donation of HK$2,000,000 in support of a research project on ‘Genetic Reconstitution of High-Affinity Uptake Systems for Neurotransmitters' undertaken by Professor Dominic Man-Kit Lam, professor of biotechnology and director of the Hong Kong Institute of Biotechnology (HKIB). F i r s t Research Grant Received by HKIB The research team comprises staffmembers from HKIB and other departments in the University, and scientists from other institutions in Hong Kong and China. Their work involves the transfer of specific human genes into mouse fibroblast (skin) cells to construct specific genetic-engineered cell lines useful for elucidating the molecular mechanism of certain brain functions such as vision, learning and memory. The cell lines are also useful for the discovery of new pharmaceutical agents against certain brain and cardiovascular diseases. This is the first research programme in Hong Kong that utilizes human-mouse transgenic cell lines to study informatio processing in the nervous system. Ch i nese universi ty Press and Renditions Wi n Awards Three publications of The Chinese University Press have won honours in this year's Hong Kong Print Awards. They include two merit awards in the category of cover design for the books China: Modernization in the 1980s and Papers in Chinese Linguistics and Epigraphy, and the prestigious Grand Prize for the book Dai Wangshu: The Life and Poetry of a Chinese Modernist. In addition to these prizes, the series of nine volumes 《近代名人手札眞蹟》 published by The Chinese University Press for the Institute of Chinese Studies also won one of The Best Produced Books Awards from the Urban Council. This is the first time the Press has won four major awards in the same year and reflects the significant improvement it has made in the production and design quality of its publications.