KE Spotlight - Community Engagement - HKU Knowledge Exchange

HKU and Jockey Club launch leadership programme to empower the Third Sector

HKU and Jockey Club are jointly presenting a 32 million-project ExCEL3 - "Excellence and Capacity building for Entrepreneurship and Leadership for the Third Sector". The Project seeks to empower the third sector for a better society. So far over 1,000 representatives from the Third Sector have participated.

HKU develops interactive e-learning platform

HKU's E-Learning Technology Development Laboratory has begun a project to develop a software platform which can be used to facilitate interactive e-learning and development of teaching materials for primary and secondary schools.

Student KE Projects 2011/12 on Social Media

Some student teams have shared the progress of their Student KE Project and their experience on social media. Find them on Facebook or other social network websites.

HKU launches community project to raise quality of life among retirees

HKU and the HK Christian Service have jointly launched the CADENZA Community Project, sponsored by the Jockey Club Charities Trust, to make use of successfully retired people as mentors. A total of 27 retirees have been trained as mentors since June 2011. Another 48 soon-to-retire people have also been recruited to participate in the project. Around 20 organisations are participating members of the project.

HKU Law and Technology Centre launches legal information website for young people

The HKU Law and Technology Centre has launched the first legal information website for young people in HK. The Youth CLIC website is sponsored by the Home Affairs Bureau.

HKU develops environmentally friendly ballast

HKU Department of Electrical & Electronic Engineering Chair Professor Ron Hui Shu-yuen and his research team have invented the environmentally friendly "Ultra-low-loss magnetic ballast" to be used in fluorescent lamps. Professor Hui said the newly developed ballasts had longer lifespan and were recyclable. The ballast is also energy efficient, and can reduce expenses on repairs as well as electronic waste management.

Communicating serious health hazards of Hong Kong air: A new version of the Hedley Environmental Index

Hong Kong's air quality has been deteriorating over 20 years and today presents a serious daily threat to the health of the public and for future generations. The Environmental Protection Department of the Hong Kong SAR Government relies on the Air Pollution Index (HKAPI) to communicate the health hazards of pollution to the public. However, the standards used by HKAPI are 25 years out of date, primitive and seriously misleading. The risk categories in the HKAPI bear no relationship to the currently measured bad health outcomes in the population. In order to create a new approach to health risk communication and to inform and assist the public in the interpretation of pollution levels, a group of researchers at The University of Hong Kong School of Public Health developed the Hedley Environmental Index (HEI) in 2008 and launched an updated version on January 17, 2012 to improve the hourly estimation of air pollution impacts on bad health outcomes and economic costs. The new HEI is based on the latest scientific evidence for health risks and referenced to the World Health Organization (WHO) Air Quality Guidelines (AQG).