HKU Bulletin January 2011 (Vol. 12 No. 1)

HKU has come on in leaps and strides since Professor Stevenson Fung was a student in the 1970’s. An Academic and Advocate One indication of how far the University has come in terms of accepting individuals with a disability is reflected in the astonishing story of Professor Stevenson Fung. Having experienced discrimination first- hand the blind scholar, who suffers from retinitis-pigmentosa, has thrown himself into advocacy on campus, and was one of the 16 founding members of Hong Kong’s own Equal Opportunities Commission, in 1996. “I was there for seven years, helping the Government and the Commission implement legislations. Then I heard about the Equal Opportunities Committee (EOC) at HKU so I offered my service.” Although Faculties today are more open to accepting students with a disability Professor Fung’s experience in the 1970s was quite different. “I was never admitted to HKU,” he says. A Passion for Physics In his youth, before the days of integrated education form three was the highest level a blind pupil could reach, and although he was top of his class academically he was forced to leave school and train as a telephone operator. But his passion for physics and mathematics led him to pursue further study in his own time. “I was very interested in mathematics and physics so reading those books was like reading a novel for me. It was entertainment, so it just came naturally and I taught myself my O and A levels.” As experiments were conducted in pairs, Professor Fung was able to find himself a sympathetic partner to share the work. Both went on to earn first-class honours and later his partner, Professor Chris Beling, (who sadly passed away in June 2010) joined him at HKU, where they continued to conduct research together for 23 years. Returning to Hong Kong “When I came back to HKU after getting my doctorate the head of Physics at HKU was a newcomer with a very positive attitude and he secured funding from the Croucher Foundation to sponsor a post-doctoral fellowship position.” Today, Professor Fung says part of his success was down to the fact that he knew early on what he wanted to do. Second-year Engineering student, Hamza Farrukh, originally from Pakistan, says he was delighted with the welcome he received at HKU. Now on an undergraduate exchange programme in the United States he says of his experience at HKU, “It was everything I hoped for and probably more.” He did not come across any racial discrimination and feels the University met his needs as a non-local student, in terms of providing support and facilities. HKU from an International Perspective However, he would like to see more seminars and student societies in English. Although he feels the standard of education at HKU is “probably a bit better” than what he has experienced in the US, “the campus life is much more different as there are more student organizations and activities for international students to join,” whereas at HKU, “Almost all groups are in Cantonese or Putonghua so we are unable to join.” “I had already identified my goal. Physics is not the easiest subject for someone like me, but I was very determined and HKU has allowed me to develop.” Now he can look back on a career in which he has trained over 60 PhD/MPhil students and has published around 300 papers. Although academic life has got easier for him, thanks to a talking computer and better Web accessibility, he feels more resources could be made available for students with a disability. “There’s never enough money for technology because it’s not cheap. We are already doing quite a bit but more could do more. For example, I have been trying to help students get assistance, like paying part-timers to look for library materials for them and read for them. But HKU has definitely progressed,” he says. Through a friend in England he was able to borrow brail books from the Royal National institute for the Blind (as it was then called) there being no equivalent in Hong Kong. Then, armed with his new qualifications he applied to HKU to study physics. “I saw a couple of professors and they simply laughed at me. They had never heard of a blind person going to university. This was 1972. It was only 30-odd years ago but it was a very different world in Hong Kong,” he says. So he raised enough money to study in England for six months where he took the subjects he was unable to take in Hong Kong. “I got straight A’s so my headmaster (at Worcester College for the Blind) encouraged me to sit the Oxford entrance examination.” He passed and was admitted to the University of Oxford on an Open Scholarship, but despite that success his problems were not over. The First at Oxford “The professor who interviewed me said I was academically sound but in their nearly one thousand year history they had never taken a blind person to read physics, so I had to beg him to give me a chance. He gave me one term to prove myself.” However there were no brail books for a student at that level. “So I had to advertise for readers to come and read the text books to me and I would record them. Working in the laboratory was a little more difficult. But the difference between Hong Kong and England in those days was that in England they had this ’can do’ attitude. So the laboratory technician would adapt the equipment to suit my needs.” Professor Stevenson Fung, one of the 16 founding members of Hong Kong’s own Equal Opportunities Commission in 1996. Professor Stevenson Fung and his life-long partner in the quest for knowledge, Professor Chris Beling. 13 Cover Story The University of Hong Kong Bulletin January 2011