Higher education | UM plans to admit 1,500 local students in 2020

The University of Macau (UM) plans to accept 1,500 local students this year, according to Song Yonghua, rector of UM.

Yesterday, during the UM’s Open Day activity, Song said this year the school’s admission plan for Macau students remains the same as that last year.

The admission rate of local students for undergraduate programs will be between 75% to 80%. In total, the school plans to welcome 2,000 new undergraduate students in 2020.

The exact admission plan for non-local students for undergraduate programs will be adjusted based on the number of applications the school receives and also the eventual results of the applicants.

Before 2018, UM accepted approximately 1,300 Macau students for undergraduate programs and 1,600 in total.

However, non-local high school students from the Greater Bay Area, in this case Guangdong and Hong Kong, are given more opportunities to study in UM, Macau’s only public university.

According to Song, in 2019, UM set up a special scholarship for high school students from the Greater Bay Area. “We enhanced enrollment towards students from the Greater Bay Area,” said the rector.    

Song explained that the special scholarship is intended not only for UM to serve local students better, but also to expedite integration into the Greater Bay Area.

Starting from 2019, UM started offering courses specifically to train science teachers for secondary schools and to respond to the demands for science and technology in the Greater Bay Area and Macau. In the schools’ Faculty of Science and Technology, new majors were also established as a response to big data and artificial intelligence development.

During the UM Open Day, many families with young children, as well as high-school students, were seen participating in the events.  The Open Day featured various activities, including course consultation, themed talks, and recreational and sports activities. The school’s residential colleges, laboratories, and the library and sports complex were also opened to visitors.

The university invited student representatives from different departments to provide information to visitors and share their personal experiences of studying at UM.

One Macau local high school student, surnamed Kou, expressed hopes of getting into UM’s Faculty of Business Administration, whereas another Open Day visitor, a high school student in his final year, was confident that he will be admitted to UM in the near future. JZ