The Hong Kong Prize is the top award granted by the University of Hong Kong to the best students of each year. It is based on a wide range of criteria, including the students’ overall academic performance, the students’ research achievements and contributions in science, technology and engineering disciplines, and their influence on the transformation of R&D outcomes in Hong Kong. The prize is sponsored by the Bank of China (Hong Kong) Limited and carries a prize money of HK$ 2 million.
The competition is open to all undergraduate and postgraduate students of Hong Kong universities, with the exception of those enrolled in degree-granting programmes run by foreign universities. Students must submit an innovative and creative project showcasing their research in the area of science, technology or engineering. The competition is divided into five categories: artificial intelligence, robotics, life and health, new materials and new energy, advanced manufacturing, and fintech. Each category will have one winner who will receive a certificate, and a HK$ 100,000 prize for the school to use as development funds.
No ticket holders won the first prize in last week’s draw, allowing a snowball jackpot to build up to HK$102 million for tonight’s lottery draw. As a result, Stanley Street betting stations opened an hour early today and were packed with eager punters.
HK’s Olympic Medallists Receive Top Prizes
Hong Kong is believed to be handing out the most medal prize money out of any city in the world, with epeeist Vivian Kong Man-wai and foilist Cheung Ka-long winning HK$6 million each for their golds at the Paris Games, and swimmer Siobhan Haughey getting a coveted HK$3 million for each of her two bronzes. The hefty payouts are in line with the Olympic Games’ own rules and reflect the high levels of skill demonstrated by Hong Kong athletes.
Despite the huge sums of prize money on offer, only a handful of winners have actually claimed their winnings. One of them, Cheung Shuk-yan, was deported by police after a Court of First Instance judge ruled that his claim violated Basic Law articles 25 and 38, which state that all Hong Kong residents are equal before the law and enjoy the freedoms safeguarded by the law.
Good News in the Newspapers
The 2022 winners of the Hong Kong Press Club’s Best News Reporting awards were announced on Friday, and the accolades highlighted a variety of inspiring stories about the work that our journalists are doing. Among them was a series of stories by the Post’s Sammy Heung on movers and shakers in the city’s scientific fields, which won third prize in the Science News Reporting category. Other prizes were awarded to stories by the Post’s Harvey Kong, production editor Matt Haldane and reporter Xinmei Shen. The prestigious news awards ceremony was attended by more than 617 members of the public and media guests. It was officiated by the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, John Lee Ka-chiu.