President Way Kuo of City University of Hong Kong (CityU) received a two-minute standing ovation on 21 March from all attending members of the Senate after he gave a final presentation as President on CityU’s accomplishments over the past 10 years or so.

President Kuo will retire from the presidency at the end of his third term in May 2023, making him the current most experienced president among the eight UGC-funded universities. He said in the meeting that ever since the beginning of his term of office, he had been committed to leading CityU to become a leading global university through “the integration of research and teaching”.

President Kuo said, over the past decade, CityU has become one of the fastest-growing universities in the world. Its first-class teaching and research teams have repeatedly received international recognitions. For example, our overall international ranking has been rising, CityU is ranked 1st in Asia and Hong Kong for academic citations, and CityU garners the highest amount of research funding from mainland China among all UGC-funded universities.

Senate members applauded these achievements when President Kuo cited them in his presentation. President Kuo expressed his gratitude to the CityU management team and all CityU staff for their united efforts, and especially to the CityU faculty for showing the world CityU’s strengths in teaching and research. He also thanked current and former Council Chairmen and members, especially Mr Lester Garson Huang, current Council Chairman, for their trust and support, which, he said, had been key to CityU’s achievements.

After a vote of thanks proposed by Dr Kevin Downing, Council Secretary, all attending Senate members gave President Kuo a standing ovation for over two minutes. President Kuo expressed his wish that CityU would scale new heights under the leadership of the new President.