BEIJING, Oct. 14 -- It is back to school for university students in Hong Kong, and campuses will host more students from the mainland. This year, about 10 percent of the student population comes from the north.

    After rapid expansion of the mainland's university system in recent years, it is now entering a period of consolidation. A university degree no longer guarantees even a decent job, and competition among universities will become intense. Unlike business enterprises, academic institutions have to build on quality, and quality alone. Good universities are always in short supply, and only the not so good have to worry for their survival.

    The abovementioned 10 percent amounts to less than 1,000 students in absolute terms. It is a drop in the bucket among millions of university students in the country, and will never be sizable enough to affect the status of top mainland schools like Peking University.

    It is worth mentioning that higher education is a two-way street. Whilst more talented mainland students are coming to Hong Kong to pursue their higher education, it is also becoming more popular for brilliant Hong Kong students to apply at mainland universities. This healthy exchange of students works best for the country's future development.

    Because of the sudden increase in students from the mainland, most universities are caught unprepared, especially regarding dormitory space. The government has allocated funding, but some of the facilities are not available on time. As a result, a few local students are being squeezed out, leading to a series of protests in various campuses. Some mainland students are now temporarily being housed in makeshift quarters.

    Apart from this, mainland students on the whole feel they are welcome here, and find the campus life to be entirely different from what they previously experienced.

    First of all, Hong Kong campuses are highly cosmopolitan, with students coming from many parts of the world. Students are therefore very culturally sensitive, and none would ever feel discriminated or alienated.

    Mainland students fare even better because they are Chinese, as is over 90 percent of Hong Kong's population. The only difference is that the daily dialect here is Cantonese instead of mandarin, but mandarin is not a problem anywhere in Hong Kong, especially since the handover 10 years ago.