Hong Kong’s education minister has apologised after parents received SMS notifications of their children’s primary school allocations a day before the official announcement, with authorities launching a review and stressing that the results to be released on Wednesday should be treated as final.
Some parents were left confused on Tuesday following text messages that listed the correct school choices but the wrong calendar year. The Education Bureau’s hotline was inundated with calls from parents seeking clarification.
Secretary for Education Christine Choi Yuk-lin said the incident would not affect the allocation results that would be officially released on Wednesday.
“On behalf of the Education Bureau, I sincerely apologise for any inconvenience caused to parents by the incorrect distribution of the Primary One admission allocation SMS notifications [on Tuesday],” she said.
“All complete and accurate allocation results across Hong Kong will be officially announced as scheduled at 7.30am [on Wednesday].”
Choi stressed that no cyberattacks or hacking were involved, adding that the incident also did not involve services from contractors.
“After an immediate thorough inspection by our professional technical team, we have confirmed that the system has absolutely not been subjected to any cyberattacks or hacker intrusions, and the core data is intact,” she said.
Earlier in the day, the bureau apologised for the error and said it had rectified the system after SMS notifications were mistakenly sent due to an operational issue.
“According to a preliminary investigation, the Primary One admission allocation results, originally scheduled for release on Wednesday, were mistakenly sent out early via SMS [on Tuesday] due to an operational error in the system’s dispatch configuration,” a spokesman said.
“The bureau has since conducted a comprehensive verification of all students’ allocation information and clarifies that the SMS messages sent in the morning do not affect the final results.”
The bureau has formed a crisis management team to review the system, procedures and manpower allocation.
“If the incident involves human error or a system fault, the bureau will follow up seriously. It will also enhance the system and supervisory workflow of the dispatch mechanism to prevent similar incidents from recurring,” the spokesman said.
He also stressed that the incident was unrelated to information or cybersecurity, adding that the personal data of parents and students was protected by high-level encryption.
The bureau also sent a follow-up text message urging parents to disregard the earlier notification and has stepped up hotline services, advising them not to rush to contact schools.
Education sector lawmaker Lawrence Tang Fei said he did not recall any similar incidents happening in the past.
He acknowledged the bureau’s efforts to clarify the incident within hours and rule out the possibility of a cyberattack, noting that it had also contacted schools to prevent further confusion.
“Upon learning the allocation results, parents dissatisfied with the result approached preferred schools ... The bureau has clarified the situation with the schools, and they have not started handling the inquiries,” he said.
Tang was referring to the practice known as “door-knocking”, which allows parents to approach schools for discretionary places after central allocation results are released.
Authorities have been informing parents of school placements via SMS since 2021.
Parents were earlier asked to provide a mobile phone number if they wished to receive central allocation results via SMS on Wednesday, June 3.
But some said in WhatsApp groups that they were surprised to receive the results a day sooner. Many noted that their school choices, school names and their children’s application reference numbers were correct, but the calendar year stated in the SMS was wrong.
“The year in the SMS is 2025,” a user named Candi said.
“Is it true? Mine is correct – the school name is my second choice,” another user, Dada, said. “I called the Education Bureau, but nobody answered.”
A user named Twk said: “I just hope only the year is wrong and the result is correct.”
Some parents cited a response from bureau staff, who said the results to be announced on Wednesday should be taken as final, adding that the bureau was working with network service providers to address the issue.
“They said it was a system error, but if the application reference number is correct, the result is right,” said a message forwarded in the group.
All telephone hotlines for allocation inquiries were inundated after parents began discussing the unexpected early release of results.
Parents could also view the results through “iAM Smart”, the government’s one-stop digital service platform, but some said they were unable to access it.
Last week, the bureau said that around 86 per cent of children seeking places in Hong Kong public primary schools had secured one of their top three choices through the central allocation system, up from about 79 per cent last year – a record high.
The record came as the number of applicants fell by 16 per cent to 16,345, the steepest decline on record, amid the fallout from the 2019 anti-government protests and the Covid-19 pandemic.
But school representatives said competition for discretionary places was unlikely to ease, as some parents whose children were allocated their second choice might still try to secure a place at their preferred school. -- SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
