Lingnan University to confer honorary fellowships upon six distinguished individuals

Lingnan University will confer honorary fellowships upon six distinguished individuals, namely, Dr Alman Chan Siu-cheuk; Dr Adrian Cheng Chi-kong; Prof Christine Fang Meng-sang, BBS, JP; Mr Shen Jinkang, BBS, MH; Dr Deric Daniel Waters, ISO, BBS; and Ms Fermi Wong Wai-fun, in recognition of their outstanding achievements in their respective professions and valuable contributions to the well-being of society.

Dr Alman Chan has devoted himself to education for 30 years. He founded the Christian Zheng Sheng College in 1998, a private secondary school offering life education to young drug offenders and teenagers with behavioural or emotional problems in Hong Kong, where he has been serving as Principal. He was selected as one of the Ten Outstanding Young Persons of Hong Kong in 2000.

Dr Adrian Cheng is an art entrepreneur who uses innovation, art and culture to create new family entrepreneurial businesses. He founded the K11 Art Foundation in 2010 to incubate young contemporary Chinese artists and to promote public art education through innovative initiatives, such as building art village in Wuhan, and international partnerships in New York and Paris. Combining art and commerce, he has also created a sustainable global art and lifestyle brand – K11 – based on a revolutionary museum retail concept, represented by the flagship K11 projects in Hong Kong and Shanghai. There will be 19 K11 projects in Mainland China and Hong Kong by year 2020.

Trained as a social worker and social service administrator, Prof Christine Fang has been fighting poverty and empowering the disadvantaged for more than 30 years. In 2001, Prof Fang was appointed as Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Council of Social Services, where she served until retirement in 2013. She was awarded the Bronze Bauhinia Star by the HKSAR Government in 2009 for her meritorious public and community service.

Having served as the chief coach of the Chinese national men’s cycling team and subsequently the national cycling team for about 10 years, Mr Shen Jinkang took up the challenge of coaching the Hong Kong cycling team in 1994. Over the past two decades, Mr Shen has transformed the Hong Kong team from a group of amateurs to world-class cyclists, who have won at the Asian Games as well as regional and global tournaments.

Dr Deric Daniel Waters is a renowned expert in building technology from Norwich, England. He has served as a Desert Rat with the famous Eighth Army in North Africa during the Second World War. Dr Waters set sail to Hong Kong in 1954 and taught at the Hong Kong Technical College. He was appointed principal of the Morrison Hill Technical Institute in 1969. Dr Waters was the President of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch and has written books and papers on Hong Kong.

Ms Fermi Wong founded Hong Kong Unison in 2001 to defend the rights and justice of ethnic minorities in Hong Kong, and to promote racial harmony and cultural sensitivity in the Chinese-dominant community. She was awarded the 2012 Hong Kong Humanity Award in recognition of her long term contribution to humanity by serving the underprivileged.

A ceremony will be held at Chan Tak Tai Auditorium, Lingnan University on Monday, 13 October 2014 to confer the honorary fellowships.