CUHK Chung Chi College: Founded 1951, the Torch of Thirteen Schools, and Lake Ad Excellentiam

# Chung Chi College: Ad Excellentiam, the Torch of Thirteen Schools, and Lake Ad Excellentiam

The earliest and largest independent church on any public university campus in China — flanked at the altar by thirteen wooden crests bearing the emblems of Christian universities that once dotted the mainland before their closure in 1951. Chung Chi brought this interrupted "torch" to the Ma Liu Shui valley in Hong Kong. This entry surveys the origins, faith tradition, landmarks, rituals, and figures of Chung Chi College: one of CUHK's three foundation colleges, established in 1951 by representatives of Protestant Churches in Hong Kong, with the motto 「止於至善」 (Ad Excellentiam — "In pursuit of excellence"). It is the only college in the University to house a chapel, a divinity school, and a chaplain's office.

This is a consolidated dossier on Chung Chi College, far more detailed than the Chung Chi section in the college overview. University-wide topics that involve Chung Chi (CUHK's founding, restructuring, the debate over religion and secularisation, etc.) are covered in dedicated articles elsewhere on this site; here they are only summarised and signposted.

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# 1. At a Glance

According to the College's official brief history^※, Chung Chi College was founded in October 1951 by representatives of Protestant Churches in Hong Kong, making it the territory’s first institution of higher learning to be both Chinese-medium and Christian in character. Among CUHK’s nine colleges, Chung Chi carries a singular spiritual weight — through its distinct Christian higher-education heritage, which carries forward the torch of thirteen Christian universities that operated on the Chinese mainland before 1951, and through the only chapel, divinity school, and chaplain’s office in the University.

The name "Chung Chi" : the College explains that the name captures the spirit of "崇奉基督" (exalting Christ) while also signifying a "lofty foundation" — professing the Christian faith as the bedrock of the institution while aspiring to build upon it a noble foundation for nurturing talent. Worth noting: Chung Chi is the only one of CUHK's nine colleges whose formal Chinese name retains 「學院」 (xueyuan, "college/institute") rather than having switched to 「書院」 (shuyuan, "college" in the collegiate sense). This nomenclature dates from its era as a post-secondary college (1951–1963, when it operated independently as "Chung Chi College"), and it was not changed upon merger into CUHK — a unique exception among the nine.

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# 2. Founding History: From the Torch of Thirteen Schools to Ma Liu Shui

# Before 1951: The thirteen mainland Christian universities

Chung Chi’s founding must be understood within the context of twentieth-century Christian higher education in China. From the late nineteenth century through the first half of the twentieth, various Western missionary societies established a number of Christian universities across the Chinese mainland. According to CUHK professor Xing Fuzeng’s study on the post-war continuity of Christian higher education in Hong Kong through the case of Chung Chi College^※, following the 1950 reorganisation of higher education in mainland China, these Christian universities were successively taken over by the state, restructured, or merged into public institutions — ending their existence as church-affiliated universities.

Chung Chi formally positions itself as the inheritor of the tradition and mission of the thirteen Christian universities that existed in China before 1951. According to the Chinese Wikipedia entry on Chung Chi^※, these thirteen institutions are commonly listed as: Hangchow University (之江大學), Central China University (華中大學), West China Union University (華西協合大學), St. John’s University (聖約翰大學), Lingnan University (嶺南大學), University of Nanking (金陵大學), Soochow University (東吳大學), Cheeloo University (齊魯大學), University of Shanghai (滬江大學), Hwa Nan College (華南女子大學), Ginling College (金陵女子大學), Fukien Christian University (福建協和大學), and Yenching University (燕京大學). The wooden crests displayed on either side of the altar in Chung Chi Chapel are precisely the emblems of these thirteen schools — embedding architecturally the "torch" that was extinguished on the mainland and rekindled in Hong Kong (see Section 4).

A caveat: Chung Chi’s "inheritance of the thirteen schools" is an inheritance of spirit and mission, a symbolic continuity, not the legal succession or asset transfer of any specific university. It was a newly founded institution that consciously claimed this faith tradition as its own.

# 1951: Beginnings in borrowed premises on Caine Road and at St. John’s Cathedral

According to the College’s official brief history^※, Chung Chi College was formally founded and began classes in October 1951; Wikipedia records 63 students on the first day. With no campus of its own in those early days, classes were held in borrowed premises: the Cathedral Hall of St. John’s Cathedral, St. Paul’s Co-educational College, and premises on Caine Road. Many of the faculty and students had ties to the aforementioned Christian universities — the first head of the College, Li Ying-lin, was the former President of Lingnan University in Canton, giving Chung Chi an especially close kinship with Lingnan (a link that would later explain the naming of "Lingnan Stadium" and "Lingnan Gymnasium" on campus).

# 1955–1956: Statutory registration and the move to Ma Liu Shui

The official brief history records that in 1955, Chung Chi was formally registered under Hong Kong government ordinance as a recognised post-secondary college; in 1956, it moved to its permanent campus in the Ma Liu Shui valley, Sha Tin, New Territories. According to Wikipedia, the government granted seven parcels of land totalling roughly ten acres in Ma Liu Shui, giving the College its own home for the first time.

# 1963: Co-founding CUHK

According to the College’s official brief history^※, in 1963, Chung Chi joined New Asia College and United College as one of the three foundation colleges of The Chinese University of Hong Kong. After the merger, Chung Chi’s academic departments were progressively integrated into the University’s central structure, but the college retained its distinctive role in general education, religious life, and community culture.

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# 3. Motto, Crest, and Christian Tradition

# Motto: 止於至善 (Ad Excellentiam)

Chung Chi’s motto is 「止於至善」 , drawn from the Great Learning: 「大學之道，在明明德，在親民，在止於至善」 ("The way of great learning lies in illustrating illustrious virtue, in loving the people, and in resting in the highest excellence"). Its Latin rendering is Ad Excellentiam; the English gloss is "In Pursuit of Excellence". According to the English Wikipedia, the motto expresses the College’s aim of fostering excellence in every dimension — academic, physical, and ethical (with an emphasis on integrity), as well as spiritual (understanding the meaning of life). The motto dovetails with Chung Chi’s Christian ethos: grounded in the Christian faith, it pursues fullness of character and learning.

# The only Christian college in the University

According to the English Wikipedia entry on Chung Chi College^※, among CUHK’s nine colleges, Chung Chi is the only one with a religious affiliation. It maintains a Chaplain’s Office and a Divinity School that support Christian activities on campus. This religious identity is the fundamental feature that distinguishes Chung Chi from the other eight colleges, and it has made "the secularisation and modernisation of religious education" a perennial topic of academic discussion in relation to the Chung Chi case (see, for instance, studies by Peter Tze-ming Ng, Xing Fuzeng, and others).

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# 4. Landmark Buildings and Landscape

Chung Chi occupies a large swath of low-lying land in the southern part of the CUHK campus, near University Station (the railway station); it is the lowest-lying and earliest-developed college precinct among the nine. Its landmarks are almost all expressions of either its Christian tradition or the Ad Excellentiam ideal.

# Chung Chi Chapel

According to the Chinese Wikipedia entry on Chung Chi^※, Chung Chi Chapel is the earliest and largest free-standing church on any public university campus in China. According to the Chapel’s official page^※, the foundation stone was laid on the occasion of the College’s tenth anniversary, and the building was completed the following year. On the wall behind the altar are carved the wooden emblems of the former thirteen Christian universities in China, permanently inscribing the history of "thirteen-school continuity" into the College’s most sacred space. It is architecture as a vessel of memory: the thirteen universities no longer exist, yet their spirit lives on above the altar. The Chapel, together with the College’s Christian identity and its weekly College Assembly, forms the most distinctive feature of Chung Chi life.

# Divinity School of Chung Chi College

According to the official site of the Divinity School^※ and Wikipedia, Chung Chi’s theological education has deep roots. In 1962 — before Chung Chi joined CUHK — theological education was undertaken by an independently constituted "Chung Chi Theological Seminary", with the Hong Kong Theological Seminary of the Church of Christ in China at its core. After the merger, theological education continued as the Divinity School of Chung Chi College, an important centre for Christian theological research and ministerial training both within CUHK and in Hong Kong. The Divinity School’s new chapel is located on the top floor of the Yung Chit-tung Memorial Building, completed in November 2011; the chapel covers roughly 1,450 square metres and seats about 350, serving as a worship space for the Divinity School community.

The lineage of Chung Chi’s theological education runs deeper than Chung Chi itself. According to the Divinity School’s official history^※ and the English Wikipedia^※, its roots trace back to 1864 and the Training School of the Canton Presbyterian Mission. In 1914, this school merged with Anglican (CMS) and Methodist bodies to form the Canton Union Theological College (廣州協和神學院). That theological tradition was subsequently preserved and developed within Chung Chi, eventually becoming today’s Divinity School of Chung Chi College. From 1864 to the present, this thread spans more than a century and a half — one of the longest-running histories in Hong Kong’s higher theological education. It extends the thread of "Christian higher education in China" from the late Qing dynasty into the contemporary CUHK campus, forming, alongside the thirteen crests in the Chapel (the "visible" dimension), the two-fold thickness — depth and visibility — of Chung Chi’s Christian tradition.

# Lake Ad Excellentiam (formerly the Lotus Pond)

According to the Chinese Wikipedia entry on Chung Chi^※, the lake on Chung Chi campus occupies what was once farmland and streams. It evolved into a "Lotus Pond" in the late 1960s, and in the mid-1990s, a campus beautification project transformed it and gave it its new name: 「未圓湖」 — Lake Ad Excellentiam. The characters 「未圓」 ("not yet complete / not yet perfect") convey the idea that "in learning and in life, nothing is ever fully complete; one must rest in the highest excellence and continue striving" — an echo of the College motto. The Lion Pavilion beside the lake and the Path of Philosophy that encircles it offer staff and students a place for strolling and quiet reflection; it is the College’s most poetic corner.

# Chung Chi Tang, the Library, and Others

The Chung Chi campus also includes Chung Chi Tang (the student activities centre), the Mou Loi-sze Library, the Lingnan Stadium / Lingnan Gymnasium (named to honour the College’s ties to Lingnan University), and the Lee Wong Yiu-bik Building, among others. The gate arch bears a couplet inscribed by the scholar Ling Daoyang and others. Many building names and campus inscriptions draw meaning from Christian faith and from the classics of the Great Learning and the Doctrine of the Mean — everywhere one sees the intention to "bear culture through architecture".

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# 5. College Traditions

Chung Chi’s collegiate traditions revolve around two main axes: the life of faith and whole-person education.

• College Assembly: A weekly gathering for the entire college, one of Chung Chi’s longest-running traditions. Programmes include sermons, lectures, music, and cultural activities, embodying the whole-person ideals of "spiritual, moral, physical, social, and intellectual" growth.
• Chung Chi General Education (College GE): Chung Chi’s college-based general education programme is, according to the Office of University General Education^※, designed around the College’s Christian and Chinese cultural heritage, with an emphasis on values education and reflection on life.
• Class Association System: Chung Chi undergraduates are organised by year of entry into "class associations", each with its own name, colours, and traditions — a significant source of college identity and cohesion.
• Orientation Camp, Thousand-Person Banquet, and Graduation Service: The orientation camp helps new students integrate into the college community; the college anniversary is marked by a thousand-person banquet and other festivities; the graduation service sends off graduates with a Christian liturgy — a ceremony unique to Chung Chi.

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# 6. Heads of College and Notable Alumni

# Heads of College (selected)

According to the English Wikipedia and official sources, Chung Chi’s first head was Li Ying-lin (1951–1954), former President of Lingnan University, Canton. Successive heads have included Ling Daoyang (Lin Daoyang, a renowned forester and soil-conservation expert) and Yung Chit-tung (a botanist, later commemorated in the "Yung Chit-tung Memorial Building"). The current College Head is Professor Kwan Mei-po (a geographer, from August 2023). The title of the headship evolved from "President" during the post-secondary college era to "Head of College" (or Master) after the merger into CUHK.

# Notable Alumni (selected)

• Yau Shing-tung (丘成桐) : According to the English Wikipedia entry on Chung Chi^※, mathematician and Fields Medalist; graduated from Chung Chi’s Department of Mathematics in 1969. One of the founders of geometric analysis in the twentieth century, he later taught at Harvard and established several mathematical research institutes.
• Chung Chi has also produced large numbers of alumni active in theology, education, music, social service, and the business and political sectors; given its Christian and humanistic background, its tradition in theology, music, and social service is especially deep.

Lists of heads of college and alumni are based on official and authoritative sources; entries concerning living persons record only neutral facts.

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# 7. Cultural Positioning: The Christian Wing of CUHK’s "Dual-Source Humanistic Tradition"

Chung Chi’s "inheriting the thirteen schools" is not the legal succession or asset transfer of any specific university; it is an inheritance of spirit and mission, a symbolic continuity: it was a newly founded institution that consciously claimed this faith tradition as its own. Viewed within the larger context of CUHK, Chung Chi’s Christian humanistic tradition and New Asia’s Chinese cultural humanistic tradition together form the twin wings of CUHK’s "dual-source humanistic tradition" :

Chung Chi (Christian humanism): Carries forward the tradition of Christian universities in China, grounded in Christian spirituality, Sino-Western exchange, and social concern; the Chapel and Divinity School are its institutional carriers.

New Asia (Chinese cultural humanism): Carries forward the Chinese cultural mission of émigré scholars, grounded in New Confucianism and Chinese scholarly traditions; the Pavilion of Harmony (合一亭) and the New Asia Institute are its institutional carriers (see New Asia College).

United (pragmatic émigré): Formed from the merger of five Cantonese private colleges, with an ethos rooted in the overseas-Chinese experience and business-oriented pragmatism (see United College).

Each of the three foundation colleges has its own spiritual character; the "Christianity × Chinese culture" dual source represented by Chung Chi and New Asia has been especially formative in shaping CUHK’s overall ethos as a place where "humanistic traditions converge and East meets West". This also resonates with the founding mission of CUHK: "to combine tradition with modernity, and to bring together China and the West" — with Chung Chi and New Asia serving as the two fountainheads of that synthesis at the collegiate level. Precisely because of its pronounced religious identity, "the secularisation and modernisation of religious education" has long been a topic of scholarly discussion in relation to the Chung Chi case (see, for instance, studies by Peter Tze-ming Ng, Xing Fuzeng, and others).

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# 8. Unvarnished Tales and Rumours (Low Reliability)

Reliability note: The content in this section is mostly hearsay, campus oral tradition, or online forum anecdotes. It has not been verified against authoritative historical sources and is of low reliability. It is offered solely for cultural interest; please do not cite it as historical fact. This site does not reproduce subjective judgments about living persons; the anecdotes below do not refer to any real individual.

The Lotus Pond / Lake Ad Excellentiam "drowning candidate" urban legend

The stillness and nocturnal beauty of the Chung Chi Lotus Pond (today’s Lake Ad Excellentiam) have long spawned various campus urban legends — for example, tales of an "extra silhouette appearing by the lake late at night", "chanting heard on rainy nights", or "couples who circle the lake together will break up". Stories of this type are universal campus folklore motifs attached to bodies of water and scenic lakes everywhere (CUHK’s own Pavilion of Harmony at New Asia and various student hostels have similar variants). They are purely fictional imaginings, not corresponding to any real person or event, of extremely low reliability, and are noted here only as campus folk curiosities.

Apocryphal explanations of the name "Lake Ad Excellentiam"

There is a separate strand of campus lore that interprets 「未圓」 ("not yet complete") romantically as "something (some past affair) left unfulfilled". In fact, the name Lake Ad Excellentiam was chosen to express the idea that "in learning and in life, nothing is ever fully complete; one must rest in the highest excellence" — an echo of the College motto — and was adopted after the mid-1990s beautification project. Interpretations equating 「未圓」 with "regretful romance" are largely retrospective colouring, more rhetorical than historical, and of low reliability.

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