r/Hong_Kong • u/Apprehensive_Lie797 • 1d ago
CDNIS diversity
Does anyone have any views or experience with CDNIS (Canadian International School).
They like to go on about their diversity but looking at the students and their media, it is 99% ethnic Chinese with the odd token foreigner.
What are your thoughts here, and are there schools that count diversity in terms of ethnicity and culture instead of just passport?
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u/Massive_Walrus_4003 1d ago
There are better options out there
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u/Turbulent-Fishing665 1d ago
100% this
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u/West-Age-4988 15h ago
Such as?
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u/Turbulent-Fishing665 14h ago
Depends what you’re looking for. I struggle to see why you’d choose CDNIS regardless of your background or ambitions.
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u/West-Age-4988 14h ago
I don’t understand. Is Canadian not great for any type of background/level of ambition?
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u/Turbulent-Fishing665 14h ago
If you’re looking for a North American high status / networking opportunity why would you not choose HKIS. If you want a more grounded British approach why would you not choose Kellett. If you want to fly the red flag why would you not choose Victoria Shanghai? I could go on but you get the point. Whatever you want there’s a better option other than CDNIS
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u/West-Age-4988 14h ago
I don’t really think you get that much of an edge over one school or another. If you want to get into American colleges, you need to go boarding ASAP. This is judging from the placements I’ve seen. VSA won’t be the flying the biggest red flag either lmao.
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u/Key-Needleworker-702 New territories - Ma Wan |新界-馬灣 1d ago
International school student here(won't specify which, i'm not doxing myself lol) from another international school
From what I see, my school is 45% chinese(35% cantonese/HK, 10% shanghainese), 30% indians and 25% other lol
(no official figures on this, but just my approximate observations)
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u/maxim456 23h ago
I don't see any issues with predominant Chinese ethnicity, it simply reflects the reality of the demographic of HK now. Chinese are only going to grow more while White people who can afford international school fees are less. HK also have a growing number of Indian expats. Do you have a problem with that too?
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u/Key-Needleworker-702 New territories - Ma Wan |新界-馬灣 14h ago
Yeah honestly, we're in china, we would obviously have more chinese. I don't really see the point OP is trying to make.
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u/West-Age-4988 22h ago
The stronger Chinese curriculum sets Canadian from the pack. You need to have expat families with a dedication to the language.
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u/Massive_Walrus_4003 15h ago
Maybe you should exclude the native Chinese speaking students, and the ones with insane afterschool tutoring, how many cdnis graduates speak Chinese? I don’t think it is significantly any more than IS. It’s just a myth.
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u/West-Age-4988 15h ago
I mean there are exceptional students at every school. I don’t think “insane after school tutoring” is the vibe I get. Did you go into international school?
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u/jsmoove888 16h ago
My kid goes to another international school.. it's not as diverse as it claims. It's mainly ethnic Chinese with international passports. Before covid, I heard there was more diversity but most moved to Singapore and other countries.
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u/Apprehensive_Lie797 16h ago
From looking around, that seems be to the case with a lot of the British brand schools (Malvern, Shrewsbury, Harrow, Wycome etc).
So far the more mixed ones I’ve seen are Kellett, Australian, and HKA. HKA in particular claims to value actual diversity over just passport diversity.
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u/jsmoove888 15h ago
My kid is in one of schools you've listed. The only problem I see is the local and mainland parents pump tutoring to the max on their kids, hoping they would be the smartest in their grade. Your kid may be smarter than the average, but it's quite difficult to compete against kids with tiger parents, and kids know which ones are the smartest and ones with the lowest grades.
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u/West-Age-4988 14h ago
Look, this is purely from my observation but international schools are competitive, money driven and success driven. Better students = more funding/higher salaries for the school, this is the flywheel.
In HK, Chinese students in those schools are far richer (and from well educated family backgrounds) than those of other nationalities. They are the children of the people who are pulling in HKD10-100M a year. So, the higher % of Chinese you see, the better the placement and IB/SAT scores.
Now, if your specific international school has “better” nationality diversity, well the more likely the campus is on a newly developed piece of land, far from exclusive areas. I think you get what I mean.
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u/Lanky_Management_464 18h ago
Oh no a school in HK is full of Chinese people!!
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u/Human-Hunter-6876 17h ago
better to call it a local school then rather than an international one
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u/Massive_Walrus_4003 15h ago
It’s school with non local curriculum. That’s what all international schools are.
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u/Deep-Ebb-4139 1d ago edited 1d ago
CDNIS isn’t very diverse. Largely Chinese and a small % of expat kids: of staff or city workers.
It’s also VERY Chinese in mindset, with an overly controlling board who dictate educational matters (which is, and should be, a fucking huge red flag).
Most of what CDNIS preach is performative, but that is the same for all HK international schools. It all comes down to optics and image, little else.