Over 50 years ago, in 1965, Ms. Christina Ting Yuk-Chee and her sister, Mrs. Cecilia Lee Ting Yuk-Kuen, opened a nursery that would provide a more caring and enjoyable place for their own children and others in the community. From this family-based foundation, the school flourished under the visionary leadership of one of its first students; Ms Ting’s daughter, Dr. Maggie Koong May-Kay. Dr. Koong returned from university in America to become the Chief Principal of the two nursery schools, and expanded the “Victoria family” into what is now known as Victoria Educational Organisation (VEO).
With seven kindergartens and one nursery school, Victoria is the leading provider in Hong Kong of high quality education for over 3,500 children. Victoria was the first kindergarten to introduce English teachers into the classroom, and to establish a collaborative, co-teaching environment with native Chinese- and English-speaking teachers working side by side.
The Victoria vision continued, and the idea of trilingual (Cantonese, Putonghua and English) classrooms was born in 2007. This vision entailed the need for three qualified native speaking teachers in each classroom, which has proven an enormously successful and popular teaching strategy. With a small student to teacher ratio, Victoria continues to provide a personalised and nurturing learning environment to students using an immersive trilingual approach.
It did not stop there. Dr. Koong had always been concerned with each child fulfilling his or her potential. She searched for a programme that would incorporate creativity and play, whilst maintaining academic rigour. In that vein, she decided upon the International Baccalaureate Primary Years Programme (IB PYP). In December 2005, the first Victoria Kindergarten was authorised as an IB World School, and all the Victoria Kindergartens have since followed suit.
Victoria has a long history of educating and inspiring young minds. Our graduates are equipped as multilingual learners today, and have the foundations to become global citizens of tomorrow. We are proud of our network of global alumni with representation across diverse industries. Leading doctors, lawyers, entrepreneurs, CEOs, educators, musicians, artists and many others all took their first important steps at Victoria.
