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New Immigration Measures for Internship, On-campus Part-time and Summer Employment

The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region has implemented a set of new immigration measures relaxing certain restrictions in respect of intership, part-time on campus employment and summer job for non-local students with effective from May 19, 2008. 

 
Non-local students studying a full-time locally accredited programme at degree level or above with a study period of not less than one academic year will receive a "No Objection Letter (NOL)"  issued by the Immigration Department upon approval of application for student visa / visa extension of stay. 

With this NOL, you are then allowed to take up study/curriculum-related internship, part-time on campus employment and summer jobs.  Please note that the NOL will not be issued to Foundation Year students, since foundation year programme is not counted as degree level.  Hence, Foundation Year students are not allowed to take up internship and part-time on-campus employment during their foundation year.  Below are the details of the relaxation for your reference.  Please refer to details announced by the Immigration Department and the terms set out in your NOL as final and in case of doubt.
 
Study/curriculum related internship
  • must be study/curriculum-related and be arranged or endorsed by the programme offering department
  • duration of study/curriculum-related internship is up to one year, or one-third of the normal duration of the relevant full-time study programme, whichever is shorter
  • internship cannot take place before a non-local student is officially registered with PolyU concerned and begins attending any scheduled classes of their registered programme, or when the student has fulfilled all the course/credit requirements for graduation
  • there is no restriction on work location, salary and working hours
Part-time on-campus employment
  • Part-time on-campus employment is allowed up to 20 hours per week throughout the year.  However, unused hours of part-time on-campus employment could not be rolled over from one week to another.  ("Week" refers to a period of seven days from Sunday to Saturday.)
  • Students may only work at the on-campus "Designated Operators".  If the work location is outside campus, the employer must be PolyU.
Summer employment
  • Summer employment is to be undertaken during the summer months (i.e. June 1 - August 31).
  • there is no restriction on work location, working hours, nature of work and employers
Terms listed on the NOL will become invalid if your student visa expires or you switch to another institution and/or study programme.

If you wish to take up charity/voluntary work, you need to seek permission from the Director of Immigration beforehand.  Otherwise, you will be committing an offence of breaching your conditions of stay.  You may liaise with either your programme offering department or Student Affairs Office for helping you to submit application via the Academic Secretariat.  To ensure that you will get the permission before starting the activities, please submit your application at least 2 weeks beforehand.

For more information on the Immigration Policy on Education for Non-local Students and Immigration Arrangements for Non-local Graduates, please refer to the Immigration Department official websites at http://www.immd.gov.hk/ehtml/faq_ipoe.htm and http://www.immd.gov.hk/ehtml/faq_nlc.htm respectively.