By Leopold Chen,William Yiu

Copyright scmp

The operator of a top international school in Hong Kong has revealed it plans to negotiate soon with the institution’s US co-founder to seek an out-of-court settlement in response to a lawsuit over allegations it breached an operating agreement by only serving the rich.
The senior management of Hong Kong International School (HKIS) told the Post about the plan on Tuesday after speaking with more than 700 parents at two town hall meetings at its Repulse Bay and Tai Tam campuses.
During the meeting, HKIS senior management assured parents that the school would not undergo any operational changes “at least, in the foreseeable future”.
In response, the US-based Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) said it was deeply disappointed by HKIS leadership, which it accused of continuing to make what the church believed to be “repeated false, misleading and possibly defamatory statements”.
“It is particularly troubling that LCMS representatives were prevented from observing today’s town hall meetings,” the church said.
It said that while the actions of the school leadership “do not give us hope they are serious about working with LCMS to improve HKIS”, the synod was willing to meet with the operator at any time to discuss the matter.
Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu weighed in on the row for the first time earlier on Tuesday, stressing that education standards and students’ rights should remain unaffected by the saga.
“The standard of education cannot be affected, students’ rights cannot be affected,” he said.
“These two principles are the most important and have been duly related to the parties concerned.”
Lee said the Education Bureau would closely monitor the situation, urging the school to also regularly inform parents and students about the latest developments.
The two meetings were arranged less than a week after LCMS sued the management of HKIS, which it co-founded in 1966, for allegedly breaching the operating agreement.

LCMS, the registered owner of the Repulse Bay campus, accused HKIS of serving only the “rich and privileged few” and amassing excessive financial reserves of more than HK$2.8 billion (US$359 million).
The church also threatened to evict HKIS and set up a new institution called Hong Kong Pacific School if HKIS management failed to rectify the numerous alleged breaches of the agreement.
“The main concerns that we heard from parents were around disruption or possible disruption for their students, as they hope to remain at HKIS and under the same type of schooling that we have, because most of our parents are international, they hope to remain in an international school so they can see their students through this,” interim school head Ron Roukema said.
“We assure them that we’ll continue to have these conversations [with the church], hopefully be able to move back behind closed doors and out of the media’s eyes to have those conversations.”
Harold Kim, chairman of the HKIS board of managers, said the body would reach out to the church soon, as he said Christian Preus, chairman of the synod’s board of directors, hoped to discuss the situation in the next few weeks.
Kim said he had also told parents that the school and the church were “partners” and the litigation was a last resort.
Those attending the meetings were mainly concerned about the disruptions and the worst-case scenario that could result from the lawsuit, he added, noting some parents had also said they would not want to send their children to Hong Kong Pacific School.
Parents who spoke to the Post on Tuesday said the saga had created anxiety, and they hoped that the dispute could be settled soon.
Tiffany Zhang, the mother of a child at the school’s Repulse Bay campus, said the students were also anxious as discussions about the potential eviction were taking place “everywhere”.
“Those legal actions may raise questions and also unnecessary anxiety, especially for those young learners,” she said.

Zhang said she would not sign up her child for Hong Kong Pacific School, even if HKIS was later evicted, citing the uncertainties surrounding the new institution.
“As a parent, I hope everything will be fine. We love our school, and we want the school to continue to provide a high-quality, American-style education to the international business community,” she said.
Another parent, surnamed Tan, expressed similar concerns about the legal action’s potential impact on his son, who is a secondary student at HKIS.
“It makes us worried or anxious about the impact on the education of our children,” the father said.
Tan said he was shocked by the church’s decision to take the matter to court and make it public.
But he added that he appreciated the school’s transparency and active engagement with parents.
“I hope eventually they can come to an agreement,” Tan said.
The church’s demands include a US$1.75 million indemnity payment from HKIS management, with the figure to cover the fees of property advisers, as well as the cost of lawyers in Hong Kong and the United States.
HKIS senior management has brushed off the church’s allegations, saying the school sought to serve the international business community, not the wider public. It earlier said it was confident it could win the lawsuit.
It also previously revealed that the missionary group sent lawyers to the Repulse Bay campus to demand a property valuation in 2022, and had come up with some plans to redevelop the land.
The operator said it was told that the campus was valued at US$400 million to US$500 million, while the valuation would hit up to US$1.1 billion if the site was turned into residential and commercial development.
Education authorities earlier said that, for the present moment, they would not process an application from LCMS to set up a new international school, citing the ongoing legal proceedings.
The Parent Faculty Organisation of HKIS, which represents the school’s parents and teachers, on Sunday expressed its “unwavering” support for the institution’s operator.