The Centre for Applied English Studies (CAES) primarily offers English enhancement programmes to assist postgraduate and undergraduate students to use English more effectively in their academic studies and their subsequent careers. In addition, CAES offers a taught postgraduate programme leading to the degree of Master of Arts in Applied Linguistics and co-offers the Master of Arts in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages with the Faculty of Education.

CAES also offers the following support to help students and staff at the University of Hong Kong improve their English skills in the CAES Advisory Zone, Student Advisory Services, Chi Wah Learning Commons, Zone R:

• CAES offers small group learning activities (workshops and discussions), writing support consultations, and individual consultations with a CAES lecturer for advice on improving English.
• Through the English Teaching Assistant (ETA) scheme, students have the opportunity to consult with (near-)native English speaking graduates on academic, professional and social English issues they may have, either in a one-to-one consultation or in community learning groups.
• The Peer Tutoring Scheme (provided jointly with CEDARS) also gives students the opportunity to practise informal and confidence building speaking skills with peers. Peer tutors are selected for their native or near-native English language speaking skills and their interest in voluntary service to help others with English language improvement.
• CAES curates a range of English self-study resources, exam preparation practice materials (IELTS, LPATE, GMAT, TOEFL, etc.), a film library, and a selection of newspapers and magazines in the Advisory Zone physical space.
• Virtual English (http://caes.hku.hk) serves as a guide to the resources available to HKU students and staff for self-study of English. It provides information about the independent learning and advisory service opportunities offered by CAES, and is the place to sign up for the above support services. It also provides an online catalogue of all the learning resources in the Advisory Zone, and, through its internet resources pages provides a range of suggestions for, links to, or ways of studying English both in the Advisory Zone and on the web.
• The CAES English Language Support Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/CAES.ELRC/) is a community page for all the Advisory Zone users and a way for CAES advisory staff to communicate daily with students. The students can find posts relevant to their language learning at CAES, life-long language learning in general and their future careers.