Hong Kong education authorities have suspended a second private school in their crackdown on institutions collaborating with third-party agencies to help students from outside the city qualify for subsidised university programmes.

The Education Bureau said on Monday that it was “very seriously” looking into institutions that were allegedly collaborating with placement or tutoring agencies to operate “shell schools”, which helped students gain local status.

The bureau said it had rejected the registration application for Inno Secondary School in Kowloon Tong on July 28. It is the second school that the bureau has suspended in similar circumstances in less than a week.

Inno Secondary School principal Thomas Qi Wendi previously confirmed to media that the institution had been working with Shenzhen operators to recruit students and offer courses since July.

But he said the school planned to cease the collaborations given the suspension order imposed on another institution accused of working with a mainland Chinese tutorial centre to offer the city’s university entrance examination curriculum without registration.

Inno Secondary School’s proposed programme would allow children to study on the mainland before completing two final years in Hong Kong, where accommodation would be provided.