Search

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of the international mobility of mainland students in special administrative regions of China and in places outside China.Design/methodology/approachThere have been studies using the framework of push–pull and reverse push–pull factors to explore the movement of mainland students to North America, Australia, Singapore and Hong Kong. This study follows up by exploring such research directions in Macau, which is another special administrative region of China. Different from previous studies, the sample of this study came specifically from 130 students enrolling in teacher education undergraduate programs in Macau.FindingsIn this study, using data collected from questionnaires and interviews, the factors affecting mainland student teachers’ choice of Macau as a place for their undergraduate studies are examined. Other related issues such as the challenges these students face and their intentions after their graduation are also studied.Originality/valueThe data collected for this study were primary and original, drawing specifically from students enrolling teacher education programs. Following the various studies on the global movement of mainland students, this study aimed at understanding mainland students’ mobility pattern in one of China’s special administration regions, Macau. In this regard, cultural identity and cultural factors were considered on top of other factors.

This article reports a comparative study on the reasons for pre-service student teachers becoming teachers in Hong Kong and Macau. The study adopted a mixed methods research design, with 459 and 137 student teachers completing a questionnaire on teaching motivation and 35 and 15 student teachers joining a follow-up interview in Hong Kong and Macau, respectively. The study found that student teachers in both societies share commonality in their altruistic and intrinsic motivations, i.e. a sense of vocation. The difference in student teachers’ motivation reflects the contrasting perceptions of teachers’ work and the teaching profession in connection with the different educational systemic factors in Macau and Hong Kong. Government-initiated quantitative expansion and quality enhancement in education set the backdrop of an aspiring teaching profession with promising prospects as perceived by the student teachers in Macau. In contrast, the move towards "centralized-decentralization" with a focus on excellence, competition and accountability in education at a time of teacher surplus results in a demanding profession with gloomy prospects as perceived by the Hong Kong student teachers. These differences add to our understanding of how the development trajectories of different education systems and teaching professions influence young people’s motivation to become teachers in different societies. The study also provides insights for initial teacher education and offers suggestions for the education communities of the two societies.

Purpose Mainland Chinese students (hereafter called Mainland students) are a major source of international student applications. Some countries have initiated policies to enable Mainland students to stay and work after graduation. Additions to the literature, particularly more country-specific studies, are much needed to cast light on the employment issues for such Mainland students overseas. The purpose of this paper is to fill this gap by focussing on Mainland students who have completed teacher education programmes in Hong Kong and then served as teachers in Hong Kong schools (Mainland teachers). The incentives that attracted them to stay and work in Hong Kong and the challenges they faced were examined. Their future plans were also probed. Design/methodology/approach The study adopted a mixed methodology. Data collection comprised both a questionnaire survey and interviews. The semi-structured interviews provided opportunities for respondents to explain their answers, to narrate and widen the scope of data to areas hitherto unanticipated by the researchers. Findings Mainland teachers were attracted to stay on in Hong Kong to work for both intrinsic and extrinsic reasons. They were in fact settlers. They found the programmes they had taken to be practical and believed that they had acquired a niche situation in the teaching profession. Working and living in Hong Kong was satisfying, but some experienced social distance from local colleagues. Originality/value The paper can be read with reference to countries that recruit Mainland students and there is a possibility that some of them may stay behind to work. It sheds light on the selection criteria of such students, on ways to enrich their programmes, as well as their employment, living and social integration issues.

A random sample of 1,313 grades 7–9 Chinese language arts teachers in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Macao, and Taipei were surveyed about their instructional writing practices. When asked about their college, inservice, and personal preparation, three out of four teachers indicated that they were poorly prepared to teach writing. They were slightly positive about themselves and writing, their students and writing, and their effectiveness as writing teachers. Textbooks, school guidelines, national standards, and high school entrance exams played a prominent role in shaping how they taught writing, but a sizable minority of teachers indicated that they mostly designed their own writing program. Writing classes occurred infrequently, as just one in six teachers held a class more often than once every two weeks. Teachers used evidence-based practices, but such procedures were typically applied only once a month. Students completed a broad range of writing activities during the school year and applied a variety of revising and planning procedures. Consistent with sociocultural theory, teachers from the four locations evidenced differences on almost every variable studied, although the observed differences were mostly a matter of degree (i.e., teachers applied certain practices more or less frequently). Teachers’ preparation, beliefs about writing, and frequency of writing classes predicted their instructional practices and how frequently students engaged in specific writing activities.

This article is one of a series of papers generated from the Curriculum Reform study in Hong Kong with the purpose of understanding the impact of government’s role in the change process of the reform. This paper specifically examines the 17 government initiatives in the Curriculum Reform in terms of their adoption percentages of schools from before 2000 to 2006–7. These initiatives can be regarded as ‘soft’ measures of the Government, supplementing the hard policies on the Curriculum Reform. The adoption of these initiatives in schools reflects the extent of implementation of reform items and therefore should be crucial to the success of the Curriculum Reform. The study illustrates the impact of the government on the phase of adoption in the change process. The findings suggested that whereas the government initially played an important role in adoption of these initiatives it was not able to raise the adoption percentages further towards the end of the study. Other features of adoption and their impacts on policy and change are also discussed.

This article investigates the perceptions of English headteachers and Hong Kong principals on the kinds of pressures that they believed affected the way they did their job, and in particular the degree to which they felt their governments were affecting their leadership role. The research utilised semi-structured interviews to generate written ‘portraits’ of these individuals, which were then examined to answer questions about current pressures. The findings suggested that (1) there was considerable variation in the manner these individuals responded to key issues; (2) all individuals prioritised local concerns, and particularly with consideration to the children in their care; (3) there was a greater sense of embattlement from the English headteachers and a more critical approach to legislation, than from the Hong Kong principals, though with considerable individual variation in the degree of overt resistance shown; (4) whilst current educational reforms in Hong Kong seemed to favour the development of c...

PurposeTo prepare Hong Kong students to face a rapidly changing twenty‐first century, the Hong Kong Government implemented a major curriculum reform entitled Learning to Learn – The Way Forward in Curriculum Development. This reform has shaped the direction of Hong Kong's school education since 2001. The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the reform from the perspectives of the major stakeholders, namely principals, teachers, and students.Design/methodology/approachThe paper was written based on the data obtained from a large‐scale study that covered over 250 primary and secondary schools, or about 20 per cent of the total population in Hong Kong. Both qualitative (focus group interviews) and quantitative methods (questionnaire survey) were employed in the study.FindingsThe findings indicated that moderate progress has been made in students’ overall performance in generic skills, positive values and attitudes, language proficiency, and over the key learning areas. On the other hand, the progress made in secondary schools was perceived to be less than that made in primary schools. The views of frontline teachers could also be different from senior teachers and principals as to the degree of achievement. There also existed a gap as the progress reported for critical thinking and self learning abilities might be less favourable when compared to those reported for IT, reading habits and healthy lifestyle.Originality/valueThe original findings and policy suggestions of the paper are of reference value to curriculum policy planners, researchers and educators.

PurposeThe objective of this paper was to examine key hindering and facilitating factors in schools during the first stage of the curriculum reform (2001‐2006) in Hong Kong and to identify key strategies to address these challenges.Design/methodology/approachA total of 150 primary and 120 secondary schools with 7,869 key stakeholders including principals, curriculum leaders, teachers, and students participated in the study. The data for this study was collected from the following two major methods: survey questionnaire and in‐depth interviews. The response rate was 95 percent.FindingsIn spite of the different roles played by each stakeholder in the curriculum reform, the perceptions of school principals, curriculum leaders, and teachers were very similar with regards to the factors that facilitated and hindered their successful implementation of the reform. Consistent with the current literature, the findings clearly indicated that the recent curriculum reform in Hong Kong was still facing several key obstacles and challenges that were common in many other countries, in the implementation stage, such as teachers' heavy workloads, learning diversity in class, and teachers' inadequate understanding of the reform.Originality/valueThe study is important in that this was the first large‐scale study ever conducted to examine the progress of the recent curriculum reform in Hong Kong. The findings of the results generate important policy recommendations that may improve the implementation of the curriculum reform in the next phase and contribute to the related literature in the areas of curriculum reform not only in Hong Kong but also other parts of the world.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the progress of the curriculum reform in Hong Kong in the implementation phase from 2001‐2006, with the agreement and support of heads and teachers on the reform.Design/methodology/approachSurvey questionnaires and focus group interviews were used to collect data from various stakeholders. A stratified random sampling method was employed to select 150 primary schools and 120 secondary schools to participate in the study.FindingsIt is found that with the agreement and support of school heads and teachers, there is good progress in the reform items on teaching and learning. Findings of this paper also suggest that teachers who agreed with the reform items made changes with their practices in terms of learning and teaching strategies, catering to learner diversity, assessment for learning, developing students' language proficiency, cross‐curricula learning, playing multiple teachers' roles and preparation for the new senior secondary curriculum. This study thus supports most findings from the change literature with its empirical data that educational changes and innovations with the agreement and support of school heads and teachers tend to have a greater chance of succeeding.Originality/valueThe paper contributes by examining to what extent findings and views established in change literature elsewhere can be justified and enriched with the case of Hong Kong.

In this study, we attempt to investigate the potential effects of parents’ career interests on young adults’ career interests. Using a sample of 113 freshmen in Hong Kong, results indicated that after controlling for personality, gender, general mental abilities and emotional intelligence, some of the parents’ career interests were still related to the young adults’ respective career interests. For some types of interests, the extent of influences is found to be contingent on the gender of the respondents. Implications are discussed.

The recent works of Evertse–Ferretti (Evertse and Ferretti, A generalization of the subspace theorem with polynomials of high degree, Dev. Math. (2008), pp.175–198) and Corvaja–Zannier (Corvaja and Zannier, On a general Theu's equation, Ann. Math. 160 (2004), pp. 705–726; Corvaja and Zannier, On integral points on surfaces, Amer. J. Math. 126 (2004), pp. 1033–1055) in diophantine approximations (Ru, A defect relation for holomorphic curves intersecting hypersurfaces, Amer. J. Math. 126 (2004), pp. 215–266; An, A defect relation for non-Archimedean analytic curves in arbitrary projective varieties, Proc. Amer. Math. Soc. 135 (2007), pp. 1255–1261) in complex and p-adic Nevanlinna theory extend the classical subspace theorem and the classical second main theorem to the case of non-linear divisors in general position. These had been long standing problems in diophantine approximation and Nevanlinna theory. However, their results when specialized to the case of hyperplanes are weaker than the classical result...

Changes in assessment practices in the direction of assessment for learning (AfL) can be a powerful force to enhance student learning. This article presents a case study of teacher learning in an AfL project in Hong Kong. In the Project, AfL strategies were adopted in Chinese Language and English Language classrooms at the junior secondary level. By examining subject leaders’ and classroom teachers’ experiences with the project reported in interviews, the paper enriches our understanding of the variations in the subject department contexts of teacher learning, the situatedness of teacher learning in terms of knowledge about student learning, understanding of AfL and curriculum leadership, as well as the relationship between teacher learning and changes in assessment practices. The article concludes with suggestions on fostering subject departments to be expansive environments for teacher professional learning and to be a vehicle of internal change, alerts the importance of integration of AfL into teachers...

Emotional intelligence (EI) has been an emerging topic for educational, psychological and management researchers and consultants in recent years. Despite the emerging consensus of its definition and evidence reported in business organizations, relatively little empirical evidence have been reported in the education literature. We conducted two studies to investigate the impact of middle-level leader and teacher EI on teachers’ job outcomes. In Study 1, 107 teachers were asked to list the attributes of successful middle-level leaders in their schools. In Study 2, 3866 school teachers and middle-level leaders were surveyed on their EI and job satisfaction level. Results provide supports concerning the impact of teacher and middle-level leader EI on school teachers’ job satisfaction. Implications are discussed.

PurposeTo cope with the challenges of the twenty‐first century, the Hong Kong SAR government initiated the Curriculum Reform in 2001. In 2006, a research team from a tertiary institution was commissioned to review the progress of change for smooth implementation of the reform in its next phase. This paper aims to examine this issue.Design/methodology/approachThe nature of the review is basically a survey, applying questionnaires and follow‐up focus‐group interviews to collect data from different groups of subjects. The sample was around 20 per cent of the population, i.e. a total of 252 primary (n=138) and secondary (n=114) schools.FindingsThe paper reports findings on the support for the Reform by primary and secondary schools. Five areas of agreement among school heads are examined, which include challenges to be met, guiding principles of the reform, learning goals, reform framework and the overall agreement with the rationale of the reform. It is found that, while the curriculum reform was supported among school heads, senior teachers and teachers, there was a gap between the views of senior management team and frontier teachers.Research limitations/implicationsThis is a very comprehensive research project with a limited timeframe. The paper can only report and discuss findings mainly on the support for curriculum reform by school heads. Other aspects of the study will be discussed and reported separately in subsequent papers.Practical implicationsThe gap between the views of senior management team and frontier teachers is worth probing as this is the most obstructive factor to the implementation of the reform. Identifying the cause would be the first step in formulating strategies to address and, hopefully, to facilitate the smooth transition from the phase of implementation to the continuation phase of the change process.Originality/valueThe study has suggested the development of a two‐dimensional framework of agreement areas and stakeholders which will contribute to a better understanding of the change process in general, and achievements of a curriculum reform in particular. Other issues are also discussed.

This article provides two ‘portraits’ of headteachers in primary schools in England and Hong Kong, derived from semi-structured interviews with these individuals. Contrary to some claims that such a small sample is worthless, this article argues that what is most meaningful is sometimes derived from the singular and unique; that generalisations in education are as likely to be useful if they are ‘fuzzy’ generalisations as if they are from scientific or statistical generalisations; and that the individual case can strip away the clutter of large contexts and allow recognition of a common shared humanity. What these portraits also show is that responses to larger contexts are heavily dependent on personality and local context, and that if policy implementation and professional development are to have impact, then an attention to the personal and the local are going to be critical factors in any success in these areas.

Emotional intelligence (EI) has been an emerging topic for psychological, educational, and management researchers and consultants in recent years. However, existing literature has concentrated on demonstrating the effects of EI on either the mental health or on job outcomes such as job attitudes and performance. There is relatively little discussion concerning how EI, as a set of interrelated abilities about handling emotions, is developed. Understanding how EI is developed may be the significant first step for organizations to develop effective EI training programs. As an exploratory effort, we borrowed the basic argument from theories in human development to argue that life experiences affect EI development. Based on samples of university students from Singapore and Hong Kong, whether one of the parents was a full-time parent was a significant predictor of the students' EI. This finding was cross-validated with a sample of graduate students in Taiwan. Furthermore, age as a proxy for life experiences for this graduate student sample was found to be a significant predictor of EI. Implications for EI research and training are discussed.

Emotional intelligence (EI) has been an emerging topic for psychological, educational, and management researchers and consultants in recent years. However, there is a lack of scientifically valid measures of this concept, especially for those that have practical utility in the Asian context. Recently, a 40-item forced-choice instrument was developed for Chinese respondents in Hong Kong. We collected data in three studies to further test the practical utility of this instrument in Hong Kong and mainland China. The results provided clear evidence for the instrument’s practical utility. More research that uses this measure in Asian countries is required.

Recent research has advanced our understanding of the modifications needed for Holland’s hexagonal model of occupational interests when applied to Hong Kong Chinese. This study continues this line of research in testing the validity of Wong’s Career Interest Assessment Questionnaire (WCIAQ) and the revised hexagonal model developed in Hong Kong to three other Chinese societies, namely Macau, Mainland China, and Taiwan. Samples of undergraduate students were obtained in these three Chinese societies and Hong Kong. Results indicated that the WCIAQ and the revised hexagonal model developed in Hong Kong are more applicable to these three Chinese societies than Holland’s original model developed in Western societies. Implications for career counseling and education and further research in these Chinese societies are discussed.

Teacher promotion is an important issue in school administration that deserves more academic attention. In business management a commonly used tool for employee motivation, aside from promotion, is the compensation system, which can be flexibly and frequently adjusted with the performance of individual staff members. However, in the existing education system, pay levels and structure are relatively fixed and it is difficult for principals to use the compensation system as a tool to motivate teachers. Promotion is therefore the most important reward that principals can use. Using Hong Kong as an example, and with a sample of 210 principals and teachers from both primary and secondary schools, this article attempts to find answers and make suggestions to improve the current promotion system. It is hoped that this study will provide a better understanding of teacher promotion in general, and in Hong Kong in particular.

Emotional intelligence (EI) has been an emerging topic for psychological, educational, and management researchers and consultants in recent years. Unfortunately, there have been relatively few empirical studies on EI conducted with scientific rigor, especially in Asia. A recent study clarified the definition of EI as a set of mental abilities related to emotions, and developed a self-report EI measure by demonstrating the relationships between EI and life satisfaction, job performance, and job satisfaction for Chinese respondents. To facilitate future EI research and EI-related human resource practices in Asia, we develop an alternative EI measure in this series of four studies using forced choice items. Scenarios with alternative responses showing different levels of EI were generated in the first study, and 20 items were selected empirically. In the second study, pairs of abilities were generated and 20 EI items were paired with various ability facets. In the third study, we examined the social desirability of the 40 items developed in the first two studies. In the fourth study, these 40 EI items were cross-validated. The results indicated that this forced choice EI-scale had acceptable convergent, discriminant and predictive validity using life satisfaction, job performance, and job satisfaction as criterion variables. We discussed the implications of our findings in the conclusion.

Preparation for school leadership has become a major global educational issue since the late 1990s. In Hong Kong, the establishment and implementation of school‐based management in the 1990s have made significant demands on principals. In 1999, a leadership development and training programme for serving and aspiring principals was initiated by the Government of the Special Administrative Region, after visits to and study of similar programmes in England, Scotland, Australia (State of Victoria) and Singapore. In 2002, further suggestions were made to draw up a framework for principals' training in Hong Kong. With an adapted evaluation framework, and based on the evaluation findings of a principals' training programme developed by a tertiary institution in 1998, this paper attempts to give answers to: (1) why do serving principals attend principals' training programmes? (2) what sort of training programme do principals regard as useful? (3) are the findings consistent with the proposals of the Government? (...

Since the beginning of the 1990s, there have been changes in the rationale and practice of Hong Kong's teacher education. Apart from the expansion of initial teacher education, there has also been an increase in the provision of refresher teacher training programmes. Many of these training programmes are offered by the Hong Kong Institute of Education, and have been credit-bearing since 1998. To ensure that these programmes are effective in meeting the needs of schools, evaluation studies are necessary. This study adapted Kirk-patrick's training evaluation model to examine the effectiveness of a primary refresher training programme entitled `The School as an Organization' (SAO). We used a longitudinal investigation with multiple methods (questionnaires, tests and interviews) and sources of information (teachers and their principals) to examine the reactions, learning and behavioural changes of 129 trainees. Our results indicated that the refresher training programme is very effective, especially for senior teachers who are responsible for managerial duties. The findings and implications of the study are discussed.

Comment expliquer les changements observes dans les programmes d'etudes des differents systemes scolaires ? Les AA. s'interrogent sur les motifs sociaux, economiques ou politiques de Hong Kong pour faire evoluer ses programmes

Emotional intelligence (EI) has been an emerging topic for psychological, educational, and management researchers and consultants in recent years. In general, EI has been defined as the ability to perceive, understand, and manage one’s emotions (Salovey, Hsee, & Mayer, 1993; Salovey & Mayer, 1990). Although lacking solid research supports, proponents of the EI concept argue that EI affects people’s physical and mental health as well as career achievements (e.g., Goleman, 1995). Some emerging leadership theories also imply that emotional and social intelligence are even more important for leaders and managers because cognitive and behavioral complexity and flexibility are important characteristics of competent leaders (Boal & Whitehead, 1992). How-ever, up to now, there has beenlittle empirical evidence in the literature about the relationship between EI and job outcomes such as performance and job satisfaction. There are at least three major reasons for such lack of empirical evidence. First, as a new construct, scholars have not adopted a uniform domain of the EI construct. Political sensitivity, social awareness, service orientation, achievement drive, and some other personality dimensions have been argued as part of EI by some authors (e.g., BarOn, 1997), while other scholars confine EI to the domain of one branch of social intelligence (see, e.g., Mayer, Caruso, & Salovey, 2000). Second, because different domains of the construct are being used, a simple and psychometrically sound EI measure that can be used practically in management studies has not been developed. Third, there is no conceptual framework that defines the role of EI in the area of management and its relationships with job outcomes.

A family of high-order subparametric bending elements with up to 25 nodes are developed. These elements are conforming elements and by including the effect of transverse shear moderately thick plates can also be analysed. This is demonstrated in one of the numerical examples in which the contribution of the shear deformation to the central deflection of rhombic plates supported on two opposite sides is investigated. The elements, being subparametric, can model plates of different geometries, such as rhombic, trapezoidal and curved plates. Several examples are presented here and comparisons are made with results obtained by other methods. The versatility of these elements are clearly shown since only a few elements will normally give results of sufficient accuracy for design purposes.