Background: The concept of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) capital can serve as a framework for understanding how various resources contribute to aspiration formation in STEM fields. However, to date, it remains unclear what factors should be included in STEM capital and how they may help explain why students do or do not aspire to STEM careers. Purpose: This study aimed to validate the instruments and explore the predictive effect of various factors, including STEM capital and other non-STEM specific cultural capital factors, on students’ STEM aspirations while comparing these variables among primary, junior secondary, and senior secondary levels. Sample: A stratified sample of students (N = 3,991) from the upper-primary to senior-secondary level in Hong Kong participated in the study. Design and methods: An online survey investigation was conducted for data collection. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were performed to validate the instruments before ANOVA, correlation analysis, and regression analysis were performed. Results: The elementary students had significantly greater scores on the STEM capital variables than did the students at the junior and senior secondary levels. Gender, age, parental school involvement and expectations, informal STEM participation, positive views of professionals, and self-concept in mathematics positively predicted STEM aspirations, while having a parent/guardian with a STEM career negatively predicted students’ aspirations. In addition, the results showed that having STEM books at home and self-concept in information technology were additional predictors at some educational levels. The explored factors can explain approximately 30% of the variance in students’ STEM aspirations. Conclusion: Senior students’ STEM capital factors exhibit lower levels compared to their younger peers. The developed, adapted, and translated instruments are valid for measuring the factors composing STEM capital, where some

Few studies have explored primary school teachers’ classroom-based online assessment practices and underlying reasons. To fill this research gap, this study interviewed 48 Hong Kong primary school teachers to understand their online assessment practices and influencing factors when they were obliged to use it in their daily instruction under the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings revealed that the participants tended to use online tests/exercises for formative purposes instead of summative purposes. In addition, they tried online alternative assessment tasks, such as video or audio recordings, peer assessment and projects, and gave online feedback to students but less frequently than online tests/exercises. The school examination culture and the participants’ perceived limited control over online test fairness may have restricted their summative use of online tests/exercises. Meanwhile, the participants’ perceived positive usage norms, along with their favourable attitudes towards and confidence in using online tests/exercises probably enhanced their formative use of them. In addition, the participants’ perceived neutral usage norms and limited external control of online alternative assessment tasks and feedback seemed to impede their use of them in classrooms. Copyright © 2024 The Author(s).

Background: Students’ positive perceptions of scientists or engineers have been reported to be positively related to their science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) career aspirations. However, other research indicates that positive perceptions of experts in these fields might not necessarily lead to students’ pursuit of STEM careers. Self-concept, defined as one’s perceived abilities in specific academic domains, likely plays a moderating role in the relationship between perceptions and career aspirations according to the motivational theory of role modelling. Moreover, students’ perceptions of STEM professionals might be sourced from STEM-related media and school experiences. Therefore, through running a moderated mediation model, this study examined whether and how the influences of media consumption and school STEM learning opportunities on career aspirations would be mediated by perceptions of STEM professionals, and whether the mediation effect would be conditional on students’ self-concept. Methods: Data were collected through an online survey of 608 primary and secondary school students from Hong Kong, and were analysed using structural equation modelling. Results: Results revealed that the students’ positive perceptions of STEM professionals were positively associated with their career aspirations, and mediated the links from media consumption and school opportunities to career aspirations. In addition, this mediated pathway depended on STEM self-concept, such that perceptions of STEM professionals were only linked with STEM career aspirations for adolescents with average or high levels of self-concept. Conclusions: The findings of this study suggest the need to pay attention to the STEM perceptions and self-concept interaction while designing and implementing learning activities to connect a diversity of students with STEM careers. It is not only important to foster students’ self-concept, but also to enrich their knowledge of diverse occupations

This study investigated 14 Hong Kong primary school teachers’ conceptions of and concerns about the implementation of integrated STEM education in primary school. Data were collected through concept maps and interviews with the teachers. Results revealed that in addition to representing STEM as simplistic models (e.g., STEM as an acronym), the teachers mostly seemed to model STEM integration conceptually using integrated disciplines, science as context, or real-world problem solving as context. Not many teachers were found to represent STEM using engineering design progress as context. Results also indicated that the teachers expressed intense concerns regarding personal inadequacy of STEM knowledge or skills (personal), student outcomes of STEM education (consequence), and limited instructional time (management). This study suggested providing sustained teacher professional development, creating supportive school environments, and building a collaborative STEM community as strategies to facilitate changes in teachers’ concerns and to advance STEM implementation in primary schools. Copyright © 2022 Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden.

This chapter introduces the reform of teacher preparation for primary General Studies teachers and secondary science teachers to implement STEM education in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (Hong Kong/ HKSAR) of China. In response to the call for the promotion of STEM education in recent policy addresses, STEM education is to be promoted through the Key Learning Areas of Science Education, Technology Education, and Mathematics Education in the school curriculum. Given the imperative role that teachers play in the provision of quality STEM education, the government, universities, and other stakeholders have contributed significant resources and funding to provide training programmes, workshops, projects, and research to prepare teachers to provide students with relevant school-based STEM learning opportunities. The discussion includes mainly pre-service teacher education comprising the degree programmes, subjects, and courses offered at undergraduate and postgraduate levels to nurture qualified teachers in STEM education and some brief information about in-service teacher professional development. Data is collected and analysed from government reports, policy documents, research articles, discussion papers, and programme information on STEM education and teacher education. This chapter provides an overview to inform future directions of teacher preparation for STEM education in Hong Kong. Copyright © 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Students’ social identity is considered to have profound effects on their learning and academic performance, but there was a lack of research on whether students’ social identity would also influence their aspirations to pursue STEM careers. This research studied the associations between the social identity of students and their aspirations to engage in STEM careers. Nearly 4,000 Hong Kong students from three key learning stages participated in a survey related to their STEM aspirations. Data analysis using multiple regression and structural equation modelling showed that local and national identity were predictive of STEM career aspirations. Moreover, students’ sense of contribution to the nation and local society, as well as the perceived value of STEM professionals were mediators of the impact of their social identity on their STEM career aspirations. The implications provide insights for policymakers and educators to formulate appropriate curricula benefiting students’ social identity development as well as their STEM aspirations. Copyright © 2022 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

There have been increasing concerns about the significant decline in teenagers’ intentions to pursue STEM subjects or careers. This study examined how students’ perceptions of parental expectations, STEM cultural capital, mathematics/science self-efficacy, gender, and parents’ jobs were associated with STEM career aspirations and tested whether these associations differed by school level. Data were collected from 1,864 junior and 665 senior secondary students in Hong Kong via an online survey. Results indicated that, perceived parental long-term expectations were closely linked to STEM career aspirations, whereas, perceived parental short-term expectations were closely linked to self-efficacy. Out-of-school STEM experiences and STEM media consumption both had positive impacts on aspirations and shaped different aspects of students’ perceived parental expectations. Additionally, significant gender differences were found in STEM media consumption, self-efficacy, and aspirations. These relationships mainly were invariant across school levels. However, the indirect paths from STEM media consumption to aspirations via self-efficacy varied significantly between junior and senior secondary students. Based on these findings, this study argues for the essential role of perceived parental expectations in shaping STEM career aspirations for teenagers. STEM cultural capital may be more productive and supportive if it promotes teenagers’ interpretations of parental expectations and their mathematics and science self-efficacy. Copyright © 2022 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Although encouraging student creativity is a commonly recognised goal of STEM education, there is a lack of research in this area. In this study, the effects of epistemic beliefs on STEM creativity and the mediation of intellectual risk-taking were investigated. The subjects were 461 primary students in Hong Kong. The findings revealed that (i) intellectual risk-taking was a significant and positive predictor of STEM creativity; (ii) the certainty and justification dimensions of epistemic beliefs had direct, negative and significant impacts on STEM creativity; and (iii) the complexity dimension of epistemic beliefs had both direct and indirect significantly positive impacts on STEM creativity, and the indirect impacts were mediated by intellectual risk-taking. This study revealed the complicated relationships between different orientations in epistemic beliefs and STEM creativity, which include both constraining and facilitating effects, and both direct and indirect impacts. We argue that although reducing naïve and relativistic epistemic beliefs is essential for the development of creativity in STEM education, the effects of cultivating mature epistemic beliefs may not be sufficient. Further direct and explicit approaches are required to more effectively enhance students’ STEM creativity. Copyright © 2021 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.