One of the major innovations in the recent wave of education reform in Hong Kong is the target-oriented curriculum. An interesting feature of this new curriculum initiative was its amoebic characteristics - changing shape and focus in its course of development. It was reshaped from an assessment system for accountability purposes to a centrally developed curriculum initiative for improving teaching and learning, and finally to a school-based curriculum development. In this paper, this course of development and the reasons behind it will be described and analysed. The study suggests that the two-tier educational policy and implementation system in Hong Kong is a major cause leading to such a phenomenon. If this system were not improved, the possibility of achieving real changes at the school and classroom level would be low.
[Copyright of Journal of Education Policy is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0268093032000145890]

Since 1997, Hong Kong's reintegration with China has been founded on the principle of 'One Country, Two Systems', which serves to guarantee the sustainability of the capitalist system in Hong Kong under the rule of the socialist motherland. This paper is an intra-cultural and inter-regional comparative study of the curricula of two systems (socialist and capitalist) under one country, using the junior secondary History curricula in Shanghai and Hong Kong as a case study. In addition to tracing the differences and similarities, divergences and convergences in the junior secondary History curricula of the two systems, the paper also generates proposals for the future improvement of History education in both cities.
[Copyright of Comparative Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0305006042000274836]

After the resumption of sovereignty in 1997 mother tongue education in Hong Kong, though it began with the good intention of national reintegration, politi-cally, socially, culturally and educationally, has escalated the tensions and contradic-tions of the politics of bilingualism in its implementation. The government policy of bi-literacy and trilingualism addresses, rather than resolves, the problems of hegemonic struggle among different social groups in the society, and between the indigenous elite class and national ruling elites at both the local and national level. A reproduction analysis is conducted to examine the events pertinent to the language shift of English as a medium of instruction (EMI) to Chinese as a medium of instruction (CMI), with particular emphasis on controversial issues such as parental choice, antagonism of elite classes, and group politics in the face of the internationalisation of English under globalised developments of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT). English, a colonising language in the past and now a world language for changes in ICT, remains problematic for Hong Kong's language policy undergoing decolonisation and internationalisation in its early post-transitional years. Putonghua, the national lan-guage of China, challenging Cantonese, the regional dialect, as the formal and high Chinese language of the society, has added complexities to the discourse of polemical mother tongue education under the 'one country, two systems' framework practised in Hong Kong.
[Copyright of Compare: A Journal of Comparative Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0305792032000107786]

This study examines how the language used at home, Putonghua or Cantonese, has influenced the Chinese reading attainment of 4335 primary school students in Hong Kong. Also examined was the influence of the birthplace and home background socioeconomic status (SES) of the reader. Although the indigenous Hong Kong population uses Cantonese, a dialect of Chinese, for everyday communications, the Chinese written in school is Modern Standard Written Chinese (MSWC), the written equivalent of Putonghua, the spoken language of the people of China. Many of the numerous families migrating from China to Hong Kong in recent years have brought with them children educated in Putonghua in China and with extensive experience of MSWC. It was hypothesised that the reading attainment of these students would be superior to that of classmates born in Hong Kong and using Cantonese habitually. This would apply particularly to students from advantaged SES homes. The children born in China indeed had superior reading attainment. But children speaking Cantonese at home and Putonghua 'sometimes' had the highest reading scores, regardless of their birthplace or SES. The writers reflect on assumptions about the influence of the language used at home on language attainment and the implications for educational planning.
[Copyright of Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.2167/jmmd529.1 ]

This study explores graduates' and students' perceptions of the importance of quality of different modules in a Diploma in Hospitality Management (DHM) program in relation to their future development. A structured questionnaire was developed to examine the relationship of the quality of taught modules (courses) and future development. Data collection was conducted at a local university in Hong Kong, through a survey from graduates of the first intake and students of the second intake. Empirical findings indicated that the respondents generally viewed the program positively, but significant differences on various modules were found between those i) who had and had not completed an internship, ii) who preferred to work in the industry and to pursue further studies, and iii) graduates and students.
[Copyright of Journal of Quality Assurance in Hospitality & Tourism is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15280080802412735]

Teacher education programs and teachers' own lives in the relatively homogeneous communities of the past have hardly equipped them to assist their students to become interculturally sensitive, global citizens. This study compares the levels of intercultural sensitivity of secondary school teachers in four Hong Kong schools using the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI). Findings indicate unique IDI profiles at each of the four schools in the study and a wide range of IDI scores at each school. Implications of the findings provide the basis for recommendations for the professional development of teachers in these schools.
[Copyright of Intercultural Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14675980701327247]