Curriculum reform in higher education has been taking place in many countries, with much attention paid to many such as the national-level Bologna process in Europe, institutional-level Melbourne Model in Australia and discipline-level Engineering Criteria 2000(EC2000). This paper gives a detailed account of the reform initiatives taking place in the recent Hong Kong educational system and in particular, focusing on a research-intensive university in Hong Kong through literature and consultations. Being aware that teachers often face challenges in dealing with curriculum changes, this small-scale study aims to identify areas which faculty members require assistance in their professional development by investigating university teachers' perception of the curriculum reform in the Science discipline. Through quantitative and qualitative methods, it was also found that academics expressed doubts towards the implementation of outcome-based and student-centered learning approaches in the new curriculum despite their understanding of these concepts.
[Copyright of International Education Studies is the property of Canadian Center of Science and Education. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.5539/ies.v6n4p56]

'Soft' policy has newly emerged as a policy implementation concept in relation to governance. Non-binding in character, 'soft' policy is designed for multi-level systems of governance in which there is relative autonomy at different levels of collective decision-making. 'Soft' policy has gained attention since the adoption of curriculum reforms in various countries that involve governance and coordination among multi-level systems. In real practice, 'soft' methods or measures are used to assist implementation at various levels. The present study explores how 'soft' policy has been realised in recent large-scale curriculum reform in Hong Kong. In essence, the study explores the 'soft' measures used by the government in the curriculum change, how these 'soft' measures have brought changes to schools, and how they were received by school principals and teachers. Implications are also drawn from these real cases of 'soft' policy implementation.
[Copyright of Curriculum Journal is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09585176.2012.703378]