This article examines the quality of Hong Kong's sub-degree level education provided by the self-financing institutes in terms of its impact on the earnings of workers, based on Hong Kong's 2006 by-census data. Education is an investment in human capital that enhances the productivity of workers and increases their lifetime incomes; and a more productive investment will produce a higher rate of return. The effects of education on workers' earnings can be regarded as a proxy for measuring the quality of education undertaken. This study shows that, as regards earnings, and therefore (indirectly) quality, the quality of sub-degree level education provided by some self-financing institutes is statistically significantly lower than that provided by publicly-funded institutes.
[Copyright of Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1360080X.2012.689180]

Research Findings: Western ideas and progressive pedagogies have been introduced to China (including Shenzhen), Hong Kong, and Singapore to replace traditional Chinese pedagogy. But these imported ideas are not congruent with traditional Chinese culture and thus have encountered resistance from Chinese teachers. The present study observed and analyzed 18 early childhood classrooms in the 3 localities and questioned the class teachers about their respective teaching practices to see how those ideas were actually turned into practice. Whole-class direct instruction was found to be the predominant Chinese pedagogical mode. This indicates that Chinese traditional pedagogy still dominated those Chinese preschool classrooms. Slight societal differences in classroom practice were also found, reflecting the spectrum of openness and Westernization of the 3 cities.
Practice or Policy: The findings suggest that people should adapt rather than adopt those pedagogical innovations developed in other sociocultural milieu, as different societies have different social, cultural, and educational traditions. Cultural appropriateness should be seriously considered when choosing the pedagogies to be adapted. Moreover, influences from the culture, language, teachers, parents, resources available, and the prevailing education system should also be taken into consideration when planning for pedagogical reforms.
[Copyright of Early Education & Development is the property of Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10409289.2010.536441]

Background: Hong Kong, Macau and Singapore are the top five cities/countries with the cheapest fixed line broadband as proportion of monthly income. It is interesting to know that several decades ago, they were still among the list of developing nations, struggling for survival and relief. However, they are climbing to the top in ICT development now.
Aims: This paper reviews the ICT development in school education of Hong Kong, Macau and Singapore with respect to their social, geographical, and economic backgrounds. Johannessen's three orders of benchmarks are proposed for the comparison.
Method: Literature reviews on recent reports, research articles, books and internet data were used to understand the current situation of the ICT development in education for Hong Kong, Macau and Singapore.
Conclusion: It is clear that these three cities' determination and relative amount that had invested in the development of ICT in education were enormous when compared with the US investment. Among these three cities, the investment of Singapore has been much larger than the other two. Singapore's apparent leading in the development of ICT in education is not an accident, especially for the first benchmarks. For the second and third benchmarks, Macau lags behind Hong Kong and Singapore, this is partially due to Macau education system is comparatively much liberal than the other two.
[Copyright of New Horizons: The Journal of Education, Hong Kong Teachers' Association is the property of Hong Kong Teachers' Association at http://www.hkta1934.org.hk/]

This paper reports the results of a study concerning the expectations for the transition from kindergarten to primary school amongst teachers, parents and children in Hong Kong. It probes the expectations that teachers and parents have about children's competence in five specific areas of child development thought to be essential for a smooth such transition, as well as children's competence in these different developmental areas and their performance upon the transition to primary school. The study's data were obtained through questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and classroom observations, and its results will serve as a reference for evaluation of existing transitional practices and the design of effective transition programmes in the local context. Children's voices and their observed performance during the transition period indicate that they have varied expectations of the transition. Parents, in contrast, have high expectations for their children's academic ability and self-discipline. Both primary school teachers and the parents of kindergartners rank pre-academic skills as the most important developmental area, whereas kindergarten teachers rank them as the least important. Most of the adult respondents in this study agree that a stronger connection amongst kindergartens, primary schools and parents would facilitate a smoother transition to primary school.
[Copyright of Early Child Development and Care is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03004430.2011.569543]

There has been a substantial rise in the number of students enrolling in part-time taught postgraduate awards. This study investigates the reasons or motivation for students to spend significant amounts on tutorial fees and find time alongside work, family and social commitments to take a taught postgraduate award. Data were gathered through interviews with 21 part-time students in taught postgraduate programmes in Hong Kong. Students all held several motives for studying, so the outcome was a framework for explaining multiple interacting motives. Main categories of motivation were related to qualifications, current career, potential future career, interest, perpetual students and professional and social networks. Individual students displayed varying degrees of these motivations and the sub-categories of them. Students were able to specify their needs in terms of advanced specialised study, so enrolment satisfied a need for continuing professional development. The rise in taught postgraduate enrolments, in search of advanced specialised knowledge, seems set to continue as undergraduate degrees become broader and more attribute-oriented and the knowledge explosion makes it harder to reach the frontiers of knowledge.
[Copyright of Studies in Continuing Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0158037X.2011.646979]

This article critically reviews the national innovation systems of the four little tigers in East Asia, namely Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea, in fostering R&D and technological research. A national innovation system is characterised by the interactions between the state, industries and universities in promoting innovation. This article attempts to explore such interactions in the four societies, paying particular attention to the role of higher education. Specifically, university-industry collaboration is the main body of analysis. Drawing from comparative perspectives, this article finally maps out the national innovation systems of East Asia.
[Copyright of Globalisation, Societies & Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14767724.2012.710120]

Academic entrepreneurialism appears to have become global. University systems around the globe are moving in the direction of a more entrepreneurial model of higher education. Scholars have not yet reached a consensus on the definition of entrepreneurship. Research on academic entrepreneurship in East Asia has been lacking. This article contributes to the discussion by reviewing the rise of entrepreneurialism in Asian higher education, using Hong Kong as an example. After some analyses of the definitions, rationales and pathways of academic entrepreneurship, it shifts its attention to entrepreneurship in Hong Kong, and discusses how entrepreneurship has been demonstrated in Hong Kong higher education. It argues that while Hong Kong's entrepreneurial spirit is strong in the local culture and business, its achievement in academic entrepreneurship is relatively low. This article ends by cautioning readers about the differences between academic and business entrepreneurship.
[Copyright of Globalisation, Societies & Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14767724.2012.710475]

Scholars have increasingly sought to understand how the process of school improvement differs among schools operating in different school levels, conditions, and contexts. Using Rosenholtz's (1985) conception of "moving" and "stuck" schools as a framework for thinking about school improvement, this study examines the learning outcomes of 39 Hong Kong secondary schools over a 3-year period. We examine whether features of leadership and school capacity differed with respect to these learning outcomes within the sample of moving and stuck schools. This research in Hong Kong has identified several factors that appear to synergistically contribute to differences in patterns of improvement in learning across different subjects in both moving and stuck schools. These factors include resource management of principals and school capacity in terms of professional learning community; workload of teachers; alignment, coherence, and structure; and resource capacity. This study extends the research on leadership and capacity building as a means of school improvement, in the process elaborating on their impact within a non-Western society.
[Copyright of Peabody Journal of Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0161956X.2012.664474]