In the face of heavy demand for private supplementary tutoring in basic education, the state seems to have adopted a consumerism model in the decentralised governance of mass tutoring, allowing students and parents to select for themselves course information, payment amounts and methods, tutoring dates and times, and physical conditions when buying services from registered cram schools in Hong Kong. In the study reported here, a 3-level cultural analysis of cram schools was conducted from 1998 to 2008 to examine the patterns of mass tuition trends in Hong Kong. The analysis investigated the impacts of such trends, or culture, upon youth values, and implications are drawn for policy making, educational reform, societal movements, and academic recommendations for further research.
[Copyright © 2009 HKFYG.]

In many settings a perplexing scenario is unfolding in which school systems claim to move towards whole-person development while students and parents run in the opposite direction of narrowly defined academic achievement enhanced by private supplementary tutoring. Such tutoring is widely called shadow education because much of its content mimics that of regular schooling. It has long been clearly visible in Asia, and is now increasingly visible elsewhere. This study focuses on school teachers' perceptions of shadow education in the context of a flourishing sector that parallels and to some extent contradicts progressive education reforms. Drawing on 47 in-depth interviews with teachers from 12 secondary schools in Hong Kong, the research found ambivalent views towards private tutoring. This ambivalence reflected intrinsic contradictions between the educational ideals of whole-person development and the function of schooling in social stratification. Such tensions are likely to become increasingly evident elsewhere as commercialised forms of private supplementary tutoring expand.

Adopting a case study approach with multiple data sources, this paper explores the ways in which rapport is built, and its impact on the learning process based on five successive writing support consultations between a native English-speaking (NES) tutor and her second language (L2) tutee in a Hong Kong university. With reference to the prepared coding categories, six strategies that realize the four key elements of rapport management were identified, namely greetings, small talk, the use of qualifiers and mitigation devices, first-person plural pronouns, praises and expressions of empathy, and open-ended questions. These strategies symbolized association, addressed face work and emotional reactions, and encouraged equity in the directive and tutor dominance writing consultations. Motivated by the harmonious relationship, the tutee gradually took a more active role in learning in different ways by asking questions, expressing an opposite view, admitting inadequate knowledge, reflecting on cognitive processes, and initiating small talk. The implicit impact was further reflected in her improved self-rating and the completion of the five consultations. Pedagogical recommendations for tutor training are made.
[Copyright of Language and Education is the property of Taylor & Francis. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09500782.2015.1038275]

Despite its rapid expansion in many countries around the world, private tutoring has attracted only limited attention from policy makers and researchers. This is especially surprising in the case of Asia, where high rates of private tuition have been reported. In particular, comparatively few studies have considered the views of the individual stakeholders in private tuition; students, parents, teachers, and tutors. This study addresses this research gap by using in-depth interviews to provide detailed descriptions of the challenges one group of private tutors in Hong Kong confronted as they positioned themselves within the teaching profession. The findings expose and problematize discourses which establish a rigid division between educators providing private tutoring and those in mainstream schools and constrain the capacity of the former to construct their preferred professional identities. It is argued that educational authorities should respond to the growth in private tutoring in ways that overcome the antagonisms that such division can imply for professional relations between educators in private tutoring and those in mainstream schools.
[Copyright © 2015 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.]

This chapter describes a case study of students attending a fee-paying private supplementary school in order to resit the Hong Kong Year 11 English language public examination. The study reports the students' grade in the 2009 examination, their anticipated grade in the 2010 examination, and the actual grade obtained in the 2010 examination. While, in their responses, the students hoped for a gain of at least one level on the public examination, they achieved only a gain of a third of a level, on average. While this gain was statistically significant, and does indicate a positive outcome for the cost of a year's further study, it does not translate into the gains many students had wished for as only one-third achieved the one-level gain in grade they aspired to. The study suggests that schools in the shadow education system may be promising more than they are able to deliver.
[Copyright © 2014 Springer Science+Business Media Singapore.]

Around the world, increasing numbers of students receive after-school private supplementary tutoring. Such tutoring may be provided through informal channels or by companies, and it may be received one-to-one, in small groups or in large classes. The tutoring is commonly called shadow education since its content mimics that of regular schooling. The spread of shadow education is part of a global shift of balance with increased roles for the private sector. Hong Kong is among the societies in which shadow education enrolment rates are particularly high. Much of the shadow education focuses on techniques for performance in external examinations, and is not consistent with the emphases stressed by teachers and the government. This paper focuses on a newly introduced subject called Liberal Studies in which the tensions are especially visible. Although the official curriculum emphasizes creativity and critical thinking, many students have sought large-class tutoring focused on formulae for passing examinations. Interviews exposed the needs that the students felt were not being met in their schooling. The findings illustrate some of the complexities in relationships between the public and private sectors. Viewed in a wider context, the paper illuminates some of the mechanisms and effects of marketization, which are increasingly evident globally.
[Copyright of Journal of Curriculum Studies is the property of Routledge . Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00220272.2014.883553]