Liberal Studies was initially introduced as a non-statutory subject in Hong Kong in 1992. It then confronted intense opposition and a bumpy implementation path before securing mandatory status in the new senior secondary curriculum introduced in 2009. Recently, this core subject has been under review. Whilst it is considered to promote students' socio-political participation, the subject has also been accused of triggering antagonism towards the government. In view of these concerns, this article probes teachers' perceptions of the recent development of Liberal Studies and examines the dynamic interplay between the curriculum review and the potential political controversies surrounding the subject in post-colonial Hong Kong. Reporting the results of a study comprising questionnaire-based surveys and follow-up semi-structured interviews, it reveals that whilst teachers are worried about the proposed reduction of socio-political topics in the curriculum, they approve of incorporating additional China-related content. Furthermore, the participating teachers praised Liberal Studies for its notable impact on raising students' social consciousness, which has motivated them to learn about community affairs and fight for justice. Finally, the article also explores the study's profound implications for the further development of Liberal Studies and citizenship education in Hong Kong and beyond.
[Copyright of Oxford Review of Education is the property of Routledge.]

Despite the growing advocacy for implementing leisure education in schools, its application lags behind its global expectations. Unlike the US trend of 'back to basics' educational philosophy which prioritizes the learning of core subjects over leisure related subjects, countries in Asia have been changing their curricula to nurture the whole person development and thus paving the way for infusing leisure education into school systems. One example is Hong Kong which has undergone a major education reform in the last two decades. Even though scholars have suggested numerous channels and strategies for leisure education in schools, a lucid framework which takes into account the views of those for which leisure education in planned was not developed. This study is to explore the underlying dimensions of leisure education as it is manifested by teachers' and students' views. A Seventeen-item questionnaire has been submitted to 105 teachers and 1187 students from seven schools geographically distributed around Hong Kong. Responses were analyzed through Smallest Space Analysis (SSA). The SSA solutions among both students and teachers have yield three-dimensional solution with coefficient of alienation .14. The solutions indicated a division to five dimensions: values and attitudes, self-development, motivation, ends and means and education among teachers and three combined dimensions among students: motivation and ends and means, self-motivation and education which includes active engagement, and values and attitudes. The identified dimensions resonate well with the suggested channels and strategies for leisure education in schools which incorporate various offerings, freedom of choice, trial and error and experiential learning. Whereas this similarity could facilitate the utilization of leisure education in schools, there is a need to consider the nature, strategy and context of such implementation. The paper addresses these challenges and draws implications for teacher training

The world is increasingly recognising the importance of addressing key issues such as climate change, environmental protection and clean air and water through initiatives such as Agenda 21 (United Nations, 1993), and the Sustainable Development Goals (United Nations, 2016). In 2013 Hong Kong Institute of Education launched a one-year full-time Master of Arts in Education for Sustainability degree, targeted at an international audience. The program is an educational innovation that seeks to graduate students who will reform the contemporary world. The first cohort commenced in September 2014, and this research investigates the motivations of students who enrolled in the first three cohorts of the program, particularly • where the students come from • their undergraduate background • their reasons for enrolling in the program • what they learned from the program • where they are now • whether the program changed their career directions. All students enrolled to date were to complete a questionnaire that addressed the above questions (approximately 100 students). Their responses were analysed thematically and provide insight into the role of the Masters degree in developing graduates' abilities to reform the contemporary world. This is particularly important in the Hong Kong SAR and China because most graduates come from mainland China, and China recently released its 13th Five-Year Plan on Education Development (CPC, 2017). The Plan defines the requirements for implementing ESD at all education levels in China for the next five years. This paper reports on how well prepared the students feel to work towards these goals in China and elsewhere.

Purpose: This paper aims at review the rationale of STEM education in business subjects prospective. STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) education is a new trend in the Asia-Pacific region in the recent years, such as Singapore and Japan. Through studying others countries experience, it discuss the missing link of STEM education in Hong Kong. Methodology: First of all, it describes the purpose of STEM education and recent development in Hong Kong secondary school by reviewing HKSAR STEM education report. Second, there are two STEM education sample schools from western country and Singapore. It discusses the purpose of promoting entrepreneurial STEM education in these countries. Finally, compare with others countries, it try to identify the missing link between business education and STEM education by reviewing Hong Kong's entrepreneurial education. Result: Although entrepreneurial education is mature and supported by professional parties in Hong Kong, there is a gap for business subjects to enhance the effectiveness of STEM education by integrating entrepreneurial education into STEM education, especially in secondary level. Conclusion and discussion: It is necessary to provide authentic learning for students from private and public sector commitment. Cross subject collaboration for professional development should also developed at secondary school. It aims at not only accommodating the purpose of Hong Kong STEM education, but also enhance teachers' collaboration and students' cross subject integration competence in problem solving with various stakeholders' support.

Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus (SCUBA) diving is always regarded as a risky activity to be conducted as an extra-curricular activity in the schools of Hong Kong. However, it provides a golden opportunity for students to experience the marine nature and serves as an excellent pedagogical tool of field based learning on the environmental education. The presentation will report a case study of an international school in Hong Kong on how they utilize SCUBA diving as a tool to enhance their students' knowledge about ocean and to foster the pro-environmental attitude. The teachers of the school have developed a tailor-made curriculum using problem-based approach, articulating with the discussion of current local environmental issues on marine conservation. The students have been forming a team to join the annual global citizen-scientist programme, Reef Check, to contribute their effort in revealing the health of coral community system in Hong Kong. A mixed research method, which includes semi-structured interviews of teachers, current students and alumni, and the self-administered questionnaire for them, was adopted in the study to evaluate the ocean literacy and pro-environmental attitude of the students and the effectiveness of the programme. The difficulties faced by both the teachers and the students throughout the implementation period of the programme will be reported. The opportunity and the challenge to run such a programme in the local school will be discussed, which would provide significant insights to other local schools conducting similar field-based learning and teaching activities.

Despite STEM education is highly advocated in Hong Kong schools, teachers and students are still lack of the relevant personal experience and practical training, especially in an informal learning environment. This paper reports on a new event of STEM Olympiad 2016 organized by The Education University of Hong Kong and supported by the Education Bureau of the HKSAR Government and other institutions, aiming at providing senior secondary school students with informal learning opportunities to deepen their understanding of STEM and reflecting on their interest towards pursuing further study in STEM subjects and career; and creating an atmosphere conducive to the teaching of STEM in secondary schools and heighten teachers' and students' awareness of the importance of STEM education. Students participating in the STEM Olympiad completed a “Knowledge Challenge” on both individual and team bases, and competed in the “Innovations in Practice Challenge” to solve the local wastewater treatment problems. Each team had to design, assemble and test a treatment system prototype to meet the design criteria and to demonstrate their knowledge and skills in STEM without prior training and preparation. Before the final challenge, a mass expert lecture was delivered by an experienced engineer to enrich students' knowledge in the wastewater treatment and its underlying scientific principles. A series of 11 parallel education forum and workshops were also held to raise participants' awareness of the importance of STEM education as attended by hundreds of teachers and students. The competition yielded a total of 36 gold, silver and bronze medals awarded to the competition winners. We conducted student and teacher questionnaire survey and interviews after the competition to collect data on their perceptions and opinions of the event. As expected, the feedback is generally positive in many aspects. In particular, the students widened their vision in STEM and the teachers also obtained a holistic

Recent educational research reveals that case studies can be applied in STEM education as a pedagogically powerful method for teaching scientific concepts and contents as well as science process skills. However, there exists very little research or literature on the instructional use of case study in STEM education in Hong Kong. Hence, a team of science educators and scientists initiated a collaborative project to investigate how feasible case study can be incorporated in STEM education. Over a period of seven months, we developed case teaching materials (including case story line with authentic data, worksheets for field trip and laboratory experiments, online/remote-controlled experiments, aerial movies filmed by drones and virtual reality videos etc.) for topics purposefully selected from (i) Hong Kong Wetland Park, (ii) two large sewage treatment plants/projects of the Drainage Services Department, and (iii) landfill gas used by the Town Gas company. This teaching approach was implemented in three different courses in our education university. A set of instrument for mixed research method was specifically developed or modified for collecting data on the learning effectiveness and feedback from a total of 115 students enrolled in the aforementioned three courses. Essential features of the case teaching materials and preliminary findings of the evaluation will be presented. The discussion on the difficulties encountered in the development and implementation stages as well as the direction for the future research and development work will be highlighted.

To maintain one's competitiveness edge in a global sense, we have observed a wide spread drive in various economies on STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education at different levels of education. The emphasis on STEM education originates in the US back in the middle of last century, since then tremendous input of resources and efforts have been put into STEM education for its development and implementation. The Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region highlighted Hong Kong's commitment to STEM education in his three successive Policy Address in 2015, 2016 and 2017. Echoing this high level commitment were the reports on STEM education published by the Education Bureau of the HKSAR Government and the Academy of Sciences of Hong Kong. Given these, there is still a wide spectrum of views as to the “What” and “How” of STEM education among stakeholders. While hero cases of STEM education and learning resources have sprung up in the past few years, we yet have to see sufficient research evidence to shed lights on the ways to scale up the initiative. This speech will attempt to reflect on the global and local lessons on STEM education.

STEM（科學、科技、工程與數學）教育，是近年香港教育當局力推的教育項目，並由政府以專項撥款的形式支援學校推行（小學為十萬港元、中學為二十萬港元）。政府在 2015年發表諮詢文件，並且計劃在 2016 年起的三個學年，推出不同的項目以推行 STEM 教育。本文將以香港三所小學（浸信會天虹小學、天主教博智小學、慈幼英文學校）為例，透過他們推行 STEM 教育的經驗，檢視現時政策與學校實踐之間存在著什麼問題，並且以他們的經驗，嘗試為香港未來推行 STEM 教育提出建議，供各界參考。

Objective: Developing student's critical thinking capacity has long become one of the fundamental aims in Hong Kong secondary school education sector. The aim of the proposed research was to investigate the influence of teachers' teaching strategies on the learning of students' critical thinking (CT). Method: A mixed-method research design was employed. Under the guidance and training from the research team, classroom interventions were undertaken in two rounds. Well established student survey was collected. Lesson observation tools were developed and used, measuring the teaching strategies adopted in class, and the changes of outcome variables such as classroom discourses and student higher-order thinking. Nearly 200 students from eight Liberal study (LS) classrooms, four secondary schools in Hong Kong, participated in the research. Paired samples T-test was adopted for the quantitative part of analysis, meanwhile coding schemes were developed for the analysis of lessons observed. Results: Descriptive results showed a consistent improvement on student's critical thinking across dimensions, regarding both their CT propensity and skills. Significant results were found in sub-dimension levels. Further, findings reflect improved student engagement in classroom both from behavioral and cognitive perspectives. There was also significant increase in student higher order-thinking behaviors. Conclusion: This piece of research confirmed the important role played by the teachers as facilitators in improving students' critical thinking in the process of learning and teaching in classroom. The paper concludes with recommendations for efficient teaching strategies in enhancing the student's CT and implications for linking pedagogical theories and classroom practice.