Hong Kong schools experience an era of educational change in the 1990s. In the perspective of school management, the School Management Initiative was first introduced in 1991 and later replaced by the School Based Management in 1999, allowing school management greater autonomy in general administration, finance and personnel matters but at the same time requiring a higher degree of accountability for school performance. Other major change items fall into the categories of curriculum ( TOC, curriculum adaptation), medium of instruction (EMI and CMI schools), educational technology (SAMs and information technology in teaching) and funding system (Quality Education Fund). To enhance the quality of school education, it is further recommended by the Education Commission Report no.7, apart from others (1) a framework to raise the professional standards of principals and teachers and (2) a framework of quality indicators for school performance. These changes denote a demand for professional competence of principals and teachers to meet the needs and difficulties of school. While there are various means to raise the competence of principals and teachers, the running of staff development programmes is obvious a generally acceptable one as it is less disruptive to school administration. It also has the advantages of being more school-based to meet the particular needs of individual schools. The popularity of staff development programmes can be reflected by the increasing number of services provided by the Continuing Professional Education of the HKIEd upon request. The authors of this paper have been heavily involved in the staff development programmes of primary and secondary schools since the past few years. Through participant observation, interviews and other data-collecting techniques, this paper attempts to provide information, as reflected by the programmes organized, specifically on (1) the different professional needs of different types of schools and (2) the different

The success of a school depends to a very great degree on the understanding of their roles by the school teachers as it is through them that school policies become actual practice. The move of an educational system from an elitist to a more general and compulsory one in the 1970s and wider socio-economic and socio-political changes in the last two decades have shaped the overall administrative pattern of primary schools in Hong Kong. It also denotes a demand for changing roles of teachers. As a result, a study on role identification of teachers is useful in both school administration and teacher education. Utilizing the models of Taylor and others, as well as using a sample of experienced primary school teachers attending the teachers refresher course offered by the HKIED, the symposium attempts to provide an initiate finding of a survey for the discussion of the following: 1. What administrative role-functions are the experienced teachers performing? 2. What tasks do these teachers perceive as the most important in the successful and efficient running of their subject departments/committees? 3. Are there any discrepancies between the performed roles and the perceived roles of teachers? 4. What tasks are being perceived as the most difficult to be handled? 5. Why are they difficult to handle? 6. What administratrative skills and knowledge are perceived by experienced teachers as most important to be included in an in-service training program for teachers ? Implications and recommendations for school administration and teacher education will also be discussed.

In Hong Kong, the move towards quality education has stirred up waves of changes in the education setting in the late 90s. Drastic changes have been implemented in terms of curriculum, methodology and forms of school management. Borrowed heavily from the Western democracies, the contemporary educational policy and practice in Hong Kong are increasingly directed by the market model of educational provision valuing consumer choice; accountability; quality assurance; devolution of authority and participative management process. In the face of these changes, three issues are pertinent to school leadership - Firstly, the approaches towards School-based Management stress the importance of school heads to work closely with the various stakeholders who may have different and often conflicting role expectations on their school heads. Role incumbents may find themselves confused when determining framework of defined outcomes and accountability. Secondly, the injection of consumer control into school operation and the marketisation of educational provision denote the need of school heads to have a deeper understanding of the needs, expectations and aspirations of the various stakeholders directly or indirectly involved in school management. Thirdly, increasing demands for school heads to seek professional development opportunities that will broaden their existing knowledge and increase their array of management skills to cope with the current changes. While research literature is enormous on the studies of role expectations and job aspirations of school heads especially from the perspective of teachers, parents and even heads themselves, however, there is a lack of robust research locally and abroad on the perspective of the neglected and yet the most directly involved stakeholder - the students. The present study attempts to develop understanding of the role expectations of primary school heads as viewed from the students' perspective and to identify the effects of such expectations

Since the beginning of the 1990s, there have been changes in the rationale and practice of Hong Kong’s teacher education. Apart from the expansion of the initial teacher education, there is also an increase in the provision of refresher teacher training programmes. Many of these training programmes are offered by the Hong Kong Institute of Education. Some of them have become credit-bearing since 1998. To ensure these programmes are effective in meeting the needs of schools, evaluation studies are necessary. Based on a longitudinal investigation with interviews and questionnaires, and with a sample of around 120 course participants, this study attempts to evaluate a primary refresher training programme called “The School as an Organization (SAO)”. The research methodology and preliminary findings from the pilot group are discussed.
[Copyright © 2000 The Hong Kong Institute of Education]

Hong Kong schools experience an era of educational change in the 1990s. The major change items fall into the categories of school management (SMI - School Management Initiative and SBM - School Based Management); curriculum (TOC - Target Oriented Curriculum and curriculum adaptation); medium of instruction (EMI and CMI - English or Chinese Medium Instruction schools); educational technology (SAMs and information technology in teaching) and funding system (Quality Education Fund). To further enhance the quality of school education, the Education Commission Report No.7 recommends the setting up of (1) a framework for raising the professional standards of principals and teachers and (2) quality indicators for school performance. These changes denote a demand for professional development programmes for teachers so that they can better meet changing needs and difficulties. The purpose of this study is to look into the issue of staff development programmes in local schools and see how the professional needs of teachers and schools are met.
在一九九零年代，香的中、小學校經歷了不少教育方面的轉變，當中主要的類別，包括了學校管理、課程、教學語言、教育科技及撥款制度等。為了提升優質教育，教統會第7 號報告書更建議(1)提升校長及教師的專業水準，(2)制訂學校的表現指標，面對種種轉變，學校有需要提升教職員的專業能力和水準，本文的目的，是就香學校對教職員發展計劃，作一些初步的探討和報導。
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