The COVID-19 pandemic forced Chinese cross-border students in Hong Kong to participate in online homeschooling for three years while local students attended face-to-face schooling when the situation released. Previous studies have explored the learning challenges or educational inequity among students in online learning during the pandemic. Limited studies explored the educational inequality between local students and cross-border students. To fill this gap, this study explored the extent of educational inequity between Hong Kong local students and Chinese cross-border students. It further investigated the elements that lead to educational inequity between these two groups of students and the long-term consequences of prolonged purely online learning for Chinese cross-border students. This study compared self-regulated learning, perceived academic achievement, and learning challenges between 35 cross-border students and 32 local students in Hong Kong primary schools. According to the questionnaire and open-ended opinion surveys, the findings showed significant evidence of educational inequity between these two groups of students. Through six teachers' semi-structured interviews, the study analyzed students' learning experiences and synthesized the elements contributing to the issue of educational inequity. The study attributed this inequity to infrastructure elements and stakeholder-related elements. Prolonged purely online learning has resulted in negative and positive effects. This study offers practical implications for the government to implement feasible policies to reduce educational inequity in cross-border education and for stakeholders to conduct effective measures to support young learners in the post-COVID world. Lastly, this study discusses the limitations and recommendations for future research. Copyright ©2023 Springer.

Due to the varied social inequities, the pandemic has prompted unprecedented attention to the social divides in learning gains via online/blended learning. It has been identified that approximately 27,000 Chinese cross-border students live on the Mainland but attend Hong Kong schools every day. The pandemic has restricted the passage of the Shenzhen-Hong Kong border, and these students suffer greatly as they may still be forced to attend online lessons at home for over two years, even if schools return to face-to-face teaching. This study is a 2-year longitudinal case study with a purposeful sampling of a primary school that has over 70% of Chinese cross-border students. A mixed-methods approach was adopted to examine students' online learning experiences via teachers' interviews. Regarding their learning challenges, 35 students were invited to complete a 5-point Online Self-regulated Learning Questionnaire (OSLQ) and an open-ended opinion survey, which was then triangulated with teachers' feedback. First, this study has identified three major challenges that cross-border students suffer the most in online learning: self-regulation strategies, technical challenges, and social interaction. Second, several teaching strategies have been found to offer additional support (e.g., after-school classes and learning centers in Shenzhen) for cross-border students to sustain their online learning and alleviate their learning challenges. Based on these findings, this study contributes to documenting the learning challenges for cross-border students during the pandemic, which provides insights for other schools to facilitate cross-border education and develop appropriate online learning strategies for cross-border students. Copyright © 2023 International Forum of Educational Technology & Society.