This article reports findings from a qualitative interview study that examined the provision of integrated kindergarten education for children with disabilities from the perspectives of general education teachers implementing integrated kindergarten programs. Analysis of interviews with eight informants led to the identification of two broad generalizations: the interviewed teachers emphasized teaching academics to children without disabilities, but they focused on social development at the exclusion of academic instruction for children with disabilities; and, according to the teachers, instruction was academic and skill-oriented in the integrated kindergarten programs. Research procedures are described and data supporting the findings are presented. Ways to improve program quality are discussed in terms of three major components: the Hong Kong government should include early childhood education within the compulsory education system, and enforce the formally recommended approach of developmental appropriateness; teacher education institutions should prepare prospective teachers to work in school settings where program goals may be contradictory with the ideology of inclusion; and educational researchers should monitor program quality in integrated childcare centers by conducting further research.
[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/10.1080/03004430600563430]

University entrepreneurialism has been adopted as a way of promoting quality education in Hong Kong. In light of the role of the state in Hong Kong's changing higher education governance, this article critically reviews the rationale for privatising and corporatising the university sector. With a focus on the current trends of privatisation and corporatisation, the article discusses and examines how the entrepreneurial culture has changed university governance in Hong Kong and whether these changes have boosted Hong Kong's academic diversity, particularly when the Hong Kong government has set as its vision the promotion of the city as a regional hub of higher education.
[Copyright of Asia Pacific Journal of Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02188790701591543]

University education has been thrust into the limelight by policymakers in Hong Kong and Singapore in recent years. Reforming university education thus has become a norm for both city-states. This article reviews and compares some recent developments in the university reforms in both city-states. It argues university education, as a public policy area, is not immune from the profound influence of such concepts as accountability, performativity, quality assurance and market relevance, which prevail in a wider policy context of public sector reforms and governance changes. Hong Kong and Singapore's university reforms are similarly extensive, ranging from the admission mechanisms through to the governance and funding systems. This article has four main sections. The first sketches a paradigm shift in the policymaking process and the changing state-university relationships in the age of globalization. The second reviews and compares some recent developments of the university reforms in both city-states. The third turns to assess the impacts of the reforms on university stakeholders. The final section is the conclusion.
[Copyright of Higher Education Research & Development is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0729436032000083625]

Private supplementary tutoring has long been a major phenomenon in parts of East Asia, including Japan, Hong Kong, South Korea and Taiwan. In recent times it has grown dramatically in other parts of Asia and in Africa, Europe and North America. The factors underlying the growth of private tutoring vary, but in all settings it has major implications for learning and livelihood. Families with the necessary resources are able to secure not only greater quantities but also better qualities of private tutoring. Children receiving such tutoring are then able to perform better in school, and in the long run to improve their lifetime earnings. By contrast, children of low‐income families who do not receive such benefits may not be able to keep up with their peers and may drop out of school at an earlier age. Tutoring also of course has a direct impact on the livelihoods of the tutors, providing employment and incomes for a range of professionals and amateurs of different age groups. The dynamics of inter‐relationships are complex, and vary from one setting to another. This paper argues that private supplementary tutoring deserves much more attention from policy makers and researchers.
[Copyright of Compare: A Journal of Comparative Education is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03057920601024974]

This article discusses the sources, processes and impact of the quality assurance policy implemented in Hong Kong preschools. Regarded as a sort of policy alignment between the subsystems of pre-primary, primary and secondary education, the introduction of a quality assurance policy has been directly and indirectly transforming the settlements in the preschool context. The first section of this article examines the main shift in policy direction shaped by the global movement of supranational organizations and the local agenda of educational reform after 1997. The historical review of the changing parameters in the preschool field is provided in the second section as a backdrop for later discussion. The third section analyses how the local governance of education is subtly transforming the settlements in the preschool field. The fourth section discusses how the quality assurance policy is mediated with school-level realities. It is argued that the top-down approach adopted by policy-makers should be critically re-examined in the policy process in order to ensure the quality of preschool education.
[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/10.1080/03004430600563836]