Opportunities for pre-service teachers to participate during their initial teacher education (ITE) in teaching-abroad experiences, where they spend time teaching in a foreign country, have become increasingly popular. However, studies to date have collected data during or soon after the participant’s return. Little is known about how recently qualified teachers (RQTs) who participated in such experiences during the ITE perceive their benefits. By collecting and analysing reflective writings of ten RQTs in Hong Kong, who participated in a teaching-abroad experience in China, this small-scale study sought to explore its impact on their perceived preparedness for their current roles in their home context. The findings suggest that the teachers feel that the experience added to their preparedness, in areas such as lesson preparation and planning, teaching confidence and flexibility and professional collaborations. The RQTs attributed these benefits to the unfamiliar teaching context and the additional teaching practice that the experience provided, as well as the opportunity to work closely with peers, course tutors and teachers in China. The study adds to the growing teaching-abroad literature by including the perspectives of RQTs, providing further justification for including such experiences in ITE programme curriculums. Copyright © 2022 Taylor & Francis.

The aim of this study is to investigate the reasons for academic stress in Hong Kong and provide recommendations to the government on ways to alleviate this problem. Using photovoice, 15 undergraduate students from a private community college in Hong Kong were invited to take and discuss photographs regarding their lived experiences of learning. Thematic analysis is applied to generate themes from the photovoice data. The results suggest several possible reasons for academic stress, including examination demands, school administration and parents. However, the underlying social reason for academic stress may be the internal contradictions of the education system. That is, the education system purports to value all-round and whole-person education but subordinates this worthy goal to examination results. Thus, the results of the study suggest that the government should address this internal contradiction by considering educational, economic and cultural factors when planning educational policies and/or changes. Copyright © 2020 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

Students’ social identity is considered to have profound effects on their learning and academic performance, but there was a lack of research on whether students’ social identity would also influence their aspirations to pursue STEM careers. This research studied the associations between the social identity of students and their aspirations to engage in STEM careers. Nearly 4,000 Hong Kong students from three key learning stages participated in a survey related to their STEM aspirations. Data analysis using multiple regression and structural equation modelling showed that local and national identity were predictive of STEM career aspirations. Moreover, students’ sense of contribution to the nation and local society, as well as the perceived value of STEM professionals were mediators of the impact of their social identity on their STEM career aspirations. The implications provide insights for policymakers and educators to formulate appropriate curricula benefiting students’ social identity development as well as their STEM aspirations. Copyright © 2022 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

Along with the global trend of developing students’ 21st-century skills, teacher education must enable preservice teachers (PSTs) to improve students’ learning outcomes with Information and Communications Technology (ICT), and school practicum plays an essential role in the process. This study investigated Hong Kong PSTs’ ICT competency with or without teaching practicum completed and explored factors contributing to ICT competency in and beyond the practicum. This mixed-methods study began with a questionnaire to give a broad picture of the ICT competence of Hong Kong PSTs of English (N = 127), who were found to perceive themselves as competent with educational technology and their competencies of understanding ICT related policy and using ICT for professional development was enhanced after school practicum. A purposeful subset of the sample (N = 10) was interviewed based on their ICT competency scores, exploring the factors shaping interviewees’ readiness and ICT use in their teaching practicum. It highlights that digital native students do not naturally transform into teachers with ICT competency to facilitate 21st-century learning, and the practicum could play a more critical role in enhancing their ICT competence to future-proof their skills. Promoting ICT-friendly school culture and designing better teaching practicum programmes are suggested. Copyright © 2022 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

The issue of the “research-practice gap” has been a long-standing concern in the education community. To tackle this issue, there is a growing interest in research–practice partnerships (RPPs) to connect research with practice by providing solutions for improving practice in schools. Although studies have reported that constructive relationship would produce positive outcomes, establishing long-term and mutually beneficial RPPs requires further investigation. In Hong Kong, the Learning Study (LS) approach with Variation Theory derived from phenomenology as the theoretical framework for pedagogical design has been adopted as a RPP model and has sustained for two decades. Like many RPPs models, LS approach has been facing different challenges when teachers are increasingly held accountable for meeting new demands from education reform. In this respect, this paper explores the challenges and strategies of the LS approach as a RPP model and its conditions of success. It reports a case study of how a group of English Language teachers adopting a LS approach while integrating education initiatives in their instructional design. The findings have identified trust building, teacher’s capacity building and visible outcomes as possible key factors of effective RPP model. This paper may shed light on the implementation of research–practice partnerships. Copyright © 2022 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

School-based mentoring programmes in which teachers act as mentors have the potential to offer a non-stigmatizing and developmentally appropriate source of support for secondary school students. However, the experience of teacher-mentors is under-researched, particularly in Hong Kong. Fifteen mentors participating in a school-based mentoring programme in one Hong Kong secondary school serving a Chinese population were interviewed and the data were analysed thematically. Findings indicated that teacher-mentors provided social and emotional support to their mentees, and that they were motivated to do so by a desire for greater relatedness to the students with whom they worked. The relationship formed between mentors and mentees was more spontaneous, less hierarchical, more wide-ranging, and more personal in nature than that between teachers and students, and constituted a source of satisfaction for mentors. The study has several implications for schools which may be considering implementing a mentoring programme. Copyright © 2022 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the organizational changes in higher education institutions across different regional contexts, with a special focus on the trends towards marketization in South Korea and Hong Kong. The study employs a qualitative case study approach to understand the organizational responses to the marketization from the selected research sites. Using data collected through semi-structured interviews with participants from each case, the study applies cross-case synthesis to evaluate similarities and differences related to organizational changes and management practices at universities in these two contexts in Asia. The findings underscore two principal themes: market influences and trends towards marketization, and organizational and management changes on campuses. The findings suggest that both South Korea and Hong Kong represent excellent cases through which to explore organizational responses to the marketization of higher education institutions and to highlight the reshaping of higher education in Asia. Copyright © 2021 Taylor and Francis.

This study examined the perceptions of two groups of teachers, namely Secondary 3 and Secondary 6, regarding effective pedagogical practices in relation to curriculum reform. A total of 1,215 teachers from 91 secondary schools participated in the study. Collaborative inquiry, instructional strategy and catering for learner diversity were conceived as the three most effective pedagogical practices for implementation of the reforms while seven perceived student learning outcomes were also identified. Further multi-group analyses supported invariance between the two teacher groups in their perceptions of student learning when applying the three pedagogical practices in the classrooms. Results of path analyses revealed that Secondary 6 teachers viewed collaborative inquiry as having a significant effect on all aspects of student learning, but such impacts were not seen as very likely in the view of Secondary 3 teachers. On the contrary, Secondary 3 teachers conceived instructional strategy as the most effective way to enhance student learning. Catering for learner diversity had a positive association with various aspects of student learning in the view of both teacher groups. The study concludes with the implication for enhancing professional development of teachers. Copyright © 2021 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

Acculturation is an emerging field of inquiry in the multicultural context of Hong Kong. Behavioural acculturation focuses mainly on cultural practices such as language use, dietary preferences, customs and traditions, socialization and media consumption. Despite a phenomenal growth of research on the educational predicament of immigrant youth based on a deficit-based “stress and coping” approach, there is a dearth of literature on how non-Chinese young people experience the phenomenon of intercultural learning in Hong Kong. This article reports a qualitative study on the behavioural acculturation of a group of Pakistani secondary school students in Hong Kong from a culture leaning perspective. The study findings challenge the deficit-based perspective and advocate a culture-learning approach to the study of acculturation. Copyright © 2021 National Institute of Education, Singapore.

The way culturally responsive teaching is employed in school settings in non-Western contexts is unclear. The question of how to teach Chinese effectively to ethnic minority (EM) children in Hong Kong has recently attracted much attention because their generally low level of Chinese language proficiency hinders their education and social integration. This study investigated teachers’ competence in utilizing culturally responsive teaching to teach Chinese to EM children in kindergartens. Focus group interviews were conducted with 43 teachers from 20 kindergartens. The results showed that teachers from kindergartens with a high concentration of EM children were more competent in adapting their teaching methods to cater for EM children’s learning styles and educational needs. However, teachers from low concentration kindergartens were less competent in incorporating multicultural elements in curriculum design and teaching materials. They demonstrated a more monocultural mindset in teaching Chinese to EM children. Teachers from high concentration kindergartens developed a better understanding of EM cultures, were more caring and had higher expectations of EM children. Implications for teacher education, school level and policy were discussed. Copyright © 2021 National Institute of Education, Singapore.