Debate over educational reform in many countries has addressed the question of how to attract and retain teachers. As part of a multiple case study that includes eight beginning English language teachers in Hong Kong, this article offers an in-depth analysis of the experiences of two participants, Christine and Samuel, during their initial year of full time teaching in Hong Kong schools. The data, collected during an entire academic year, suggests that Christine used her experiences of becoming a teacher to justify and reaffirm her determination to pursue a career within English language teaching. In contrast, Samuel's preliminary year of full-time teaching culminated in his decision to leave the teaching profession. A contribution of this study is to explore these very different experiences and outcomes using a framework of teacher identity construction. From this perspective, findings suggest that the participants' engagement in the practices and activities of teaching, their relations with colleagues, and their positioning within different discourses of teaching and learning by their schools as well as by the wider educational environment, shaped their decisions about whether to continue to pursue a teaching career. Implications for attracting and retaining teachers, as well as for future research, are discussed.
[Copyright of Australian Educational Researcher is the property of Australian Association for Research in Education. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13384-012-0067-7]

This paper reports on Stage 1 of a learning and teaching project focused on students studying in the Chinese and English language delivery of transnational Master of Business Administration (MBA) programs of an Australian university. The programs are delivered using limited and intensive face-to-face teaching augmented by self-directed and web-based learning, and ongoing (mainly email) contact with lecturers before and after they have returned to Australia. The aim of this stage of the project is to provide a greater understanding of students' instructional preferences so that, where appropriate, lecturers can better scaffold learning and teaching arrangements (Stage 2 of the project) to assist them to meet the learning objectives of the MBA program. Survey data were collected from students studying the MBA in Hong Kong and Singapore in English (EMBA), and in Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan in Chinese (CMBA). Findings demonstrate that whilst students ranked teacher-directed face-to-face instructional delivery highly, they also indicated that an independent, web-based learning environment was their least-preferred approach to learning. These findings put lecturers in a more informed position when it comes to them planning how to best assist students from Confucian-heritage backgrounds to work productively and successfully in their studies.
[Copyright of Journal of University Teaching & Learning Practice is the property of University of Wollongong, Centre for Educational Development and Interactive Resources. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://ro.uow.edu.au/jutlp/]