This presentation embraces two inter-related objectives: to examine the current policies and strategies that are employed by Hong Kong to attract more non-local students in order to become an educational hub in the region, and critique dominant conceptions of ‘higher education’ and the ways these play out in higher education policy. The paper begins by examining ‘markets’ and how this idea cannot be separated from the global dominance of neoliberal ideologies. This is related in turn to questions of policy borrowing. The particular pertinence of this is then emphasised by turning to a topic that, although it may seem a digression, goes to the heart of thinking in social sciences: the nature of humanism in Chinese and Occidental philosophy. Finally a return is made to aspects of international higher education in order to unsettle some of the dominant patterns of influence and open the way towards different kinds of thinking.

This paper explores teaching and learning experiences concerning young Pakistani Muslims in Hong Kong, who are found simultaneously immersed in two divergent systems of education - first, the conventional daytime schools where students are educated formally with general knowledge, and second, the madrasahs (Islamic learning institutes) where student recite Qur’an and receive religious teachings every day after school. Based on the ongoing ethnographic fieldwork (with methods including participant observation and interviews) in both local conventional schools and madrasahs in Hong Kong, this paper reveals that the three parties involved, namely the Chinese-speaking educators from conventional schools, the Qur’anic teachers from madrasahs (along with the students’ parents, who are often supporters of madrasah education), and the ethnic Muslim students, might have different understanding and expectations on education. This paper further argues that such difference could be a result of contrary worldviews and meanings of life to the two groups of educators, as well as limited communication between the two sides of educational institutes.

自從施政報告於 2014 提倡全面推行生涯規劃教育，生涯規劃教育成為高中教育的一個嶄新領域。政府建議生涯規劃教育應以全校參與模式推行，老師則可以由升學及就業輔導老師逐步過渡至生涯規劃教育老師，扮演協調者、指導者和輔導者的角色。本文嘗試引用一項香港國際比較研究的部份數據，探討老師在生涯規劃教育的角色，以及未來香港生涯規劃教育的發展方向。
[Copyright © 2016 香港教師中心.]

Identity formation is a major development issue confronting adolescents (Erikson, 1968). By adopting Marcia’s (1966) identity status model and employing part of the Objective Measure of Ego Identity Status, the researcher examined a sample of Hong Kong secondary school students’ identity statuses in the four identity domain areas, say education, career, life-style, and friendship. It was found that 95.9% of the students can be categorized into a particular status, and 31.7%, 25.6%, 20.4%, 22.3% of the students were assigned as diffusion, foreclosure, moratorium, and achievement statuses respectively. Further statistical analysis has been conducted to unpack the relationship between the respondents’ identity statuses and personal characteristics, parents’ influence, and community service engagement. Implications for the enhancement of community service programmes at secondary schools will be discussed at the end.

Career planning plays a salient role in determining the individuals’ goal setting, work engagement, and outcomes. In school settings, helping students to establish good career planning would contribute not only to maximize their potential to learn and achieve based on their personal strengths, but also to suit their career development needs. However, to students with special educational needs (SEN), they are usually the group facing greater challenges in career planning and development compared to regular students. In the Hong Kong context, the present study took the initiativeto examine the aspirations, expectations, and challenges of post-secondary school transition among SEN students and their parents. A qualitative approach through a series of focus group interviews was adopted. Over 70 SEN students from both mainstream schools (n =38) and special schools (n =34) and 37 parents of SEN student participated in this study. The results were categorized into career aspirations, difficulties and challenges, expectations and recommendations of SEN students and their parents. The results draw educators’ attention of the found inadequacy of positive attitude to career planning and low confidence levels to achieve desirable post-school transition outcomes among SEN students. Implications are discussed in relation to SEN students’ needs of career planning training and career development.

Hong Kong is an international city, with people of different races. In recent years, the number of people from South Asia, especially from Nepal, Pakistan, and India, is rising rapidly. Increasingly more of them are choosing to study in public schools, where learning the Chinese language is compulsory. However, the Chinese language is too difficult for them to learn, and their failure in the public examination usually presents an obstacle to further study in universities as well as to their career prospects in Hong Kong. Moreover, many non-Chinese-speaking (NCS) students have experienced racial discrimination in daily life in public transport, public places, and schools in Hong Kong. They find it difficult to make friends with the local people because they do not know Cantonese or use inaccurate pronunciations. Since 2006, the mission to provide formal education to NCS students was buttressed by ‘designated schools’ which were nominated by the Education Bureau (EDB) to admit more NCS students. However, recent complaints regarding the allocation of NCS children in multiethnic schools as a form of cultural segregation and discrimination has resulted in an increasing demand for spaces in mainstream schools where Chinese is the main medium of instruction. Hence, NCS students have to face more difficulties in learning and in managing interactions with local students. In this research, a case study of a multiethnic school was performed to examine the major challenges faced by the non-Chinese speaking (NCS) students when learning Chinese and how the school helped these students overcome their challenges. How the multiethnic school developed a suitable environment for promoting multicultural integration and harmony in the school was also studied. Through investigations of school documents, observation of lessons and activities, and discussion with teachers and students, the school was determined to have applied a suitable range of strategies to provide pleasurable and

Children are expected to read and write Chinese character before they reach their formal schooling in Hong Kong. The 4 to 6 years old children, *non-Chinese speaking (NCS) and native Chinese speaking children are given similar Chinese writing exercise in the preschools. Nevertheless NCS children are still affected by the differences between their mother language and Chinese. NCS children are more likely to encounter difficulties in writing and reading Chinese. According to the past research reports, the NCS students in Hong Kong who enter a mainstream primary school (Chinese medium instruction), their levels of literacy in Chinese tends to remain at a low level, and they are unable to keep up with local Chinese classmates. The aim of the study is to focus on how NCS children who are 5 to 6 years old learn Chinese characters in a realist classroom setting. The study will be conducted in three Chinese preschools in Hong Kong and investigate the teaching and learning of Chinese characters in five classroom settings using with a phenomenographic approach.

Background: Abundant research has been undertaken on the importance of teachers’ feedback to the school achievement of students. However, focus has rarely been placed on the differences between the perception on feedback of students and teachers. Being a part of the study which was sponsored by a General Research Grant awarded by Research Grants Council of UGC, Hong Kong (Project Number 844011), we attempted to find out the differences between students’ and teachers’ perception on feedback. Aims and Keywords: The study aimed to find out the differences between Hong Kong primary school students and teachers in their views to feedback. Sample: Four thousand five hundred and seven students between primary 3 and primary 5, 132 teachers from 26 Hong Kong primary schools were sampled in the study. Method: A 42-item instrument with 4-Likert point response scale was constructed by the research team to collect the responses from Hong Kong students and teachers of their perception on 6 dimensions in feedback. Multidimensional Rasch analysis was conducted on the collected data with CONQUEST 2.0. Results: The results showed that: (1) item-fit was between 0.5 and 1.5 for all items except one; (2) Rasch person reliabilities in the 6 dimensions ranged from 0.72 to 0.86 and item reliabilities was 1.00; (3) the effect size of the respondents’ status (teacher or student) in the 6 dimensions ranged from 0.32 to 0.64. Conclusions: In this study, there are moderate differences between the students and teachers in the perception on the source of feedback, the effectiveness of feedback and the function of feedback. On the other hand, there are little differences among the two types of respondents in the perception on the goodness of feedback, the focus/target of feedback and the expectation of feedback.