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1 – 8 of 8This paper aims to examine the strategic role of world-class universities and the international academic profession in the regionalisation project of China’s Greater Bay Area…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the strategic role of world-class universities and the international academic profession in the regionalisation project of China’s Greater Bay Area (GBA). It illustrates the way in which the case of the GBA regionalisation project offers a potentially rich empirical example for adding contextual understanding to the literature of the Triple Helix model, which largely draws on inductive theorising from western successful innovation cases. The GBA regionalisation processes will provide a wealth of empirical cases for identifying circumstances that address tensions and increase interactions in the Triple Helix relationship of university, government and industry for fostering knowledge synergies.
Design/methodology/approach
Focusing on the case of Hong Kong, it engages in policy and stakeholder analysis and addresses three key research questions: What are the competitive advantages and potential strategic role of Hong Kong's universities and academic profession in the regionalisation of innovation systems in the GBA? What is the role of the governments in the regionalisation processes? What are the expected opportunities and challenges offered by the GBA policy initiatives for the future development of Hong Kong’s universities and academic profession?
Findings
Hong Kong, given its status as an international finance centre and global city with intense internationalisation and established judicial system operated by the rule of law, will contribute to the GBA development by leveraging on its edge in scientific research and development and international networks of academic research through the world-class academic profession. Scientists and researchers in the city, possessing the competitive advantages of basic research and international partnerships, are highly regarded by the central government. The engagement of Hong Kong’s scientific talents, can play an important role in achieving China’s aspiration of becoming a global technology power.
Research limitations/implications
Analysis of this article implies that the GBA concept is currently China’s ambitious but vague economic plan. The opportunities in which key node cities and knowledge/ innovation clusters will capture and capitalise from the regional ‘co-opetitive” ’entrepreneurial ecosystem are still unclear. The future of the GBA regionalisation is so dynamic and open-ended that grounded concepts related to the governance innovation/ discourse of ‘one country two systems’ and social connectedness and capitalisation with Chinese characteristics will help in making sense of the contextualisation of a Chinese regional innovation system and enhancing the sophistication of reconceptualisation of the Triple Helix model.
Originality/value
This article will add to the literature some novel contextualised knowledge about the GBA’s potential triple-helix relationship between government-university-industry in the 21st century. The empirical example of China’s GBA will also shed light on a new understanding of the role of international social capital in the entrepreneurial knowledge economy, dynamics between basic and applied research, and a synergistic interface between regionalisation and national innovation system.
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Hei-hang Hayes Tang and Chak-pong Gordon Tsui
The purpose of this paper is to examine the way in which higher education participation is democratized in the entrepreneurial city of Hong Kong by the policy innovation that…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the way in which higher education participation is democratized in the entrepreneurial city of Hong Kong by the policy innovation that encompasses internationalization. There is a dearth of empirical studies about transnational education in Hong Kong, except for a few which examine students’ perceptions of transnational education from a user perspective, situated in marketized conditions (Leung and Waters, 2013; Waters and Leung, 2013a, b). The minimal volume of existing research has ignored the innovative aspects of democratizing higher learning by internationalization, namely, the operation of international degrees by overseas universities on offshore campuses. This policy innovation by transnational institutions is significant in an era of the globalization of higher education, as access to higher education cannot be otherwise realized given the local education policies.
Design/methodology/approach
Employing documentary research, this paper presents and assesses the growth of community college international education at The University of Hong Kong and its unique facets, juxtaposing it with the marketized context of East Asian higher education. It engages in specific reviews surrounding the operational mode and academic collaborations of the international educational programs and practices at the Hong Kong University’s School of Professional and Continuing Education.
Findings
This documentary research finds that the internationalized academic profession of partner universities enables curriculum design, pedagogy, teaching ideas and assessment methods to be informed by a diversity of international academic cultures and indigenous knowledge. Through this policy innovation, international education is institutionalized in such a way that it takes Hong Kong students beyond the community college context, which is relatively localized. It also illuminates the way in which the “ideoscape” of American community colleges and international partnerships with Australian and British universities have been manifested in the Hong Kong education hub for transnational student flows and intellectual exchanges across the Asian region.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to the academic literature of higher education studies, particularly in the areas of massification and democratization, as well as their connection with internationalization and policy innovation. It also delineates various forces that are propelling the development of higher education’s internationalization and massification.
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Eric C.K. Cheng, Yan Wing Leung, Wai Wa Yuen and Hei Hang Hayes Tang
The purpose of this paper is to highlight the urgent need for a genuinely effective and attainable citizenship education model in Hong Kong’s schools, which focusses on promoting…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to highlight the urgent need for a genuinely effective and attainable citizenship education model in Hong Kong’s schools, which focusses on promoting student participation in school governance. It is an empirical citizenship education management model for school leaders that illustrates the predictive effects of personally responsible, participatory, justice-oriented and patriotic citizenship, necessarily supported by school management practices, school ethos and teacher beliefs.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 3,209 students from 51 secondary schools in Hong Kong participated in a quasi-experimental design questionnaire survey. A structural equation model (SEM) was applied to confirm the model.
Findings
The results of the SEM show that the values and cultural practices held by a school’s teachers drive the implementation of its citizenship education. Moreover, it is well known that organizational values can exert a powerful influence and it is the same within educational structures: management practices in schools have an impact on ethos, teachers’ beliefs and student participation in school governance.
Practical implications
The paper provides practical proposals for school leaders to create opportunities for student participation in school governance.
Originality/value
This study builds on existing literature and provides school leaders with a practical model for implementing student participation in school governance.
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Hei-Hang Hayes Tang, King Man Eric Chong and Wai Wa Timothy Yuen
National identification among young people and the issues about how national education should be conducted have been the significant topics when the Hong Kong Special…
Abstract
Purpose
National identification among young people and the issues about how national education should be conducted have been the significant topics when the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region was entering its third decade of the establishment. This paper was written based on data the authors obtained upon participation in a project organized by the Centre for Catholic Studies of the Chinese University of Hong Kong. The project was carried out after the official curriculum, known as the Moral and National Education Curriculum Guide, was shelved due to popular resentment. The project aimed at capturing the timely opportunity for substantial resources available for school-based operation of moral and national education and developing an alternative curriculum about teaching national issues and identification for Catholic Diocese and Convent primary schools to adopt. This paper aims to investigate the nature of this Catholic Project and examines the extent to which it is a counterhegemonic project or one for teaching to belong to a nation (Mathews, Ma and Lui, 2007). It assesses the project’s possible contribution to citizenship and national education in Hong Kong, since the withdrawal of the Moral and National Education Curriculum Guide.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors of this paper worked in an education university of Hong Kong and were invited to be team members of this Catholic Project. The role comprised proposing topics for teacher training, conducting seminars, giving comments to teaching resources, observing and giving feedback to schools that tried out the teaching and designing/implementing an evaluative survey and conducting follow-up interviews with involved parties such as teachers and key officials of the Catholic Centre. Given this, the research involved can be perceived as action research. This paper was written up with both the qualitative and quantitative data the authors collected when working the project.
Findings
This paper reported a Catholic citizenship training project with the focus on a Catholic school project on preparing students to understand the nation by learning national issues analytically. The ultimate goal was to ensure teachers in Catholic primary schools could lead the students to examine national issues and other social issues from the perspective of Catholic social ethics. Though the project arose after the failure of the government to force through its controversial national education programme, this paper found that instead of being an alternative curriculum with resistance flavour, the project was basically a self-perfection programme for the Catholic. It was to fill a shortfall observed of Catholic schools, namely, not doing enough to let students examine social and national issues with Catholic social ethics, which, indeed, had a good interface with many cherished universal values. In the final analysis, the project is not a typical national education programme, which teaches students to belong to a nation but an innovative alternative curriculum transcending the hegemony-resistance ideological tensions as advanced by western literature (for example, Gramsci, 1971; Freire, 1970; and Apple, 1993).
Originality/value
The paper contributes to the literature of Hong Kong studies and citizenship education studies. The results of such an innovative endeavour, which captures and capitalizes the opportunity and resources for developing a national education curriculum in school-based manner. Attention was paid to the endeavour’s nature and its possible contribution to the knowledge, policies and practices of citizenship and national education in Hong Kong amidst deep social transformations. In particular, the paper can add to the specific literature about Hong Kong’s citizenship and national education development since the withdrawal of the Moral and National Education Curriculum Guide. Using an empirical example of Asian schooling and society, analysis of this paper illustrates the way in which development of an alternative curriculum is more innovative and interesting, transcending the hegemony-resistance ideological tensions.
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The purpose of this paper is to undertake an inquiry into the way academic entrepreneurialism manifests itself in the changing discourses of the notion of “scholarship”. It…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to undertake an inquiry into the way academic entrepreneurialism manifests itself in the changing discourses of the notion of “scholarship”. It particularly examines the contexts, rationales, definitions and implications of the discursive field of the “scholarship of application”. The global trend of academic entrepreneurialism profoundly affects the organisation of higher education institutions and academic life. Particularly, the form of scholarship has been undergoing subtle but constant transformation. The emergence of knowledge economies worldwide influences the practices and goals of traditional academy and illustrates commitment for fundamental knowledge and the new economies emphasise the results and impacts brought by applied knowledge. Alongside the “scholarship of discovery”, the “scholarship of application” is given attention.
Design/methodology/approach
By reviewing the related literature, this paper articulates the definitions and dimensions of the “scholarship of application”. In addition, the impacts brought about by the concerned academic and policy discourses will be discussed.
Findings
This paper finds that the emergence of the discursive field of the “scholarship of application” – as well as the discussions and actions in response to it – coincide with the intense neoliberal changes that affected traditional academia in the 1990s. It is argued that the emergence of and subsequent responses to the discursive field of the “scholarship of application” resulted in transforming purposes and practices of academic life. The discursive field of the “scholarship of application” also impacts on the concerned academic and policy discourses.
Originality/value
To sustain the advancement of the scholarship of application, this paper implies the need to develop practices, cultivate culture as well as formulate prestige and reward mechanisms inherent to the existing higher education systems.
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The aim of this study is twofold; to test the effects of participative and authoritarian leadership styles on employee creativity; and to examine whether organizational…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this study is twofold; to test the effects of participative and authoritarian leadership styles on employee creativity; and to examine whether organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) mediates the relationship between these leadership styles and employee creativity.
Design/methodology/approach
A survey tool was employed in this research for data collection from the staff at higher education institutions in Malaysia. The collected data were analyzed via PLS-SEM to verify research hypotheses and reach at conclusions.
Findings
The outcomes verified that participative leadership positively affects OCB as well as employee creativity. The findings also demonstrated that authoritarian leadership does not really have any impact on the creativity and OCB of employees. Finally, the results demonstrated that OCB mediates the connection between a leader's participative approach and employee creativity, while its mediating effect among authoritarian leadership and employee creativity is not supported.
Originality/value
This paper addresses research gaps in the existing literature with regards to the role of participative and authoritarian leadership in predicting employee creativity through OCB. There are also scarce research studies on the linkages among the chosen constructs, particularly in higher education context.
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Priyanka Nema, Ritu Srivastava, Rohan Bhalla and Abhinandan Chakarboty
The study examines the impact of social media distraction on the relationship between student engagement and student evaluations of teachers (SET) in management education, part of…
Abstract
Purpose
The study examines the impact of social media distraction on the relationship between student engagement and student evaluations of teachers (SET) in management education, part of the STEM disciplines. While it is widely accepted that student engagement and evaluation of teachers are two important constructs of active learning systems, their links, especially in the context of management education, have not been explored. This study seeks to fill this research gap as teachers' appraisal and career growth greatly depend on SET across higher education institutes worldwide.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected from 247 student participants from higher education institutes/universities using a questionnaire-based survey. Further, 15 students were interviewed to glean insights from their feelings regarding social media distractions and how it impacts their engagement and evaluation of teachers. For the quantitative and qualitative analyses, multiple regression and thematic analysis were applied, respectively. A word tree was developed to determine the association between experiences and contexts.
Findings
The results indicate that social media distraction moderates the relationship between students' cognitive engagement and their evaluation of teaching faculty. Social media distractions disrupt student engagement inside the classroom, leading to wrong/biased assessments of teachers' performance. Additionally, cognitive and emotional engagement significantly impacted student evaluations of the management college faculty.
Originality/value
The authors’ findings enable educators in higher education systems, specifically management education, to rethink the faculty feedback system and social media distractions impeding student engagement other than SET drawbacks.
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Bilal Ahmad, Sajid Iqbal, Mahnoor Hai and Shahid Latif
This paper aims to examine the mediating role of relational mobile usage on the relationship between personal values (individualism, collectivism and academic self-efficacy) and…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the mediating role of relational mobile usage on the relationship between personal values (individualism, collectivism and academic self-efficacy) and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) among the faculty members of higher education/degree-awarding institutes (DAIs) in Pakistan. The paper also examines the moderating role of gender on the relationship between relational mobile usage and OCB.
Design/methodology/approach
Cross-sectional data from 217 faculty members of higher education/DAIs in Pakistan were collected through an online questionnaire. Structural equation modeling technique using SmartPLS was used to assess the measurement and structural model. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21 was used for data normality analysis, missing value analysis and variable calculation. Response and non-response bias were also examined.
Findings
The findings confirmed that individualism was not significantly related to relational mobile usage; however, collectivism and academic self-efficacy were significantly related to relational mobile usage. The relationship of relational mobile usage and OCB was also significant. The mediating role of relational mobile usage on the relationship between individualism and OCB was not significant; however, the mediating role of relational mobile usage between collectivism and OCB, and academic self-efficacy and OCB was significant. The moderating role of gender on the relationship between relational mobile usage and OCB was also significant.
Practical implications
DAIs’ administration should strive to encourage individuals to value group priorities over the individualistic interests. Valuing group interest over the individualistic interest would promote the usage of mobile technology for relational purpose. This relational perspective of mobile usage will ultimately develop OCB among individuals. Also, academic self-efficacy through relational mobile usage can lead to OCB; therefore, another important policy implication for the administration of DAIs is to develop academic self-efficacy among the stakeholders of the institutions.
Originality/value
Although OCB has become a theoretically mature concept, the framework proposed for this study has rarely been discussed in previous scholarships, particularly from the perspective of relational mobile usage. Arguably, this study is the first in testing the mediating role of relational mobile usage between the personal values and OCB within the context of academia in Pakistan.
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