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Selected Research Project
 
Project Title Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement in Hong Kong and England: How Schools Mediate Government Reforms
 
Principal Investigator
Professor Allan David WALKER
 
Area of Research Project
Educational Leadership, Policy and Administration

 
Project Period
From 9/2012 To 4/2014
Objectives
  • to examine the focus of change in recent top-down policy reforms in Hong Kong and England over time and key challenges identified at the interface between country, school and classroom levels;
  • to identify and analyse principles and practices of effective leadership and educational practice for change in improved and effective schools and classrooms;
  • to identify and examine how school leaders at all levels and teachers mediate centrally mandated reforms reform which focus on improving classroom teaching and learning and pupil outcomes;
  • to compare and contrast the similarities and differences between schools within and between each country in relation to i)-iii) and the implications for analysing the mediation of systemic change reforms in different educational systems.
Methods Used

A longitudinal, mixed methods design was used to investigate the interface of reform at macro (country), meso (school) and micro (classroom) levels, the proposed research will make a distinctive contribution to knowledge of the efforts of mandated reform changes on the educational structures, cultures, classroom practices and educational outcomes of schools and how schools, in turn, also shape such effects.

Impact
The research will generate new understandings about how schools mediate mandated models of
systemic change, and through these, have potentially positive benefits for end users in policy and
practice communities in the following ways:
  • For government officials and non-government public bodies, quangos and schools in England and Hong Kong in terms of evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of current models of and strategies for systemic change at school level;
  • For school leaders in terms of increasing their knowledge of new strategies and skills through which they can mediate reforms and reform intentions in ways which result in context sensitive sustained successful change;
  • For classroom teachers in terms of support for acquiring new skills in teaching and learning which will improve pupil achievement

Given both the distinctive focus of the research and the use of a mixed methods methodology that entails in-depth complementary qualitative and quantitative analyses, it will have the ability to have a direct impact on academic communities in education and other disciplines, particularly in adding a new dimension to current understandings of and ways of designing research into the ways schools mediate driven reforms;

We anticipate, also, that the research findings will be of value to international NGOs such as the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) which may use the outcomes of our research to inform their cross country evaluation work on the design and evaluation of the ways in which systemic reform intentions are realized in practice.
Beneficiaries

The research will contribute to knowledge of:

  • how school leaders at all levels and classroom teachers mediate externally mandated government reform, in relation to their own board professional educational values and current preferred practice. This is critically important for understanding how external reform works at schools and classroom levels and thus the contribution which such reform makes to raising standards of teaching and learning in classrooms. This research will contribute to better understandings about the interface between macro (country), meso (school) and micro (teacher) level reform.
  • How school contexts affect the mediation and relative success of reform intentions and aspirations in all schools and for all pupils. This is of particular importance in relation to government and academic concerns with equity in schools which serve socio economically disadvantaged communities.

Thus, the research will advance our theoretical and empirical understanding of the context specific dynamics of the leadership, management and implementation of centrally driven reform efforts at school and classroom levels.

 
Output
  1. Day, C., Ylimaki, R., Bennett, J., Johansson, O., Walker, A., Armstrong, P., Gu, Q., & Uljens, M.  (2014, September 4). How successful school leaders mediate and enact government reforms. Paper to be presented at ECER 2014 -The Past, the Present and Future of Educational Research in Europe, Portugal.
  2. Gu, Q., Day, C. & Walker, A. (2014, September 23-25). Overview of the research design for Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement: How Successful Schools Enact Government Reforms in England and Hong Kong. Paper to be presented at the Symposium titled Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement: How Successful Schools Enact Government Reforms in England and Hong Kong at the BERA 2014 Annual Conference. London, UK.
  3. Chen, J., Ko, J., Sammons, P., Gu, Q. (2014, September 23-25). Models of the perceived impact of headteacher leadership on improvements in pupil outcomes: Results from the survey research on senior and middle leaders. Paper to be presented at the Symposium titled Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement: How Successful Schools Enact Government Reforms in England and Hong Kong at the BERA 2014 Annual Conference. London, UK.
  4. Armstrong, P., Bryant, D. A., Ko, J., Gu, Q., Day, C., & Walker, A.. (2014, September 23-25). Enacting values and educational purposes: How leaders of the case studies schools mediate policy for improvement. Paper to be presented at the Symposium titled Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement: How Successful Schools Enact Government Reforms in England and Hong Kong at the BERA 2014 Annual Conference. London, UK.
  5. Gu, Q., Day, C., Walker, A., Armstrong, P., Bryant, D., Ko, J., Chen, J., & Sammons, P. (2014, September 23-25). How successful secondary schools in England and Hong Kong reshape external educational reforms: Key messages from the Research. Paper to be presented at the Symposium titled Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement: How Successful Schools Enact Government Reforms in England and Hong Kong at the BERA 2014 Annual Conference. London, UK.
  6. Bryant, D., Walker, A., & Ko, J. (2014, April 5). How do school leaders in Hong Kong shape policy enactment? Paper presented at The American Educational Research Association (AERA) Annual Meeting 2014, Philadelphia, USA.
  7. Ko, J., & Walker, A. (2014, January 2-7). The dynamic roles of school principals in leading and improving school improvement in the 21st Century: Lessons from Hong Kong. Paper presented at the 27th ICSEI Congress, Yogyakarta, Indonesia.
  8. Walker, A., & Team. (2014). Confidential research reports to project schools A-D: Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement in HK and England. Hong Kong: The Joseph Lau Luen Hung Charitable Trust Asia Pacific Centre for Leadership and Change, Hong Kong Institute of Education.
  9. Walker, A., & Team. (2013). Confidential Mid-term research report: Reshaping Educational Practice for Improvement in HK and England. Hong Kong: The Joseph Lau Luen Hung Charitable Trust Asia Pacific Centre for Leadership and Change, Hong Kong Institute of Education.
Biography of Principal Investigator

Allan Walker is Joseph Lau Chair Professor of International Educational Leadership, Dean, Faculty of Education and Human Development and Director of The Joseph Lau Luen Hung Charitable Trust Asia Pacific Centre for Leadership and Change at The Hong Kong Institute of Education.  Prior joining the HKIEd, he has worked in universities in Australia, Singapore and Hong Kong and has conducted leader development courses and/or research in America, Europe and across the Asia Pacific.  Allan has published extensively on educational administration and leadership; and school leadership development and learning. His work also explores the relationship between culture and school leadership. Allan serves on the editorial boards of the top ranked journals in his field and has published over 300 books and articles with international publishers and in the world’s most prestigious academic journals.  He is co-editor of the Journal of Educational Administration. His recent research focuses on expanding knowledge of school leadership in Chinese and other Asian societies and disseminating this internationally.  Allan has also acted as a consultant/advisor on large-scale research and development activities in countries including Singapore, China, Taiwan, Norway, Finland, Vietnam, Malaysia, Netherlands, Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Canada, the US, UK, and Australia.   He is known internationally for his passion for school leadership, innovative approaches to leader development and the promotion of leader control and accountability for their own professional learning.  In 2010 Allan was made a Fellow of the Australian Council for Educational Leadership for his contribution to educational leadership research and development globally, but especially in South and Southeast Asia. In 2011, he was awarded an endowed chair professorship by The Hong Kong Institute of Education in recognition of his outstanding research and academic achievements in international educational leadership.  He has won six General Research Fund grants and twenty other competitive research and development grants.

 
Funding Source
Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC)/ Research Grants Council (RGC) Joint Research Scheme