Professional learning communities: research and practices across six educational systems in the Asia-Pacific region

Introduction

The world is changing at seemingly breakneck speed. Many nations around the world are undertaking wide-ranging reforms of curriculum, instruction, and assessment to prepare students for increasingly complex demands of life and work and develop the ability to compete effectively in a knowledge-based economy. Teachers are the single biggest in-school influence on student achievement and teacher quality is therefore central to improving education systems around the world. This challenge grows ever more acute as the demands on education systems become more ambitious – to prepare all students with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions for success in an increasingly globalized and digital world (Asia Society, 2012).

We live in a globalizing world where organizations are faced with an evolving new era fuelled by unrestrained, accelerated expansion of ideas, technology, competition, culture, and democracy, all captured under the banner of “globalization” (Pang, 2006). The main characteristic of this world is quicksilver – a world of fluidity – sometimes fickleness – where sudden and unpredictable change can occur (Pisapia, 2009). This uncertainty creates a web of tensions that challenge organizational leaders to meet new demands in the face of international, national, and local constraints. Because the main bases of globalization are knowledge intensive information and innovation, globalization has profound impacts on education (Carnoy, 2002). Educational systems across the globe are now under pressure to produce individuals prepared for global competition and individuals who can themselves compete for their own positions in the global context (Daun & Strömqvist, 2011). Globalization has brought a paradigm shift in educational management, administration, and governance in many countries (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business International, 2011). The search for evidence to develop high quality education systems continues to intensify as national economies seek to compete globally in the twenty-first century. Under this circumstance, school education systems have to respond to the challenges and transform in a changing world.

In recent years, as the role of education in driving economic and social development grows ever more apparent, international benchmarking of educational best practices has become an increasingly valuable tool for policymaking (Stewart, 2012). The supranational organizations including the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) come to play an increasingly important role within the global education policy field through a so called “globalizing empiricism”. In a global economy, success is no longer measured against national standards alone, but against the best-performing and most rapidly improving education systems. More and more countries are starting to look outward and utilize reference societies and international benchmarks, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), and Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), as levers to increase their competitiveness in the global knowledge economies (Sellar & Lingard, 2013). More countries and education systems are looking beyond their own borders for evidence of the most successful and efficient educational policies and practices (OECD, 2013). The connections among nations at multiple levels and dimensions are unprecedented. Hence, there is much to learn through critical and comparative perspectives on school transformation in different socio-cultural contexts.

Educational challenges and PLCs as a strategy for supporting school reforms

The educational challenge facing many countries in a globalizing world is to achieve equal access and higher levels of learning for all students. School reforms across different education systems in the Asia-Pacific region have targeted education quality and equity, with a particular focus on the improvement of learning outcomes of all students and their holistic development. Accumulating research evidence indicates that teacher quality is the single most important in-school factor influencing student achievement, and the improvement in teaching quality is of paramount importance (Jensen, 2012; McKinsey & Company, 2007; Wang, 2015). Researchers have also sought to understand the relationship between leadership and learning, and they asserted the strong influence of leadership on teaching and learning. The leadership dimension that is most strongly associated with positive student outcomes is that of promoting and participating in teacher learning and development (Leithwood & Jantzi, 2008; Leithwood, Louis, Anderson, & Wahlstrom, 2004; Robinson, Lloyd, & Rowe, 2008).

Another challenge is related to teacher collaborative learning. Increasing research evidence shows that professional teachers will become more effective in supporting their students’ learning when working collaboratively with their colleagues to improve their practices (Louis & Marks, 1998; McLaughlin & Talbert, 2006). Collaborating with colleagues is a manifestation of a strong professional community, which will have a great impact in developing a sense of collective responsibility for the students’ learning. This sense of responsibility relates positively to higher levels of student achievements. A strong professional community is likely to emerge in a school with a high level of empowerment. Professional networks provide teachers with venues for applying their personal practical knowledge in solving their common problems. Peer-led learning and development within and across schools is increasingly popular, and is identified as a feature of the world’s most successful improving school systems (McKinsey & Company, 2010).

Since the 1990s, the concept of professional learning communities (PLCs) has gained increasing attention in the English speaking world as a promising model and strategy to improve teaching quality and student learning outcomes (DuFour & Eaker, 1998; DuFour, Eaker, & DuFour, 2005; Hord, 1997; Hord & Sommers, 2008; Stoll & Louis, 2007). Despite various definitions and debates on the key features and dimensions of PLCs, there appears to be a consensus that the major goal of the PLC is staff learning together, with the staff’s learning directed to student needs and learning. Accumulating research evidence about teacher collaboration suggests a positive and significant relationship between PLCs and the improvement in student achievement and teachers’ practice (Timperley, Wilson, Barrar, & Fung, 2007; Vescio, Ross, & Adams, 2008). There is a broad endorsement of PLCs as a desirable infrastructure for supporting school reform and improvement. Research evidence suggests that a PLC offers a significant staff development approach that contributes to whole-school improvement and overall effectiveness (DuFour et al., 2005; Hord, 2004; McLaughlin & Talbert, 2006).

The development and sustainability of PLCs depends not only on internal structures and processes, but also on external influencing factors and stakeholders. To identify and understand key issues related to PLCs, we need to have a profound understanding of both internal and external environments that are related to creating and developing PLCs in different contexts. For example, supportive leadership is an important resource for PLCs. Creating structures that support PLCs is important, while shaping a positive school culture has a significant impact on developing and sustaining PLCs. Adopting appropriate strategies is essential to achieve the organizational goals and objectives, and to develop and sustain the embedded PLC process within a school. It is important to take into account these issues when investigating the process of creating, developing, and sustaining effective PLCs.

Despite an increasing research interest and a growing body of literature on teacher learning and PLCs since the 1990s in the western world, there is limited literature regarding the development and practices of PLCs in the eastern countries. Much of the existing literature on PLCs has originated from and focused on Anglo-American settings. The concept and practices of PLCs in other cultural contexts have yet to be explored in-depth. Thus, it is significant to investigate the diversity and complexity of PLCs in different cultural contexts and broaden our understanding of critical education issues in an interdependent, globalizing world.

Imperative of global perspectives on PLCs

Professional learning communities are defined, understood and enacted differently in diversified contexts. The shades and manifestations of an umbrella term of PLCs are inevitably revealed differently in various contexts, and mediated by the particular contextual factors and actors who enact them. There is an imperative to develop enriched and contextualized understandings of PLCs from diversified perspectives. Given the fact that empirical research on PLCs in the Asian settings is particularly scarce, this special issue attempts to explore the present status of PLCs across six different education systems in the Asia-Pacific region, namely Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, and the United States.

This special issue seeks to study the PLC construct and practices in multiple contexts in order to enhance our understandings of PLCs through critical, global perspectives. Thus, the major aim is to expand our understandings of PLCs from multiple perspectives, and examine the PLC practices and factors that enhance the effective practice of PLCs in different educational contexts. Through the analytical accounts in seven research papers from six educational systems, this special issue aims to:

•	provide insights into educational challenges faced by different education systems and the role of PLCs in the process of school improvement in these education systems.
•	investigate the essential features of PLCs and examine the key factors that enhance or hinder the development and effective practice of PLCs in different cultural contexts.

This special issue on the global perspectives of PLCs has four distinctive contributions. Firstly, seven articles in this special issue investigated major issues related to PLCs in six different education systems in the Asia-Pacific region. The PLC concepts and models originated from the west, and the existing literature is predominantly focused on the Anglo-American settings. Six articles in this special issue particularly focus on East Asian school settings, namely mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, and Singapore. The collective analyses of a specific research topic would be powerful and offer unique, multiple perspectives. These education systems have different historical, political, cultural, demographic backgrounds and are faced with various educational challenges in their specific contexts. How to improve the teacher quality and improve the effectiveness of teachers and schools leaders? How to enhance the improvement of student learning and all-round development? There is no panacea or one-size-fits-all solution to these essential questions. However, contextualized analyses on the PLC practices and strategies on how to tackle identified issues in varied education systems presented informed perspectives in a globalized education landscape. These informed understandings can develop the knowledge base of PLCs and school improvement across the globe. In recent years international benchmarking of best educational practices has become an increasingly valuable tool for policymaking. Recent PISA results show that Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, and South Korea are high performing education systems (Jensen, 2012; OECD, 2013). Empirical studies on the PLC practices in these education systems offer useful insights into their effective strategies to enhance student learning and education quality.

Secondly, these seven articles presented empirical studies which utilized a range of methodologies including both qualitative and quantitative approaches. Much of what we know about how and in what contexts teachers in schools work collaboratively to forge the best possible support for student learning is drawn from in-depth, long-term ethnographic studies. Scholars of educational organizations have tended to resist the idea that we can measure key characteristics of teachers’ work life, such as PLCs using survey data (Lee & Kim, this issue). A variety of research designs such as case study, ethnography, survey, and document analysis employed in the studies presented in this special issue demonstrated the strength of multiple perspectives enabled by various, rigorous research designs. The PLCs research area has been criticized by some researchers as having limited empirical evidence or quantitative analyses. We argue that both qualitative and quantitative approaches are valid in empirical studies. Varied and creative methodologies employed in the research area of PLCs will contribute to the knowledge development and comprehensive understandings of the phenomena under study.

Thirdly, the majority of the authors in this special issue are established researchers on PLCs in their respective contexts (e.g., Chen & Wang, 2015; Hairon & Dimmock, 2012; Hipp & Huffman, 2010; Huffman et al., 2015; Pang & Leung, 2016; Wang, 2015; Zhang & Pang, 2016). They examine leadership, learning, and teaching for sustainable school effectiveness and improvement through the lens of PLCs in six different education systems. This collection of seven articles explores the key features and practices of PLCs in multiple educational systems, and provides a platform for an exchange of different perspectives and professional dialogue. These articles offer alternative possibilities of theorizing PLCs across different socio-cultural contexts. Existing literature suggests a linkage between the practices of PLCs and school effectiveness and improvement in the English-speaking world. This special issue provides more evidence to determine such a linkage through empirical educational research in a wider range of cultural and educational contexts.

Fourthly, we recognize and acknowledge the value positions held by the researchers from a wide range of social contexts and value their diversified perspectives brought to this special issue. Axiology refers the theory of values that inform how we see the world and the value judgements we make within our research. Social phenomena occur in the real world, where moral, political, and cultural values are an integral but often unseen part of the social landscape. The specific social, cultural, personal, and moral milieus of the social phenomena we study are inextricably entwined in those social phenomena. Therefore, being value free is impossible. Rather, understanding our own axiology and recognizing that values are implicitly, at least, embedded in all research allows us to read our own research and that of others with an eye to the values informing it (Walter, 2010, pp. 15–16). In this special issue, the analyses offered by the researchers in their specific cultural context and education system make valuable contributions to intercultural dialogue on enhancing teaching quality and school improvement across the globe. Their insights will contribute to the existing literature and enrich nuanced and contextualized understandings and critical analyses of the PLCs. Their insights also provide implications for policy makers and educators. Explicitly acknowledging the influence of values and cultural contexts on conducting the research, the special issue highlights the validity and legitimacy of knowledge claims developed from multiple cultural contexts and traditions.

PLC practices in diverse education contexts

The papers in this special issue on the practices of PLCs from global and critical perspectives offer a number of useful insights into addressing similarities and diversities across a number of theoretical and practical issues. While there may be variations of conceptualization of PLCs and differences of PLC practices in diversified educational contexts, a closer examination reveals in many cases some fundamental similarities. The school-based PLCs have significantly impacted these educational systems. This collection of research papers provides critical and illuminating accounts of professional learning community practices in different socio-cultural contexts, such as Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, and the United States.

China has a long history since the 1950s of enhancing teachers’ professional competency and teaching skills through collaboration in school-based contexts (Paine & Fang, 2006). The opening article by Ting Wang sets the stage. Wang employed a qualitative case study approach to examine how professional learning community was understood in the Chinese school context and what types of leadership contributed to developing the embedded PLC process within a school. Utilizing data collected from 20 interviews, Wang explored the experiences of principals and teachers in two high achieving senior high schools in Northeast China. Wang identifies and elaborates on a structured, school-based, and research-oriented professional learning system in these two schools. Organizational structures such as timetabled sessions, infrastructure, and resources have been implemented to support teacher professional learning. Two schools under study have had a long history of teacher collaboration in Teaching and Research Groups. All teachers participated in school-based communities of professional learning. While the term professional learning community was not commonplace, the actual practices of PLC characterized by collective enquiry and collaborative learning became the norm in the two schools. Institutionalized collaborative teams were perceived to be effective in facilitating structured collaborations as well as spontaneous conversations among teachers. School leaders demonstrated strong instructional leadership and visionary stewardship for school continuous improvement. They played a critical role in developing and communicating a shared vision, shaping a culture of trust, supporting and monitoring collegial learning. Principals utilized a facilitative rather than a coercive surveillance approach to monitoring teaching and learning. Teacher leadership was evident in collaborative teams and expertise leadership was acknowledged. Emotional bonds and shared responsibility in these teams strengthened professionalism. A comparison of the PLC practices in two schools revealed remarkable similarities in their systematic approach. Concerted efforts were made to create aligned structures and processes that support collective enquiry, and to develop a culture of collaborative learning that builds collective capacities. Ultimately, Wang argues that developing and sustaining the embedded PLC process within a school seems to provide a promising infrastructure for supporting school improvement in the Chinese school context.

While Wang chose to focus on two successful secondary schools in a provincial city in Northeast China, Zhang and Pang present a study involving teachers and schools from both rich and less developed regions in China. Given the regional disparity and the fact that China has the largest education system in the world, Zhang and Pang present a quantitative study which investigated the key features of PLCs in schools located in two distinctive Chinese cities, namely, Shanghai and Mianyang. Shanghai ranked No. 1 in the 2009 and 2012 PISA test and is a leading education system in China, while Mianyang is a less developed city located in Southwest China. Based on the literature review and an analysis of the Chinese context, the authors developed a questionnaire to explore and compare the PLC practices of schools in the two cities. Teacher surveys were administered in 13 schools. Principal axis factoring (PAF) with oblique rotation and T-test were used in analysing the data. Zhang and Pang argue that the practices of PLCs in Chinese schools under study are characterized by collaborative learning, professional competency, facilitative leadership, structural support, and organizational barriers. These are largely shaped by the historical, institutional, and cultural factors within the Chinese context. They noticed that teachers of Mianyang perceived their schools having better development of PLCs in terms of collaborative learning and facilitative leadership, compared with their counterparts in Shanghai. They explained that it may be due to the fact that the teachers in Mianyang schools had lower expectations and standards in their perceptions and thus would rate the items with higher scores. Such differences could also be attributed to the regional, economic, social, and cultural disparities between the two cities. This study demonstrates context specificity of PLCs at the regional level.

Hong Kong as a Special Administrative Region of China has unique cultural and historical features. It has Chinese traditions as well as western influences. Hong Kong has an education system distinctive from mainland China. Pang, Wang, and Leung’s article continues this line of enquiry by seeking to understand the key characteristics of PLCs in a particular context. They present a quantitative study which investigated the practices and processes of PLCs within 10 Hong Kong primary schools. They explored the characteristics of PLCs, and identify schools which had strong PLCs according to their hypothetical framework. They investigated the profiles of the strengths of professional learning community in schools. This study sought to formulate a quantitative perspective to compare and validate PLC variables across schools in Hong Kong. The authors developed the Professional Learning Community Questionnaire (PLCQ) for Hong Kong schools to assess the PLC practices in six different areas: leadership for teacher learning, collaborative learning capacity, student-focused orientation, a culture of sharing, mutual understanding and support, and continuous professional development. A composite construct, the Professional Learning Community Index (PLCI) expressed in quantitative terms was utilized to assess the strength of PLC in a school. Within the schools which were identified as strong professional learning communities, both the school leaders and teachers had strong emphases on the six subscales of the PLC practices. The school leaders established strong supportive infrastructures for professional learning. Their strong leadership focused on teacher learning and nurtured a strong culture of sharing. Teachers generally had high capabilities of collaborative learning and developed a strong sense of focus on student needs. Pang, Wang, and Leung argue that the PLC practices as evidenced in Hong Kong schools appeared to have some unique features. These could be explained by the influence of organizational, societal, and cultural factors in the Hong Kong context.

Along the line of context specificity and exploring essential features of PLCs in diverse educational contexts, the article by Chen, Lee, Lin, and Zhang explored the key factors of developing effective professional learning communities within the Taiwanese context. Four constructs – supportive and shared leadership, shared visions, collegial trust, and shared practices – were adopted and developed into an instrument for measuring PLC function. Using confirmative factor analysis, the four factors in the conception of PLCs were confirmed. The findings show that these four factors were essential to the formation and sustainability of PLCs in Taiwan’s schools. The factor of collegial trust relationships among teachers was the most important PLC factor. Supportive and shared leadership and shared visions, via the path of collegial trust, influence the shared practices of teachers. The results of the structural equation modelling indicated that a collegial trust relationship was strongly and directly related to shared practices, and was an important mediating factor between supportive and shared leadership, shared visions, and shared practices. Other studies on PLCs in China and Singapore in this special issue suggest that strong leadership, organizational structure, and systemic monitoring are required to assist schools in developing PLCs with a clear focus on student learning. Interestingly, administrative leadership was not perceived as a strong factor in this Taiwanese PLC model. The authors argue that supportive leadership and shared vision could influence teacher initiative and collaboration through interdependence and trust-building of school members. It may be possible that the weak correlation to supportive leadership is a result of self-selection by teachers to participate in PLCs. This study suggests that further exploration could lead to a better understanding of the interplay between school leadership and teacher leadership in relation to the PLC practices, or uncover alternative functions of monitoring teaching and learning in the Taiwanese school context.

Over the last decade, school-based professional learning communities have emerged as a key feature of the education system in South Korea. Lee and Kim’s study explored the emerging landscape of school-based professional learning communities in South Korean schools. To understand this relatively new phenomenon in the context of South Korea, they present a review of research on school-based PLCs in South Korea and an empirical analysis of the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) 2008 with a particular focus on school-based PLCs. The study explores what constitutes school-based PLCs in South Korean schools and how they are similar to and/or different from their counterparts in other countries. Despite certain variations in terms of measuring school-based PLCs, PLCs in the context of South Korean schools has the following components: shared visions, values, norms, and responsibilities; focus on student learning with academic support; professional learning from various collaborative activities. The five components of PLCs in the TALIS resonate with the major literature of PLCs in Western education contexts: shared vision, focus on learning, reflection, de-privatization of practice, and collaborative activities. Teachers in South Korea showed the highest extent of involvement in three components of school-based PLCs: Shared vision, De-privatized Practice, and Collaborative Teaching (joint teaching). The level (i.e., frequency) of South Korean teachers’ involvement in their school-based PLCs in three components was significantly higher than those of teachers in other countries. The authors argue that educators and policy makers need to consider the ways of enhancing the authenticity and quality of teachers’ involvement in their school-based PLCs, rather than just increasing the frequency of the involvement, shaped by formalized school practices and externally-imposed regulatory policies. Thus, creating working conditions which help teachers be involved in their school-based PLCs will be more effective for promoting school-based PLCs in South Korea. Lee and Kim’s study is in line with the argument in this special issue that teachers’ practices of professional learning, commonly conceptualized as school-based PLCs, may have variations across different countries. This poses us an analytical challenge for cross-national or cross-cultural studies of teachers’ practices such as PLCs.

Professional Learning Community (PLC) has now received an official status in Singapore education. The growing importance of PLCs lies in its potential to act as a lever for school-based curriculum development and innovation so as to provide diverse learning experiences to satisfy broader learning outcomes beyond academic achievements. Salleh Hairon’s study explored facilitation for professional learning community conversations in the Singapore school context and sought to build a proposed PLC facilitation framework. Hairon describes key findings drawn from participant observations with three Grade 5 PLC facilitators’ involvement in an intervention to explore how PLC facilitators can support teachers’ collective learning on matters of teaching and learning. The growth in PLCs implies greater time investment for teachers to come together to develop new curricula that engage students to meet these broadened set of learning outcomes. However, this also implies that new competencies need to be acquired to productively participate in PLCs. One essential competency is facilitating PLC conversations. The study drew from the ethnographic case study approach. The data collection and analysis were drawn mainly from participant observations of three Grade 5 Professional Learning Teams (PLTs) each from mainstream public primary schools in Singapore. The findings from the study served to aid in generating a proposed intervention framework consisting of processes, principles, and practices that facilitators can use in PLC conversations. This study has highlighted the crucial role of conversations in PLCs and facilitation in PLC conversations to bring about collegial, collaborative, and learning relationships in the course of impacting teachers’ teaching and students’ learning. Although conversations are a naturally occurring phenomenon in PLCs, it cannot be left to chance. Hairon argues that this proposed PLC facilitation framework can be used for the development of PLC facilitators. The penultimate aim of which is to not only support the development and maintenance of PLCs, but also ensure that the learning that takes place in PLCs is translated to classroom teaching practices, and thus ensuring the sustainability of PLCs.

As school communities begin to learn about building the strong professional learning community process, more schools in the United States are choosing to organize their reform efforts around this effort. Olivier and Huffman’s article focused on Professional Learning Community Process in the United States, more specifically, on the conceptualization of the process and district support for schools. The study showcased two high performing school systems in Louisiana and Texas, both embedding the PLC process within their district culture. Each district addressed challenges in the transition process by involving staff from all professional levels. The success of these districts was supported by intentional purpose for incorporating the PLC process, and maintaining a district level focus on high quality teacher and student performance. Olivier and Huffman found that as the PLC process becomes embedded within schools, the level of district support has a direct impact on whether schools have the ability to re-culture and sustain highly effective collaborative practices. Their PLC conceptual model is organized around five dimensions: shared and supportive leadership, shared values and vision, collaborative learning and application, shared personal practice, and supportive conditions. The overarching question guiding this qualitative research study is: How do school district personnel (central office staff) support schools in the professional learning community process? A total of 21 interviews were conducted with school level administrators, teacher leaders, and central office staff from districts in Louisiana and Texas. Findings reveal the importance of transformative and proactive district involvement, and the use of transparency, trust, accountability, and autonomy in school re-culturing. It was also found that developing leadership capacity, embedding professional development, and focusing the culture on student success were critically important. As districts provide support for the PLC dimensions and themes, school leaders will have a foundation of curricular strategies, collaborative skills, and necessary resources to serve teachers and students through continuous school improvement. This study highlights the necessity and benefits of district level support in the initiation, implementation, and sustainability of the PLC process within schools.

Conclusion

The article is concluded with Confucius’ saying “Learning without thought is labour lost; thought without learning is perilous”. The multiple perspectives presented in this special issue will enrich our learning and thinking about effective approaches of collectively tackling the global educational challenges. This collection of articles discusses distinctive features of the PLC concept, practices, and processes in diverse educational contexts, particularly in the East Asian educational systems. The special issue, which is supported by researchers from six different educational systems, has the potential to make significant contributions to existing literature and future research of PLCs. Firstly, a collection of seven research papers offers an opportunity to investigate the commonalities and differences of practising PLCs in multiple contexts from a cross-cultural, comparative perspective. Through the investigation of PLC practices, these articles have collectively explored the very meaning of school effectiveness, school improvement, and school transformation in different contexts and paradigms. The analyses presented in these articles will expand our understandings about the dynamics and complexity of teacher professional learning and school leadership for effective teaching and learning in different socio-cultural contexts.

Secondly, this special issue raises important questions regarding new possibilities for theorizing and practising PLCs across different educational systems. It will enhance our ways of thinking in coping with challenges arising from global changes. These articles will provide theoretical and practical insights for policy makers, educational researchers and practitioners who have passion for increasing the quality of education, teacher professional learning, and community of practice in a changing world.

Last but not least, this special issue will contribute to knowledge development and fill in the gap identified in the literature on the non-Anglo-American perspectives of PLCs. Six out of seven empirical studies focus on PLCs in the Asian contexts. These empirical research studies investigate key factors that determine effective practices of professional learning communities in different social cultural and school contexts, and shed light on educational reforms and policies that aim at school continuous improvement. These articles will provide valuable insights for policy makers and educators in the Asia-Pacific region and elsewhere to deal with critical questions about the improvement of teaching and learning and school improvement in a globalizing world.

Funding

The work described in this paper was supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China [RGC Ref. No. CUHK 14408814].

Nicholas Sun-Keung Pang
Department of Educational Administration and Policy, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong
[email protected]
Ting Wang
Faculty of Education, Science, Technology and Maths, University of Canberra, ACT , Australia