Career concerns and needs of mainland Chinese Master’s students in Hong Kong

ABSTRACT

This study explores the career concerns that confront mainland Chinese Master’s students in Hong Kong, and identifies their needs for career support. Forty mainland Chinese students from a wide range of Master’s programmes participated in semi-structured interviews, after which the qualitative data were subjected to phenomenological analysis. The results showed that most interviewees were uncertain about their career paths. The study contributes to the literature by applying the systems theory framework of career development to organize the various factors that give rise to career concerns into three systems: a) individual, b) social and c) environmental-societal. Four key aspects of the students’ career support needs at the institutional level were also identified: information channels, relational networks, technical skills and practical experience. Based on the findings, we discuss the theoretical and practical implications for understanding the career concerns and meeting the needs of Master’s students.

KEYWORDS:

• Master’s education
• career concerns
• career planning
• career support
• Chinese students
• Hong Kong

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the reviewers for their valuable comments and all of the research participants

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the University of Hong Kong under Seed Fund for Basic Research [201601159020].

Notes on contributors

Xiaoshi Li

Xiaoshi Li is a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong. He has worked as a consultant in international education. His major research interests lie in the area of higher education internationalization, master’s education, graduate employability and university-to-work transition.

Jisun Jung

Jisun Jung is an assistant professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Hong Kong since 2015. She obtained her PhD in Education at Seoul National University, South Korea in 2011 and worked as a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Hong Kong. Her current research focuses on academic profession, doctoral education, master’s education and employment. She is a co-editor of Higher Education Research & Development.