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EDUCATION
co-ordinator posts will be provided to schools in the 2000-01 school year. Furthermore, contract technical support service is being provided to all public sector schools.
On a day-to-day basis, the Education Department conducts school visits to offer on-site help and advice on issues related to IT in education. Seminars and workshops are organised to disseminate good practices and to facilitate experience sharing. Education software is being developed to assist IT-facilitated teaching and learning activities.
Medium of Instruction
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The Government's language in education policy is to enable students to be biliterate (to master written Chinese and English) and trilingual (to speak fluent Cantonese, Putonghua and English). In this context, it is recognised world-wide that students learn better in their mother tongue. Since the 1980s, the Government has promoted mother-tongue teaching while strengthening support for English language learning. Chinese is the medium of instruction in the vast majority of primary schools, with English taught as a core subject from Primary 1.
From the 1998-99 school year onwards, Chinese has been adopted as the medium. of instruction (except the subject of English Language) in about 300 secondary schools, starting with the Secondary 1 intake in the 1998-99 school year and progressing each year to a higher level of secondary education. Schools satisfying the requirements in terms of student ability, teacher capability and language learning support strategies and programmes were allowed to teach in English. About 110 schools use English as the medium of instruction.
Heavy emphasis continued to be given to the teaching of English in all schools. Secondary schools teaching in Chinese were provided with additional support: an average of two additional English Language teachers for each school, the choice of an additional native-speaking English teacher, a one-off grant for employing clerical staff and purchasing equipment and additional recurrent grants for equipment and library books.
Quality Education Fund
Pursuant to a recommendation in the Education Commission Report No. 7 (ECR7), the Quality Education Fund (QEF) was formally established on January 2, 1998, with an allocation of $5 billion. It provides an efficient channel to finance school-based projects for the promotion of quality school education in Hong Kong. Projects mainly fall within the categories of effective learning; all-round education; school- based management; and education research,
The QEF Steering Committee considers all applications, then makes recommendations to the Government on the award of grants and advises on the policies and procedures regarding the operation of the QEF. In all, 4 527 applications were received in the first two calls for applications. Of these, 1 140 were approved, involving grants totalling $585 million. The third call for applications was announced in October and more than 3 200 applications were received.
Dissemination of the good practices and experience resulting from funded projects across the school sector is also a prime objective of the QEF. The activities organised