TNAG-1073-FCO40-1323-Policy-of-the-Government-of-Hong-Kong-on-education-including-1981 — Page 256

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relationships between management committees and teachers. To this end

steps are being taken to strengthen channels of communication between

school staff, management and the Education Department, and to develop

systems by which teachers' views can be effectively communicated to the

school management. Training programmes are also being introduced for

senior school staff in management and administration.

3.22

The status and functions of the codes of aid in relation to the

Education Ordinance are now being reviewed by the Department with the aim

of ensuring an unambiguous and uniform standard of enforcement. The

review is being undertaken in consultation with sponsoring bodies and

schools councils but the ambit of the codes of aid is so comprehensive,

the subject-matter so complex and the views held by different bodies on

points of detail so diverse that the review is not likely to be completed

in the near future. One of the aims of the review is to define more

clearly the roles and functions of the school supervisor, members of the

management committee, school principal and teachers. At present there

are two codes of aid (primary and secondary) for ordinary schools and

two (also primary and secondary) for special schools and special classes.

The feasibility of unifying the latter two codes is now being explored

since in special education the categorisation of children (especially

mentally handicapped children) as "primary" or "secondary" is in many

cases meaningless; it can also result in frustrating administrative

complexity and uneven standards of provision in those special schools

which cater as single administrative units for a wide age range (in some

cases from kindergarten to Form V).

3.23 A particular feature of the system is that the terms "sponsor"

and "sponsoring body" appear in neither the Ordinance nor the codes of

aid, both of which charge the management committees of schools with

numerous legal and administrative obligations, especially with regard