ENG-1997 — Page 188

EDUCATION

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The Task Force on Benchmarking formed under ACTEQ in response to the recommendation of the Education Commission Report No. 6 has also completed the first phase of its work to develop tentative benchmarks for English-language teachers. in lower secondary forms, and Putonghua teachers as well as teachers using Chinese as the medium of instruction in primary schools. A pilot exercise involving the assessment of 1 150 teachers in language examinations and classroom observations will be conducted in 1997-98 to finalise the benchmarks and establish suitable exemption criteria. Plans are being made to implement the language benchmarks for new teachers starting the year 2000. Serving teachers will be offered ample retraining opportunities so they can reach the benchmarks within a prescribed period.

University Grants Committee

The University Grants Committee (UGC) is appointed by the HKSAR Chief Executive to advise on the development and funding of higher education and administer public grants to eight publicly-funded institutions. It comprises 11 non- local academics, four local academics and four local professionals and businessmen. Its secretariat is staffed by civil servants.

When the UGC was established in 1965 to administer grants to two publicly funded tertiary institutions, there were only 4 100 full-time equivalent students. With the addition of the Hong Kong Institute of Education (HKÏEd) in 1996–97, the number of UGC-funded institutions increased to eight and the number of full-time equivalent students increased to 69 516 (see tertiary education).

The UGC published a report on the review on the development of higher education in Hong Kong in November 1996. The UGC's recommendations include the overall student numbers at different levels during a period of consolidation in growth, the number of non-local students, the funding of continuing education, the provision of student hostels, the normative length of undergraduate study, language proficiency and the target of reducing student unit costs by 10 per cent by the end of the 1998-2001 triennium without detriment to quality, while further improving standards and meeting the changing needs of Hong Kong. The government accepted most of the recommendations in the review, except on the number of taught post-graduate places. To reduce student unit costs, the government agreed that half of the annual savings should be ploughed back into tertiary education for meeting new expenditure requirements and to encourage special developments, including areas of excellence.

The UGC plays a major role in monitoring quality assurance in its institutions. In order to ensure that mechanisms for promoting and improving the quality of teaching and learning in the institutions are operating properly, the committee has undertaken a first series of Teaching and Learning Quality Process Reviews (TLQPR) of its institutions between January 1996 and April 1997, and is planning to undertake Management Reviews of the institutions starting in early 1998.

The UGC also conducted a second Research Assessment Exercise in November 1996, which aimed at assessing the research output performance of the UGC-funded institutions (except the HKIEd, which joined the UGC in December 1996). The findings will be used as the basis for allocating some of the research portion of the institutional recurrent grant for the 1998-2001 triennium.

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