Teacher education in a postcolonial Hong Kong: Forms, drivers, influences

With the unique character of Hong Kong in a postcolonial context, where eastern philosophies and approaches meet those of the west, it could be presumed that it is an ideal system for generating innovative ideas and practices (Lu & Campbell 2021; Bautista et al. 2022). However, understanding the role, influence, and impact of teacher education as a career-long pursuit in Hong Kong remains both contested and under theorised (Bautista et al. 2022). While Hong Kong enjoys a complex and sophisticated teacher education infrastructure which includes a range of opportunities and legislated time to dedicate to the varied forms of teacher education throughout a teachers’ career, such opportunities are frequently reported on as a being too demanding, rigid, or unrelated to practice (Lu & Campbell 2021; Pang et al. 2016). Drawing upon critical policy analysis and key informant interviews, the questions driving this study are:

• How are the forms and purposes of teacher education in Hong Kong understood in the domains of research, policy and practice?

• What is the role of the historical and contemporary socio-political context in understanding the effectiveness and future possibilities of teacher education in Hong Kong?

Drawing upon postcolonialism as an interdisciplinary political, theoretical and historical academic toolkit, this paper argues that colonial rule, and the aftermath of it, paved the way for international influence in education in Hong Kong, with significant implications for how the purposes and underpinning values of education are understood, and how this is reflected in teacher education. With this arises tensions in the extent to which this does, could, and should reflect the complex and unique character of Hong Kong (Lu & Campbell 2021; Bautista et al. 2022).

This paper illuminates the complex and wide-ranging expertise that teachers develop and draw upon in and through their practice, and how new forms of teacher education in a complex socio-political context might support this. Through the development of more varied forms of teacher education in Hong Kong, focused on making sense of the complex influences and drivers of the varied forms teacher learning and education can take, more relevant forms of teacher education may be able to emerge and be sustained through formal and informal means (Ho & Lu 2019). In the policy context, further critical analysis of how teachers are positioned in the system, how this relates to the forms and purposes of teacher education, and whether or not this relates to shifting demands placed upon teachers and schools, is needed (Lu & Campbell 2021). Consideration is also needed of the means through which various groups with a stake in teacher education in Hong Kong are able to come together in order to build a more sophisticated understanding of the varied and emerging professional learning needs of teachers, and how this can and should influence the development of teacher education in the SAR. Copyright © 2024 ICSEI.