Chapter 9: Management of Schools and Tertiary Institutions

Under the Hong Kong education system, each school has a school management committee (SMC). The SMC is responsible for ensuring that the school is managed satisfactorily and that the education of the pupils is properly promoted. The Government has been promoting school-based management since 1991. The underlying principles of school-based management are to provide schools with enhanced flexibility and autonomy in managing their own operations and resources according to the needs of their students and, at the same time, to increase schools' transparency and accountability in their decision-making process and the use of public funds by providing for a participatory decision-making mechanism where all key stakeholders are involved.

With several years of actual experience, and as more and more responsibilities are devolved to schools in the use of public funds, the Government considers that the time is ripe to set out a more clearly defined institutional framework for school-based management, and to apply school-based management on a wider scale. To this end, the Education Department set up an Advisory Committee on School-based Management (ACSBM) in 1998 to advise the Director of Education on the further implementation of school-based management. Following a two-month public consultation, the ACSBM has made its recommendations to the Director on the school-based management governance framework. A bill on this was being prepared to provide legal backing to the recommendations.

Each tertiary institution has its own structure of governance, set out in its ordinance. The structure includes a governing body (called the council or the court), a body to regulate academic affairs (called the senate or the academic board) and, in some cases, an executive body.

The Chief Executive of the HKSAR, in his capacity as Chancellor of the universities, is empowered by the ordinances to appoint the chairman of each governing body, as well as a prescribed number of members. This ensures a balanced distribution of members from the industrial, commercial and academic fields.

To give impetus to the school improvement process, since September 1997 the Government has been conducting quality assurance inspections using a whole-school approach instead of a subject-based approach. The inspections focus on four domains, namely, management and organisation, teaching and learning, school ethos and support for students, as well as attainment and achievement. The inspections aim to provide the inspected schools with an external view on their strengths and areas for improvement and further development; the Government with information for disseminating good practices among schools; and the Government and the public with information on the current position regarding the overall quality of school education.

In the past four school years, 163 schools underwent quality assurance inspection. Performance indicators were developed to provide a basis for assessing schools' performance in schools' self-evaluation and inspections. Existing performance indicators used in the inspections are being refined and new ones are being developed. In the 2001-02 school year, some 70 schools will be covered. To enhance schools' capability for sustained self-improvement after inspection, the Government will strengthen the post-inspection professional support to schools from the 2001-02 school year. Through partnership with schools, the service aims to help schools improve in areas identified in the inspection process.