{"id":642,"date":"2011-03-21T21:27:18","date_gmt":"2011-03-21T13:27:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/?p=642"},"modified":"2022-11-22T11:47:18","modified_gmt":"2022-11-22T03:47:18","slug":"dss_quality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/2011\/03\/dss_quality\/","title":{"rendered":"Weighing Cost and Quality"},"content":{"rendered":"

DSS schools receive subsidies and charge fees but are they good value for money?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reporters: Joana U Hoi Teng, Gavin Li\u00a0Chi Wai<\/strong><\/p>\n

The best primary school, the best secondary school and the best university – these are the things all parents want for their children. Since 1991, Hong Kong\u2019s parents have been able to choose from more than just government and aided schools for their children\u2019s education.<\/p>\n

The Direct Subsidy Scheme (DSS) was introduced in that year with the objective of promoting excellence and injecting diversity into the local school system through the development of a strong subsidized private school sector. The rationale was that this would give parents and children more choice.<\/p>\n

Schools in the scheme are given subsidies from the government for every child they enrol. But unlike government schools, they can also charge tuition fees and receive funding from other sources, such as donations.<\/p>\n

In return for the government funding, the schools are monitored by the Education Bureau (EDB). The Bureau is supposed to make sure the schools comply with stated admission requirements and agreements, conduct quality assurance, vet the schools\u2019 audited accounts and issue guidelines. Authorities will also carry out investigations if there are complaints against the schools.<\/p>\n

On the face of it, it seems this monitoring system is comprehensive. So, are DSS schools really better choices for parents?<\/p>\n

Lam Kin-wah\u2019s response is affirmative. \u201cBasically, the quality of DSS schools is undoubted,\u201d says the chairman of the Hong Kong Direct Subsidy Scheme Schools Council (DSSSC), who is also the principal of the Fukien Secondary School.<\/p>\n

Lam says DSS schools have more flexibility in their operations and curriculum and can offer higher quality education because of their extra resources. Using his own school as an example, he says it has offered both English as medium of instruction (EMI) and Chinese as medium of instruction (CMI) classes since early in 2000. Aided secondary schools just resumed EMI classes in 2009. If parents want their children to study in an EMI class, DSS schools would be a choice for them.<\/p>\n

Another advantage, says Lam, is that DSS schools carry out small-class teaching, whereas this policy has only been implemented in aided primary schools. \u201cYou can see that the class size of DSS schools is smaller than aided schools. That is why parents prefer DSS schools,\u201d Lam explains.<\/p>\n

This is borne out by Iris Wong Wai-ling, whose two children went to DSS schools. Wong says her children got more attention from their teachers because there were only around 30 students in their classes. \u201cYou can easily approach their class teachers and they will remember who your children are. They will not treat you as passersby,\u201d Wong says. She also believes DSS schools have the flexibility to recruit more teachers to improve their teaching quality.<\/p>\n

For Wong, a measure of the quality of DSS schools is their ability to recruit good students. \u201cI quite believe that input will affect output,\u201d Wong says. \u201cIf schools admit good students, it is unlikely that their performance will worsen in five years time.\u201d<\/p>\n

But not all parents are as positive about the quality of DSS schools as Wong is. Mrs. Cheung, whose son graduated from Logos Academy in Tsang Kwan O in 2009, was not satisfied with the school.<\/p>\n

Cheung, who refused to reveal her full name, paid $20,000 in tuition fees per year, an amount she found unreasonable. \u201cThe school charges such a big amount, but I think it is worse than other ordinary schools. I really do not know where the school fee goes,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n


\nCheung complains that the school did not put adequate resources into satisfying students\u2019 needs. She recalls that she once visited a classroom and wondered why it was so big. Then she discovered there were more than 50 students in one class for English.<\/p>\n

She is also critical of the school management. She says there was chaos within the school\u2019s administration that affected teaching quality. One group of teachers were responsible for administration and another for the actual teaching. The teaching syllabus was set by the administrative staff. However, Cheung says she got the impression there was no effective communication between the two groups. She says she had no idea which textbooks to buy until November because the school had not decided on which books to use before school started.<\/p>\n

More seriously, she says there was a high turnover rate of teachers at the school and students had to adapt to new teachers from time to time. \u201cWhat can you do if you get four new teachers in one term?\u201d Cheung asks (see below for the perspective from a source close to the school).<\/p>\n

Simon, not his real name, formerly taught at a DSS school and he confirms the high turnover of teachers in DSS schools is a problem. \u201cYou cannot say that DSS schools are the guarantee of quality when there is high outflow rate of teachers,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

He explains that many teachers at DSS schools are on one-year contracts, so they feel insecure about their jobs. Simon mentions a number of reasons why a teacher\u2019s contract might not be renewed, such as poor performance, being unsuitable for the school and \u201cunhappy incidents\u201d. The latter could refer to conflicts with students and parents.<\/p>\n

Parent Mrs. Cheung believes conflicts between teachers and parents and students in DSS schools arise because there is a tendency for some parents to see themselves as \u201ccustomers\u201d, who want teachers to \u201cplease\u201d them. She says these attitudes then affect their children and can lead to disrespect for teachers.<\/p>\n

Simon adds that whereas teachers in government and aided schools are given several months notice if their services are no longer required, those at his former school often found out at the last moment. He says a number of teachers received termination letters in late June. Once, there were just 15 teachers left at the end of a school year. This affects both teacher morale and the quality of teaching.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe newly recruited teachers have to adapt to the school gradually,\u201d he says. \u201cActually, students may already be used to the way of teaching of a particular teacher. When there is a sudden change, they have to adapt to the new teaching method.\u201d<\/p>\n

Simon criticized his former school for prioritising facilities over teachers and students in the attempt to get more students to choose the school. For example, the school spent almost HK$10 million on a multi-media room. \u201cIf the school has extra resources, it is good to perfect facilities. But both students and teachers are also important.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

DSS schools seem to be better than aided schools but there are also problems. Apart from Mrs. Cheung\u2019s and Simon\u2019s criticisms, the Audit Commission has also criticised the management of DSS schools in a report last year. Incidents of financial mismanagement and failure to set aside enough reserves for fee remission schemes were highlighted. Questions were asked about whether there were loopholes in the existing monitoring system for DSS schools.<\/p>\n

Hui Wai-tin, a former principal of a DSS school and the vice-chairman of Education Convergence, thinks the media has exaggerated the problems of DSS schools. \u201cSimilar problems have been found in aided schools,\u201d he says. Hui believes the problems in DSS schools are reported because they enjoy more resources and freedom.<\/p>\n

Hui thinks the core problem is that DSS schools get subsidies from the government but do not have clear accountability. He says the EDB had warned the problematic DSS schools about their practices before the release of the audit report. Some schools ignored the warnings because there are no clear standards to regulate DSS schools.<\/p>\n

As the audit report states, some DSS schools are receiving public funding although they have not signed a service agreement with the EDB. What is more, Hui points out that schools are asked to \u201crefer to\u201d rather than \u201cfollow\u201d the government guidelines for aided schools.<\/p>\n

Hui believes the EDB needs to solve this problem as soon as possible by clearly stating what DSS schools can and cannot do in their agreements. This would make for easier monitoring. But given the system is designed to give DSS schools greater freedom, the question for Hui is, \u201chow far should that freedom go?\u201d<\/p>\n

In the end, Hui believes, the most effective measure of a DSS school\u2019s quality is student enrolment, \u201cIf DSS schools do not perform well, they will have no students.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lam Kin-wah, the chairman of DSSSC agrees. \u201cDSS schools wish to be energetic and innovative. At the same time, they are conscious of crisis,\u201d he says. \u201cFewer students means less income. Eventually, badly operated schools will not be able to survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lam adds that the existing system for monitoring DSS schools was drawn up 10 years ago, so it is necessary to review and perfect the system in order to plug any loopholes. He also feels the EDB has been putting off dealing with problems rather than solving them immediately.<\/p>\n

Ultimately though, Lam believes the quality of DSS schools, \u201cshould be perfected by the schools themselves\u201d.<\/p>\n

In the wake of the audit report, the schools said the accusations levelled at them were unfair given unclear rules from the government, while the Secretary for Education, Michael Suen told legislators his bureau \u201clacked the teeth\u201d to stop some of the irregularities. The schools want the government to give them clearer guidelines, but they also claim they are in the best position to monitor their own quality. For the parents who are considering DSS schools for their children, and taxpayers who are contributing towards them, there is no clear answer as to who they can trust to guarantee the performance of DSS schools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
From <\/strong>Logos<\/strong> <\/strong>Academy<\/strong>\u2019s point of view<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
We asked Logos Academy to respond to Mrs. Cheung\u2019s criticisms; a source close to\u00a0 the\u00a0 school denied there were 50 students in one class for English, as the school does not have a classroom that can accommodate 50 students. The source also described the incident where parents did\u00a0 not know which textbooks to buy as an isolated incident. The source said the school was waiting for the arrival of a new teacher. The source added the turnover rate of teachers at the school is relatively low.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DSS schools get to receive government subsidies and charge students’ fees, so they have the resources to provide better facilities and teaching environment. Does this mean they are necessarily better?
\nBy Gavin Li and Joana U<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":804,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2002,68],"tags":[47,40],"class_list":["post-642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-issue-119","category-dissecting-dss","tag-education","tag-society"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=642"}],"version-history":[{"count":38,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":939,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642\/revisions\/939"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}