A New Era Begins 1975-78

graduates teachers, in either the one-year full-time Day Course or the two-year part-time Evening Course. It was realized that many teachers would like to attend the part-time Evening Course but could not spare three evenings a week on campus to do so. It was found that in March 1975, when the number of graduate teachers in local secondary schools was 6,230, only 1,706 (or 27.4%) of them had received professional training. Thus a two-year part-time Day Course was introduced in 1976-77. As shown in the table below, the community response to this programme was enthusiastic. \Course Year \ One-year Full-time DAY Course Two-year Part-time EVENING Course Two-year Part-time DAY Course Total Full-time Equivalent (2 part- time =1 full-time) 1st 2nd Year Year 1st 2nd Year Year 1974/75 50 122 77 - - 249 1491/2 1975/76 35 87 155 — — 237 136 1976/77 71 88 83 86 — 328 1991/2 1977/78 101 103 84 101 79 468 2841/2 It must be pointed out that less than one third of the applicants were admitted to the three courses for Diploma in Education. To meet the challenge of the Government plan for expansion in secondary school education, an increase in outlay for such courses would be necessary. Research in Public Education Another important public service is the research in elementary and secondary education in Hong Kong conducted by Faculty members of the School of Education. During 1975/76 and 1976/77, 9 and 11 research projects were carried out respectively. Among the projects still in progress are "The Relative Effectiveness of Chinese and English as Media of Instruction i n Secondary School Learning", "The Teaching of Mathematics i n Secondary Schools", and " A Retrospective Study of the Impact of a Foreign Sojourn". In March 1977, the School organized a full-day on-campus Conference on Recent Developments in Education, which was attended by 440 educators, mostly secondary school teachers. The proceedings of this Conference were published in the new Educational Journal which replaced the former Studium. LIBA Public service to the business sector of Hong Kong is provided largely by the Lingnan Institute of Business Administration. The Institute was established in 1966 as one division of the Graduate School w i th generous donations from the Lingnan University Board of Trustees in New York. 73