Not quite there yet

I was looking for interesting news on the ESF website. The news section has this:

ESF News - October 2006

Developments in Chinese provision
We have now completed benchmarking of our Year 10 students. Over 70% are second language learners of Chinese and about 15% demonstrate near first language competence as defined by the IB curriculum framework. Read more

We have started writing our new Primary Chinese curriculum. This will be ready for the Primary Chinese Pilot Project which begins in January. We are currently defining the expected outcomes of the curriculum. Read more

Guess what? The links take you to the CLC* where you get a message saying that the downloads either don't exist or you're not allowed to read them. This website needs more work, methinks (it's most likely a problem with the CLC, but someone ought to check that the links work).

The Primary Chinese Pilot Project is actually quite an interesting initiative, so I'd like to write about it, but maybe another time.

* CLC = Connected Learning Community (the ESF's Intranet). Parents will be getting their own logon id's real soon now.

Still on schedule

From this week's Education Post (ESF closing on last hurdle):

The English Schools Foundation is set to overcome one of the last hurdles in changing its governance structure, with its new ordinance due to be gazetted around Christmas.

Chief executive Heather Du Quesnay said the ESF had secured a member to propose the ordinance, which includes substantial changes to the governance of the ESF, as a private member's bill. The identity of the member will be revealed when the bill is gazetted.

This week, at what is expected to be the ESF's last annual general meeting, Ms Du Quesnay said the ESF had received a legal draftsman's certificate that acknowledged the bill complied with legislation.

Ms Du Quesnay said she had met with a number of leading members of Legco, along with ESF chairwoman Felice Lieh Mak and "as far as we know people are favourably disposed" to the proposed changes.

"All of the conversations were very constructive. I think we were able to reassure them that the changes to the ordinance would meet all the concerns of the Public Accounts Committee," she said.

In June, ESF members voted in favour of draft amendments to the ESF ordinance that will replace the 133-member body with a 26-member board of governors.

The revisions provide the framework for wide-reaching reforms of governance and management. They address criticisms from the Director of Audit, the Legislative Council's Public Accounts Committee and Education Minister Arthur Li Kwok-cheung.

They will also set the stage for negotiations over the future of the ESF's public funding.

So it seems that it's still on schedule. Then we just have to hope that the negotiations on the subvention will be as straightforward as expected.

ESF unifies enrolments in line with ICAC advice

Still on the ICAC report, I see that The Standard has a different angle on the story (ESF unifies enrolments in line with ICAC advice):

The English Schools Foundation - known for being the largest provider of English-language education in Hong Kong - has reformed its process for student admissions, unifying enrolment for its 20 schools scattered across the territory.

The reforms in student admissions highlight one of 84 recommendations by the Independent Commission Against Corruption after 2 years of probing into the foundation's system of governance to eliminate possible loopholes for corruption.

According to ESF chief executive Heather Du Quesnay, the foundation, which had previously utilized a three-category system for applicants - students speaking English as first language, as second language and those speaking Cantonese and English - began placing students into two groups in September, which has simplified the process and eliminated all gray areas.

The two groups consist of native speakers who cannot access the local system at all and those who are able to enroll at local schools but would also benefit from English education.

"We have improved the admissions criteria to provide a clearer perspective for parents wishing to enroll their children in ESF schools," Du Quesnay said, adding that in previous years, employees of ESF had been approached by family members requesting help for their children in receiving placements at its schools.

"We wanted to be consistent and completely fair in handling student admissions," she said, insisting that guidelines for a standardized evaluation system will soon be in place to unify the foundation's 20 schools.

Schools in various geographical locations inevitably enforced different criteria for admission due to language diversity. "In the past, the admissions process varied in places such as Kowloon and The Peak," she said, noting that the prevalence of a greater English-speaking population would impose different criteria than those where very few Westerners resided.

ICAC lays down guidelines for the ESF

From today's Education Post, ICAC lays down guidelines for the ESF:

The Independent Commission Against Corruption has made more than 80 recommendations to ensure the English Schools Foundation avoids the type of conflict of interest that sparked uproar three years ago.

Carmel Chow Jun-lung, group head of the corruption prevention department, said the ICAC had not uncovered corruption but had identified many loose practices. These included inadequate guidelines for staff in their day-to-day work, existing guidelines occasionally not being followed and conflict of interest situations. The ESF had accepted all 84 recommendations and already implemented 60 per cent of them, he said. The remainder should be in place by the middle of next year.

Recommendations on conflicts of interest should prevent a member of a staff selection panel seeking the appointment himself half way through the process, Mr Chow said. This happened when former parent-teacher association chairman Mike Haynes applied for the post of chief executive.

"Everyone was aware that was not quite proper," Mr Chan said. He would not comment on how this could happen when John Shanahan, an ICAC chief investigator, was on the selection panel as the ESF's vice-chairman at the time.

For anyone who has forgotten, Mike Haynes was a member of the committee that was set up to find a new ESF Chief Executive. Then he decided to apply for the job himself, and he was chosen by the committee of which he had previously been a member. This was put to a vote of the full Foundation and defeated, following which the ESF chairman (Jal Shroff), vice-chairman (John Shanahan) and treasurer (Simon Glass) all resigned.

Comment: This sad episode is probably a prime example of what used to be wrong with the ESF. As I recall, at one stage it seemed that Mike Haynes's appointment was a "done deal", but a group of parents led by Christine Houston created a big fuss about it and persuaded enough members of the Foundation to vote against it. What I found hard to understand was why the ESF executive didn't realize that appointing someone in that way - especially someone without any relevant experience - could possibly be acceptable.

Thankfully, things have changed a great deal in the last few years.