The Hong Kong Quality Education Fund (QEF) Secretariat has commenced a series of training sessions for schools on the preparation of project proposals using a new evaluation methodology.
Professor Patrick Griffin from the Melbourne University Private (MUP), Australia, who undertook a consultancy study for the QEF earlier this year, conducted four half-day training sessions Friday and Saturday.
The training sessions, hosted by the QEF Secretariat for the first time, targets more than 1,000 school principals, vice-principals and subject panel chairs of secondary, primary, pre-primary and special schools in Hong Kong.
"The QEF introduces the new methodology to evaluate and monitor projects as part of the overall strategy to enhance the quality of its projects and their dissemination potential," a spokesman for QEF Secretariat said.
"Under the new approach, the impact of a project must be clearly set out and quantified at the application stage and the appropriate indicators and approaches to measurement of the impact must be given," the spokesman said.
"The QEF is seeking to introduce a culture where the applicants take ownership of ensuring the quality of their projects by self-evaluating their projects during the implementation stage, in addition to the usual end-of-project evaluation," he said.
Since its establishment in 1998, the QEF has sponsored 2.8 billion HK dollars (US$359 million) for over 4,600 projects.
(Xinhua News Agency December 2, 2002)