The project investigates the expectations and experiences of home-school relations amongst different groups of EMS in Hong Kong schools.

This project responds to the need for research into how to address the educational challenges confronting ethnic minority students (EMS) in Hong Kong, defined as “people from non-Chinese ethnicities” (Census and Statistics Department, 2017). It has been argued that developing the cultural intelligence of Hong Kong teachers should be a priority of teacher education and that teachers must learn to recognize diversity across multiple sites, including classrooms, homes and the community. To address this need, there have been calls for initiatives that build connections between EMS, their families and Hong Kong schools. This project responds to that need. The project investigates the expectations and experiences of home-school relations amongst different groups of EMS in Hong Kong schools. Using in-depth interviews, the project comprises three case study schools that have been identified as enrolling significant numbers of EMS. It aims to explore the needs and wants of different stakeholders - EMS, their parents/ guardians and their teachers – about home-school relations. Using in-depth interviews, data gathered from stakeholders will be used to design tailor-made home-school partnerships that responds to the needs of wants of stakeholders within each of the case study schools. The findings of the study are expected to have implications for educational policy makers and school authorities who wish to establish partnerships between schools and the families of EMS in Hong Kong and other analogous settings worldwide. These results will also be of interest to educationalists involved in the design and delivery of in-service teacher professional development programmes that foster the cultural intelligence of school-based teachers. Finally, the findings will provide insights for teacher educators tasked with designing preservice teacher education programs that reduce prejudice and support anti-racist education.