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My China Trip, Part XXVII

Bill Costello rides a roofless double-decker bus in Hong Kong.

My China Trip, Part XXVI

Bill Costello rides the Star Ferry in Hong Kong.

My China Trip, Part XXV

Bill Costello visits the Ruins of St. Paul’s in Macau.

My China Trip, Part XXIV

Bill Costello visits the Leal Senado in Macau.

My China Trip, Part XXIII

Bill Costello visits A-Ma Temple in Macau.

My China Trip, Part XXII

Bill Costello visits the Macau Tower.

My China Trip, Part XXI

Bill Costello visits the Tian Tan Buddha in Hong Kong.

My China Trip, Part XX

Bill Costello rides the Ngong Ping 360 in Hong Kong.

My China Trip, Part XIX

Bill Costello visits Hong Kong Disneyland.

The Not So Long March to World-Class University Status

I recently visited the top four universities in mainland China: Tsinghua University, Peking University, Fudan University, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University. The former two are located in Beijing, and the latter two are located in Shanghai.

As an educational researcher, the purpose of my visit was to witness and assess China’s higher education revolution firsthand.

When Mao [...]

Hong Kong Fourth Graders Dominate Math

According to the most recent Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), the world’s best fourth-grade math students were from Hong Kong.  Here are the top five performers: Hong Kong SAR (607), Singapore (599), Chinese Taipei (576), Japan (568), and Kazakhstan (549).

In eighth-grade, students from Hong Kong were the world’s fourth best in math. [...]

Hong Kong Students Outperform Massachusetts Students in Math

A new study by the American Institutes for Research compared the math performance of third graders from the highest performing country (Hong Kong) with their peers from the highest performing state (Massachusetts).

It concluded that “exposure, in Hong Kong, to mathematics problems that are computationally more difficult and/or cognitively more complex than those in Massachusetts at [...]

World Ranking of the C9

Among the C9, an alliance of nine prestigious universities hailed as China’s Ivy League, six are ranked in the world’s top 200 universities: Tsinghua University (49), Peking University (52), Fudan University (103), Shanghai Jiao Tong University (153), University of Science and Technology of China (154), Nanjing University (168), Zhejiang University (247), Xi’an Jiaotong University (401-500), [...]

Hong Kong Universities Among Best in the World

While there are only nine universities in Hong Kong, five of them are ranked in the world’s top 200 universities: University of Hong Kong (24), Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (35), the Chinese University of Hong Kong (46), City University of Hong Kong (124), and the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (195).

International School Growth in Asia

ISC Research, an organization that tracks the international school market, reports that the fastest growing region for international schools has been Asia. In 2007, there were 937 international schools in the Asia-Pacific. Now there are roughly 1,200.

China was among the fastest growing countries. From 2006 to 2009, the number of international schools there grew from [...]

Long Waiting Lists for International Schools in Hong Kong

I’m in Hong Kong this week researching the education system. Of particular interest is the international school market.

For the past several years, Hong Kong was one of the world’s fastest growing markets for international schools. The robust growth was driven by increasing numbers of expatriate families moving to Hong Kong. Eventually, the demand for international schools [...]

My China Trip, Part XVIII

Bill Costello cruises on the Huangpu River past the Bund in Shanghai.

My China Trip, Part XVII

Bill Costello rides the Shanghai Maglev Train.

My China Trip, Part XVI

Bill Costello visits Fudan University in Shanghai.

My China Trip, Part XV

Bill Costello visits Shanghai Jiao Tong University.