Multi‐models of quality in education
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/09684889710156558 |
| Date | 01 March 1997 |
| Pages | 22-31 |
| Published date | 01 March 1997 |
| Author | Yin Cheong Cheng,Wai Ming Tam |
| Subject Matter | Education |
In the past decade, following rapid economic
development, the education systems of most
countries or areas in the Asia-Pacific region
have been expanded quickly. Currently, the
people in this region are concerned with not
only education quantity but also education
quality. For example, in Hong Kong, a
number of policy efforts have been put into
improvement of different aspects of education
such as curriculum, language teaching, stu-
dent guidance, student streaming, manage-
ment, teacher-student ratio, physical environ-
ment, and teacher education (Education and
Manpower Branch and Education Depart-
ment, 1991; Education Commission, 1984-
1992). Although these efforts aim at improv-
ing education quality and discharging
accountability, they are suffering from poor
understanding of the complex nature of edu-
cation quality and lack of a system of educa-
tion standards and indicators for directing
practices and monitoring performance. The
effects of these efforts are often problematic
and doubted by the public. This seems to be a
serious problem when compared with the
huge investment in the education system.
Recently, China and some other rapidly
developing societies in the Asia-Pacific region
have been facing similar problems of educa-
tion quality in development of education.
Also, there are different types of educational
reform in search of education quality in devel-
oped countries such as the USA, UK, and
Australia (Cheng, 1994a, 1996). Responding
to the rapidly growing concern about educa-
tion quality in the international and local
contexts, this paper aims at developing a
framework of multi-models of quality in
education for facilitating practice, supporting
policy making, and developing research agen-
das.
General conception of education quality
In the management literature, the term quali-
ty has different meanings and has been vari-
ously defined as excellence (Peters and
22
Quality Assurance in Education
Volume 5 · Number 1 · 1997 · pp. 22–31
© MCB University Press · ISSN 0968-4883
Multi-models of quality
in education
Yin Cheong Cheng and
Wai Ming Tam
The authors
Yin Cheong Cheng is Director and Professor and Wai
Ming Tam is Lecturer at The Centre for Research and
Development, The Hong Kong Institute of Education, Hong
Kong.
Abstract
Suggests that there is a strong emphasis on the pursuit of
education quality in ongoing educational reforms in both
local and international contexts. Policies issued to imple-
ment educational changes for education quality often fail
because of lack of comprehensive understanding of the
complex nature of education quality in schools or higher
education institutions. Introduces seven models of quality
in education: the goals and specifications model; the
resources input model; the process model; the satisfaction
model; the legitimacy model; the absence of problems
model; and the organizational learning model. Concludes
that these models can form a comprehensive framework
for understanding and conceptualizing quality in educa-
tion from different perspectives and facilitating develop-
ment of management strategies for achieving it. The
framework can contribute to ongoing policy discussion,
school practice, and research development on issues of
quality in education institutions.
This article is one of the reports of an ongoing
research project on “Educational quality in Hong
Kong secondary schools indicators and organiza-
tional determinants” that is supported by an
Earmarked Research Grant awarded from the
Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Gov-
ernment to the first author. The authors appreciate
the financial support of the Council.
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