Social Capital for Newcomers
PCEd (FT) 2002 - 2003, ESC (soc) Assignment
- by Fong Yun
Question 2: What factors affect the educational attainment of students from underserved groups in Hong Kong and what can teachers do to improve the situation. In particular, what kind of social capital do these students need to attain higher levels of educational success and how can teachers help them build social capital?
Factors affect educational attainment of students from underserved groups
The problems faced by underserved groups in education are mainly the consequences of social and education stratification. The groups are so-called "underserved" because they are lying on the lower strata of the society, and enjoy fewer resources, no matter in forms of economical, human, cultural, and social capital. 1
There are different kinds of groups facing difficulties under education stratification, like poor, female, disabled, newcomers and ethnic minorities, etc. For easier discussion, we will focus on the newcomers from the Mainland China. They are chosen because of their rising impact on the education system of Hong Kong due to the merge of Hong Kong and Mainland. By the government's statistics:
In 2002, there are 45234 newcomers from Mainland with one-way permit (daily average 124), and about 35% of them are below 15 years old (in the last quarter of 2002). Moreover, the composition of newcomers is changing, the newcomers from Guangdong are reducing (from 90.4% in1998 to 47.1% in the last quarter of 2002), and those from other provinces (e.g Fujian) are rising. This caused the dropping of Cantonese speaking newcomers from 82.1% (1998) to 70.4% (last quarter of 2002). 2
In the 01/02 year, there are 8775 newcomers newly admitted in primary schools, and is counted for 1.78% of the total enrolment), and 1372 in secondary schools, counted for 0.30% of the total enrolment. 3 Although the newcomers' admission is dropped from the peak appear in the last few years (like the 96/97 year 3) due to the Right to Abode movement, the accumulated pupils still exert a great pressure on Hong Kong's education system.
The problems faced by the newcomers from Mainland is specific, of course, but they also shared some general features with other underserved groups, especially the lack of resources under the lower strata.
By an investigation, the factors affecting newcomers' study include: 4
1. The difficulties in finding schools
The Education Department (now EMB) only gives a list of school for the parents with no extra help. The parent bring their children around the schools for interview, and very difficult to find a suitable school for their children. Also, the government policy was stickled to the compulsory system, and would not help the youths over 15 in finding schools, so some newcomer youths being uneducated and unemployed.
2. The difficulties to adopt new syllabus and different language
The syllabus in Hong Kong is different from those in Mainland of course. Moreover, they are used to read simplified characters and need to adapt for the use of traditional characters in Hong Kong. Also, they need to catch up with the English standard in Hong Kong classes. The lack of reading ability through English and traditional characters limited they potential in further studying.
3. The lack of social activities and unfamiliar to the society
As a newcomer, they feel unfamiliar to the society. For a quick adaptation, social activities are needed to build up a sense of belonging. However, because of their family condition, most of them "social" with their classmates only, and not exploring their community.
4. The difference between the age of newcomers and classmates
For having a suitable level of them, the newcomers usually study in the class below their cohort. So they are facing classmates much smaller then they in age. The differences in psychology between different ages of students cause a barrier in friendship building.
5. The "single parent" phenomenon caused by the migration policy
As the migration policy allow children came first, but not their parents. Therefore, some newcomers can only live with one parent, and waiting for another to come to Hong Kong. This caused a "pseudo-single parent" phenomenon, and the only parent in Hong Kong become very difficult to look after his/her children. The lack of parental care pushes newcomers to face the great changing of live alone.
6. The anxiety and pressure for adapting new life
The life in Hong Kong is very different to Mainland. The newcomers need to face a greatest change in their life. This causes great pressure on them.
7. Being discriminated by the local people
Some newcomers were discriminated by the local people, and feel difficult to merge into the Hong Kong society. 5
There are also other factors affecting newcomers study: For example, the newcomers families are usually the poor families, so they of resources to help their children's study. Which becomes a kind of "social-reproduction" the poor status of parents continues in their children. 6
As conclusion, the following factors affect the educational attainment of newcomer students:
1. The difficulties in adapting new life, new studying method and contents
2. The lack of parental care
3. The lack of social contact
4. The lack of resources in studying
Beside the first point, these points are also shared by other underserved groups in Hong Kong.
Methods for teachers to improve educational attainment
Many of the problems that the newcomers met are in political and social aspects, that teachers cannot do much.
However, teachers could do on they own task to ease some factors and improve their educational attainment:
1. The use of government funding. Government provides a "per-head" fund to the schools receiving newcomers. Schools should use this fund to provide services targeting the factors that affect newcomers' attainment. 7 For example, having extra lessons for better adaptation to the syllabus, buying extra tutors, materials, and held activities to let them familiar with the school and the community.
2. Trying to divide classes according to ability, like some schools adopting TOC. Not to divide classes according to age could ease some pressure faced by the newcomers. Also, They need not to study some "lower level" subjects again just because they did not know English 8.
3. Besides academic attainment, teachers should also help them to adapt to the new live, like having more out-of-school activities to let them familiar with Hong Kong.
4. Cooperation with the social service providers. 8 As the newcomers facing great pressure in adapting new life, social workers are the professional helper for them. Some newcomers are already receiving helps from those provides, schools should have contact with those provider for better cooperation. Social workers could help teachers to reduce workload on newcomers, and the social workers may also discover some potential cases for early treatment.
Of course, for better educational attainment, building social capital is very important to those from underserved groups, as they are already lack of this. They are discussed in the last part.
The social capital needed by students
By definition, social capital is the aggregate of actual or potential resources that are linked to possession of a durable network of institutionalized relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition. In a simplified from, social capital is the capital formed by social connections. Which is inter-convertible into other kinds of capitals. 9
There are different forms of social capital: 10
1. Obligations and expectations
2. Information potential
3. Norms and effective sanctions
4. Authority relations
5. Appropriable social organization & intentional organization
They are all the basic needs in a social life.
Family is a primary social organization. And the resources that a family can mobilized greatly affect the resources that a student can obtain, that are also true in terms of social capital. Besides that, social capital also exists outside the family, in the forms of religious and other organizations 11.
By analysis of the factors affecting newcomers, the following social capital seems needed by the newcomer students:
1. Obligation and trust between them and the locals (a two-way relation)
2. Some effective information channels for them to familiar with Hong Kong
3. The immerge of the norms of Hong Kong
4. Closure of social networks between them and the locals (as their relationship with locals and other newcomers are usually separated without closure)
5. Sense of belonging to the local social organizations
And its need a good communication and relationship with students in the:
1. Family
2. Classroom
3. School
4. Community
Methods for teachers to help building social capital
As said before, many problems are in political and social aspect that teachers cannot do much, but they can still do a lot in schools to help building social capital for students:
1. To build obligation and trust with them, teachers should be the first to trust and obligate them, then the other students will follow. Teacher should let them involve in the volunteer works in school. For example, let newcomers be the Putonghua tutor for the locals, and let locals be the English tutor for the newcomers may be a good method to build trust and obligation between them. 12
2. Teachers should not stick to their own moral view. Popular culture like films and songs serves for an "instant" way to immerge to the local norms, and this also help newcomers to build an effective information channel with local students. 13
3. Teachers should help to held activities for the newcomers to serve in the community (not only the classroom and the school), like having a joint cleaning campaign with the local community (e.g. the estate managing committee in public housing areas), this help newcomers to build relationship with the community, and also build a sense of belonging to the community.
4. Family as a main source of social capital, which should be mobilized. Scholars are quite emphasized on the formal social organizations like PTA. 11, 14 However, if the parents of the newcomers are with low education standard and poor economic situation, the formal organization may become a kind of "co-opt" and is beyond the parents' ability. For an alternative, teachers may invite parents to join in some "self-help" groups to share experience and information (and also some works like look after children), if it's already exist (held by the social services provider), teachers should also get contact to it. This gives a platform for relationship building between parents and teachers. The relationship between teachers and parents forms a "closure" of relationship around students 15, and exert more power to improve their education attainment.
However, teachers still need the efforts from school administrators, parents, and the community. Without their help, no matter how much teachers do, there's nothing improved.
(END)
Footnotes:
1. Postiglione, Gerard (2002). Educational Stratification. ESC class notes.
2. Home Affairs Department, HKSARG (2003). Statistics on New Arrivals from the Mainland.
(http://www.info.gov.hk/had/images/pdf/report_2002q4.pdf)
3. Education and Manpower Bureau, HKSARG (2002). Key Statistics on School Education.
(http://www.emb.gov.hk/chi/highlights.asp?sid=16&cid=69)
4. 香港小童群益會長沙灣青少年綜合服務中心 (1995)，「新移民青少年生活適應個案調查報告書」
5. A study about the image of "Hong Kong People" and the discrimination toward Mainland Chinese can be found in a graduation project by 林建邦等(2002)「土製香港人」，香港中文大學聯合書院通識課程GEU0411報告
(http://www.hkedcity.net/ihouse/fy1379/geu0412.htm)
6. 「新移民收入低恐下一代延續貧窮 學者倡設審查教育津貼」《明報》2002-06-01
7. 譚鎮傑(教育署助理署長)演詞撮錄，《新移民的平等機會》(1997)，香港心理學會心理學推廣組
8. 香港基督教女青年會深水土步社會服務處、香港大學社會工作及社會行政學系二年級同學(1997)，《新移民學童學習及社交適應調查報告》
9. Bourdieu, Pierre (1997). 'The Forms of Capital', Education: Culture, Economy and Society, by A.H. Halsey et. al. (eds.). Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 46 - 58.
10. Coleman, James S. (1990). 'Social Capital', Foundations of Social Theory. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, pp. 300 - 321.
11. Coleman, James S. (1997). 'Social Capital in the Creation of Human Capital', Education: Culture, Economy and Society, by A.H. Halsey et. al. (eds.). Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 80 - 95.
12. By the news report, some schools have already starting to use this method.
13. In author's own experience, when there is an exchange students to my secondary school (from USA), he is chatting with my classmates quickly, about the different foul languages in Cantonese and English …… Of course it should not be encouraged by the teachers, but it shows how effective to build up an information channel starting from exchanging popular culture.
14. 何瑞珠(2002)，《家庭學校與社區協作》，香港﹕中文大學出版社，頁1至14
15. Coleman, James S. (1994). 'Family, School, and Social Capital', The International Encyclopedia of Education, vol. 4. T. Husen and N.T. Postlethwaite (eds.). Oxford: Elsevier Science, pp. 2272 - 2274.