This chapter explores the indigenous influences on the education systems in Singapore, Shanghai, and Hong Kong. It introduces the concept of educational harmonisation that has its origins in Confucianism. This is followed by an account of how educational harmonisation is put to use by the education authorities in Singapore, Shanghai, and Hong Kong through the strategy of decentralised centralism. With "harmony" as the cornerstone, educational harmonisation seeks to find the equilibrium among discrete or opposing parts, and consequently bring about a new integrated whole. The chapter proposes an East Asian Educational Model (EAEM) based on the patterns observed from Singapore, Shanghai, and Hong Kong. A pedagogy that bears witness to educational harmonisation in Singapore, Shanghai, and Hong Kong is the Teacher-Directed, Student-Engaged (TDSE) approach. As for assessment, educators in Singapore, Shanghai, and Hong Kong strive to harmonise Assessment for Learning (AfL) and Assessment of Learning (AoL).

Singapore higher education’s intraperiod response to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic was unique compared to other countries, being praised by the World Health Organisation (WHO) for its early response. Like many other countries, alarming growth in cases appeared, and careful strategies for the continuation of learning were implemented. This paper provides a critical case study and reflection-in-action (Green et al., 2020) of the Singaporean intraperiod response, exploring individual responses from a sample of six autonomous universities, two international universities with campuses in Singapore, and four Private Education Institutions. Through a defined qualitative content analysis of university documentation, scant academic literature, and government and media sources, an understanding of the pandemic response in Singapore was possible. We chose to ensure full coverage of the city-state to enable a comprehensive country analysis in contrast to the growing volume of single-institution pandemic and emergency remote teaching case studies applying a sociotechnical theoretical framework to guide an analysis between educational technology systems and the people using it to teach, work, and learn. This study identified that while tasks and technology were presented with depth, the social elements – people and systems – were often lacking accurate description. We discuss how this technical focus has practical and research implications, and how future research and university teaching and learning practice can better respond to future challenges through reflection of the sociotechnical perspective. © 2022, Kaplan Singapore. All rights reserved.

In this paper, I explore precarity as experienced by international students studying in the honours college of a public university in the city–state of Singapore. Precarity for this group emanates from the intersection of their temporary migrant status, the country’s changing immigration and economic development policies and public opinion about international students in the country. Through interviews and focus group discussions, I examine the life trajectories and aspirations of this group, how they cope with precarity and the strategies they used to minimise their perceived precariousness. I use the term ‘emerging precarity’ to underscore the temporal nature of students’ precarity that arises as they are about to graduate. At this juncture, precarity is heightened by the removal of resources, the ending of their visa status as students and changing policies regarding their ability to stay on and work in the country after earning a degree. Students in this study found ways to counter the effects of precarity and underscore their potential as future workers, long-term residents and possibly future citizens by building their store of human capital and asserting that their understanding of Singaporean values and cultures made them ‘locals’, on par with the native-born in the workplace.

This study intends to conduct a systematic qualitative meta-analysis that focuses on research studies into English Language Teaching (ELT) policy in Iran and Singapore. To identify and compare the main features of the studies and also to provide a contemporary picture of the field in Iran and Singapore, 13 articles published between 2010 and 2021 were included in this review. The analysis revealed that Singapore has employed a top-down language policy and utilized a holistic curriculum which has led to an English knowing society. The policies are well articulated and few mismatches were reported in the policies. In addition, the policies are positively perceived by stakeholders, leading to effective implementation of the policies. However, the findings showed that the Iranian top-down policy negatively framed ELT. Moreover, the policies are not well articulated and there are some inconsistencies between the policies and some mismatches between policy and practice. In addition, the analysis revealed that Iranian stakeholders negatively perceived the policies. They believed that the policies have marginalized the role of teachers and their professional judgment. Finally, research gaps for future research studies in ELT policy were highlighted and recommendations were offered. © 2022 The Authors. Pulished by University of Isfahan .