Higher Education Admissions in Beijing: Independent Freshman Admissions and the Influence of Family, Schooling, and Gender

The sociological study of inequalities has long been concerned with questions concerning the role of education in creating a fairer society and whether it just serves as a means for the advantaged to consolidate pre-existing privileges. This thesis adds to the existing literature by addressing the questions of how family background, types of high school, college entrance scores, and participation in the alternative admissions scheme – Independent Freshman’s Admission (IFA) – help structure access to tertiary education in Beijing, China. I examine tertiary education in terms of both university prestige and choice of university major. Using a mixed-methods study, I draw on qualitative data from my fieldwork in Beijing where I interviewed 60 first-year students and 2 admissions tutors, drawn from across seven universities of different levels of prestige, with both STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) and non-STEM subject majors. I also analyse quantitative data from the 2009 Beijing College Student Panel Study (BCSPS) consisting of 4771 students from 15 universities (3 elite, 6 selective and 6 less-selective universities). First, my qualitative analysis reveals the important role of residential background and hukou status, as well as key- point school attendance in university admission of students both through Gaokao route and IFA participation. I also explored some of the reasons behind female students’ uptake of a STEM degree. Second, using multinomial logit models for analysing BCSPS data, I confirmed the importance of family background, residence of origin and school attendance for access to universities of different levels of prestige. Further, using logistic regression, I showed gender differences in personal attributes relevant to the pursuit of STEM fields, but no associations between different beliefs about marriage and family and educational choices. Taken, together, these findings uncover the ongoing importance of institutional barriers in accessing elite and selective tertiary education in China and illustrate how the meritocratic policy objectives of IFA were undermined in practice. In moving forwards, now that IFA has been scrapped, my study suggests that, without a marked change of direction, the conflict will continue between meritocratic principles and elitist goals, and the quest to improve equality in region, class and gender will remain elusive

Forces, connections and imagination at work in studying overseas : Chinese parents and students' reasons for choosing Australian universities

The purpose of this thesis is to report on the identification of selected forces, connections and imagination influencing Chinese students to study in Australia. Previous research has investigated the ranges of drives generating the burgeoning number of students from the People’s Republic of China seeking to complete their tertiary education overseas. However, little research addresses the role of parents in decision making when they study the question of “Why choose Australia?” This research is based on a study using a focus group in Sydney in 2014 (n = 21), Internet questionnaires in Beijing and Lianyungang (n = 635) and follow-up telephone email interviews in Beijing, Shanghai, Lianyungang and Sydney (n = 12). The participants in this study were all students from the People’s Republic of China, mainly the children from High Net Wealth Income families. The analyses of the evidence from the focus group interviews produced five themes, namely; quality of education, cost, lifestyle, environment and labour migration opportunities. These themes were further investigated by the Internet questionnaire and refined in follow-up interviews with parents and students after the data had been analysed. In addition, evidence regarding these themes was collected through media and government reports regarding corruption in China and Australia. The findings from this research revealed four insights unrecognised by previous research into the main research question: 1. It is the parents who in many cases decide the host country destination and choice of university. 2. Interviewing students may not uncover the motives that influenced the parents’ decisions. 3. Overseas education per se is a prime driver of choice, rather than quality of education. 4. Corruption, especially money laundering, and transcultural immigration are the main motives driving many families’ choices of university in Australia. This thesis has changed directions many times throughout the investigation. It brings a fresh perspective on the forces, connections and imaginations influencing students to study in Australia, but at the same time it has raised questions that it was not able to completely answer

Exploring an Exam-Practice Approach to Teaching Academic Reading and Writing in China: Teacher Perspectives and Materials Analysis

This study explores teacher perceptions of an approach to teaching academic reading and writing that focuses on local English for Academic Purposes (EAP) exams (the Exam-Practice Approach) and presents a textual analysis of the teaching materials. The research context is the EAP component of an international foundation year programme for undergraduate students embarking on Business or Engineering pathways at a British university operating in China. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with English teachers and analysed thematically. This data was enhanced through participant observation, documentary evidence and a survey. Findings indicate concerns regarding the separation of academic reading and writing skills, and a mismatch between course aims and assessment. Contextual factors influencing the development of the local EAP programme are identified and concerns are raised over a perceived lack of purpose in teachers’ professional roles. Corpora were constructed from the reading input in the EAP materials divided according to the students’ disciplinary studies (Business and Engineering) and a keyword analysis conducted using the British Academic Written English (BAWE) reference corpus. This was supported through the manual analysis of rhetorical functions in reading materials. Findings indicate that the reading input does not provide a coherent model of target situation writing and that the local academic reading materials contain language features that directly contradict local writing instruction. The primary implication of the findings of this study for pedagogical and professional practice is that course assessment can greatly influence the development of an English for Academic Purposes programme. Focus on English-language test practice risks alienating teachers and reinforcing a deficit model of Chinese students. The purpose of the EAP programme therefore needs to be clear and assessment should reflect that purpose

Datasets for Large Language Models: A Comprehensive Survey

This paper embarks on an exploration into the Large Language Model (LLM) datasets, which play a crucial role in the remarkable advancements of LLMs. The datasets serve as the foundational infrastructure analogous to a root system that sustains and nurtures the development of LLMs. Consequently, examination of these datasets emerges as a critical topic in research. In order to address the current lack of a comprehensive overview and thorough analysis of LLM datasets, and to gain insights into their current status and future trends, this survey consolidates and categorizes the fundamental aspects of LLM datasets from five perspectives: (1) Pre-training Corpora; (2) Instruction Fine-tuning Datasets; (3) Preference Datasets; (4) Evaluation Datasets; (5) Traditional Natural Language Processing (NLP) Datasets. The survey sheds light on the prevailing challenges and points out potential avenues for future investigation. Additionally, a comprehensive review of the existing available dataset resources is also provided, including statistics from 444 datasets, covering 8 language categories and spanning 32 domains. Information from 20 dimensions is incorporated into the dataset statistics. The total data size surveyed surpasses 774.5 TB for pre-training corpora and 700M instances for other datasets. We aim to present the entire landscape of LLM text datasets, serving as a comprehensive reference for researchers in this field and contributing to future studies. Related resources are available at: https://github.com/lmmlzn/Awesome-LLMs-Datasets.Comment: 181 pages, 21 figure

Epistemological Obstacles to Academic Integrity: Mainland Chinese students’ perceptions of studying in the UK through the Habermasian Lens

This thesis explores mainland Chinese Master’s students’ perceptions of the challenges they face in adapting to a UK Master’s programme and how they overcome these challenges. The study uses qualitative analysis of focus group data collected during students’ time in the UK and reflections once they have returned to China. The students describe having to change the way they study in order to adapt to the different educational context, specifically the use of essay writing as the major form of assessment. Thematic analysis of the participants’ perceptions reveals that this is not simply a case of changing the method of study and adapting to the norms of academic writing and referencing, but requires an epistemological shift. In line with various models of epistemological development, the participants describe the dominant monological and absolute exam focused approach in China in comparison with the dialogic and contextual approach to knowledge in the UK. Having identified and explored the development of epistemological reflection as a key factor in the initial thematic analysis, the study then moves further in-depth utilising the conceptual framework of Jürgen Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action in order to understand the transition between educational contexts. Using the concepts of lifeworld and system, the findings indicate the significant difference between an instrumental approach to education in China and a dialogic educational approach in UKHE, which ostensibly aims at mutual understanding and reaching an intersubjective consensus on truth. This framework provides new perspectives on the challenges Chinese students’ face studying in Anglophone countries, such as English language competency and understanding the concepts of plagiarism and critical thinking. Through this Habermasian lens, the concept of academic integrity is explored in the context of the mass migration of Chinese students and the internationalisation of higher education in the 21st century

Network-based autonomous and cooperative learning : self-organised learning environments in a junior high school in China

PhD ThesisResearch in the field of Self Organised Learning Environments (SOLEs) has investigated a wide range of aspects of this approach to learning and teaching, including its application in vocational education and training, and the implications for educational strategies, metacognition, and child development. However, there has been relatively little research into how SOLEs can be used to improve learning outcomes within a traditional and exam-oriented teaching environment in China, and for a range of school subjects. This study seeks to address this gap by investigating how a SOLE can be integrated into the curricula for history and maths in a Chinese junior high school. The study was conducted in Xining, a North-western Chinese city with limited educational resources and management systems. The study involved a class in the Eighth-grade with 58 students as the SOLE group, and another two classes which were taught by same history and maths teachers as a control group. Twenty history and twenty maths SOLE classes were conducted over nine months in two semesters. Data was gathered from students and students’ guardians using questionnaires, and from students and teachers by means of semi-structured interviews, after-class diary forms, and homework assessments. Other data included classroom observation notes, and the results of three examinations. Results suggest that most students enjoyed developing their knowledge of history in the SOLEs, and made progress in history scores. In addition, students enjoyed doing geometrical tasks much more than algebraic tasks in the SOLEs, but they were not able to improve their maths scores in the exams after using the SOLE in comparison with the non-SOLE classes. In order to make effective use of the Internet-based learning environments, participants in this SOLE study had to take on new roles, and the results suggest that both teachers and students adapted well to this requirement. There was also evidence that students can learn effectively with teacher support in a task-oriented interaction in a SOLE. The effectiveness of this approach varied between history and maths classes. This was partly linked to the existence of, iv and the ability to locate, suitable online resources, though it may also have been linked to the greater dependence on scaffolding for particular subjects. These findings suggest the need for further research in larger scale studies over a broader range of school subjects, and in other educational contexts

“You are too out!”: a mixed methods approach to the study of “digital divides” in three Chinese senior secondary schools

This sequential mixed methods study investigates the differences in adolescent engagement with Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) such as computers, mobile phones, and the Internet. The multi-case project involves 698 second year high school students from three socioeconomically, ethnoculturally, and geographically specific schools in China. It examines the ways in which social factors, such as ethnicity and rurality/urbanity, shape technology access and use before analysing social and educational consequences of youth interaction with ICT. While the quantitative strand lends its power to reveal structural inequalities in the levels of access and use, the qualitative interviewing sheds light on the diversities in use and gives voice to individuals as they encode technology with values and meanings. The research finds that urban students in Shenzhen have the highest level of access to technology and support, use ICT for the widest range of activities, and are most likely to treat them as “life” and “thought” companions for psychosocial, emotional, and intellectual gains. On average, Tibetans are disadvantaged; but the most digitally marginalised teenagers are mainstream Han students with parents having no more than six years of education. Nonetheless, the return to parental education is by far greater for Han students than it is for Tibetans. While the probability of students reporting underachievement decreases as parental education increases, Tibetans are significantly less likely to report “Below average” or “Bottom 10%” in class. The study also discovers that access to ICT strongly correlates with socioeconomic status, but use of them articulates ways of learning and living, which are often resistant to change. As the global and fast-changing ICT become more prevalent, oftentimes adults highlight what they might do to students, while teenagers emphasise what they can do for them. So technology and culture regularly clash. When ICT are introduced to schools by adults, they rarely satisfy the needs of adolescents; and when they have any effect on learning, usually it is not because of what students have in school, it is because of what they do elsewhere — at home or in Internet cafés