Based on the findings, this study posits some implications for China's overseas education policy and suggests future study directions, as well as identifies its own limitations. / Findings of this study show that mainland Chinese senior secondary students' choice of major for overseas higher education can be explained better by human capital theory. Students are more inclined to choose the major that has higher expected rate of return to overseas higher education. The choice of major is in fact a behavior looking for higher investment return, or for better overseas employment prospects which would increase the probability of capturing the expected rate of return to overseas higher education. / Over the last 50 years, overseas higher education in the world has developed rapidly. Existing literature shows that overseas higher education can promote the economic development of developing countries, and overseas higher education graduates of different majors may have different roles in economic development. / The study employs multinomial logistic regression in the statistical analysis of the data. Major findings of the study are as follows: (1) Two economic factors---senior secondary students' expected rate of return to overseas higher education, and perceived overseas employment prospects---significantly affect students' choice of major for overseas higher education; while other two factors---students' perceived domestic employment prospects, and consumption preferences---have no significant effect on students' choice of major. (2) The choice between each pair of majors are either significantly affected by students' expected rate of return to overseas higher education or perceived overseas employment prospects to overseas higher education, except for the pair of Engineering vs. Business Administration. (3) The interaction effect between students' expected rate of return to overseas higher education and family location, and the interaction effect between students' academic ability and family income, significantly affect students' choice of major for overseas higher education. (4) Some information factors also significantly affect students' choice of major. (5) Students' gender, academic ability, family income, parents' education, and family location also significantly affect their choices of major. / The study is based on the data set of a research project entitled "Seeking Higher Education Abroad: Student Choices and Reasons in China", funded by the Research Grants Council in Hong Kong and conducted by Professor Hung Fan-sing of The Chinese University of Hong Kong as the Principal Investigator. The data consists of the results of a questionnaire survey successfully conducted in early 2007 to 12,961 senior secondary students in seven cities in mainland China. / This study employs human capital theory to analyze mainland Chinese senior secondary students' choice of major for studying higher education abroad, and the main factors affecting their choices. / 劉揚. / Advisers: Fan-sing Hung; Yue-ping Chung. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-06, Section: A, page: 1865. / Thesis (doctoral)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 147-157). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / School code: 1307. / Liu Yang.

published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

The underlying concern in this thesis is with the real opportunities that people have to pursue beings and doings that they have reason to value. This concern is explored through the development of four themes, namely ‘shaping aspirations’, ‘capabilities of academic researchers’, ‘qualities of play’, and ‘university internationalisation’. These themes emerged during my journey of academic inquiry, which included empirical research conducted in two distinct settings.

The purpose of this research was to investigate relations between students' academic motivation, cognition, and achievement. In particular, substantial issues are investigated involving the interaction of students' academic motivation and cognition, and specifies how selected motivational and cognitive variables may influence student academic achievement. In order to do this, this study develops a causal model of student achievement which, using goal theory as a framework, incorporates both motivational and cognitive variables to account for students' academic achivement. In total, the results suggest that students' academic achievement may be both conceptualised, and operationalised, as the product of interrelations between key facilitating, motivational, and cognitive variables. Despite some limitations, the study suggests several positive directions for future research. These include, in particular, further investigation of the social goals identified, how these goals relate to students' academic cognition, and how selected social goals and strategies together influence students' academic achievement. There is also further scope to investigate the role of particular facilitating variables in 'driving' students' academic motivation and cognition. Thus, the present research provides an empirical basis from which future, complementary, research may be undertaken / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This investigation aims to explore the attitudes of adolescents towards learning music and to gauge the extent of their involvement in the activities of playing, singing, creating and listening to music. It also seeks to determine the views of adolescents on attributions for success in various activities, including music. Beliefs about selfconcept, or self-identity, and their relationships to academic achievement and musical involvement are explored. The review of literature spans various facets of self-perception, including selfconcept, self-esteem, self-efficacy, self-regulation, and self-concept development, and considers the role of music in self-concept development. The impact of self-perceptions on motivation, which is central to learning, achievement and engagement, is also considered. The basic principles of learning, and their application to learning in music, provide the foundation for specific aspects of music learning, namely, music literacy, learning to play a musical instrument, singing, music technology and informal learning. The relationship between music learning and academic achievement is reviewed. The particular importance of music in adolescence, and adolescent attitudes to school music, provide a backdrop to the analysis of the wide-ranging factors involved in self-concept development, motivation and learning principles, thus leading to an overview of the various approaches which can facilitate the engagement of adolescents in learning in general, and in high school music in particular. A researcher-designed Survey of Musical Experiences and Self-concept was administered to Year 9 and 10 students in three high schools in metropolitan Adelaide, South Australia. Data from the survey, along with academic results, were collected from the 282 participants in the study. The data provide background information about each participant, along with their perceptions about perceived areas of strength and reasons for success in these areas. Information about involvement in musical activities was collated for all students, with approximately half of the students not studying music at school. Measures for self-esteem (Rosenberg, 1965) and perceived competence (Chan, 1993) were included in the survey. Using a mixture of qualitative and quantitative methods, the data were analysed in relation to the extent of involvement in music, attitudes to learning music, students’ attributions for success, and strengths of the relationships between musical involvement, self-concept and academic achievement. Conclusions can be drawn based on the survey data and the literature review, and these emphasise the importance of the social nature of learning and of providing opportunities for creative work in classroom activities. The most outstanding finding to be highlighted from the study was the aspect of enjoyment as a reason for achievement which appears to feature prominently in students’ responses, yet it is less widely recognised in the literature. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1321529 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, Elder Conservatorium of Music, 2008

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 175-193). Also available in electronic version. Access restricted to campus users.

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This dissertation focuses on how rural community college students make decisions regarding their post-secondary plans. To understand these decision processes, I interviewed students, faculty and administrators at Southeast Community and Technical College in Harlan County, Kentucky. The literature informing my research reflects on rural college going patterns. Most studies connect place and post-secondary plans. Central Appalachia has among the lowest population percentages with Bachelor degrees in the country. Studies argue this is because of limited application for such degrees in the region. Matching their education and training to local job market requirements, people hesitate to complete advanced degrees when little if any local application requires such additional education. This study discusses how place informs and shapes students’ decisions around college and degree selection. Unlike those who connect advanced education with outmigration patterns, my research highlights students who pursue post-secondary training in hopes of applying these degrees locally to build their communities and families’ quality of life in a rural place. From the twenty-eight student and fifteen faculty and administrator interviews conducted, rationales regarding the purpose of post-secondary degrees and training surfaced. Through selected follow up oral histories, students further described the application of their degrees towards terminal, transfer and/or transformative ends. Their articulated positions regarding the purpose and application of higher education in Central Appalachia adds to the continuing studies on how advanced degrees informs students’ decisions to stay or leave rural areas. From the Southeast interview data, I provide a critique of policy directives related to advanced education and economic development. Given many of the urban assumptions embedded in development theory, my study was interested in how these rural students, in a place considered underdeveloped partly because of low college attendance rates, attain and then apply their degrees and the rationale they articulate in doing so. As US policy makers continue to require advanced education for more and more of their citizens, my research shows the complications and complexities such rhetoric evokes when people, committed to rural places and ways of life, apply them in their local contexts.