Teachers who perform well look forward to faster promotions and higher pay

18 May 2007

We refer to the letter “Help post-grads to a degree; self-motivation is not enough; give incentives for higher studies” (Today, 11 May 2007) by Mr Peter Song.
MOE does not currently differentiate between applicants with bachelor's degrees and those with postgraduate degrees in terms of starting salaries for the Education Service. Instead, teachers who perform well can look forward to faster promotions and higher pay. This is regardless of their qualifications. Those with postgraduate qualifications and are able to perform better as teachers because of the additional skills and/or knowledge acquired during their postgraduate studies will benefit from this faster promotion opportunity.
Nonetheless, we agree that there are merits to Mr Song's suggestion to give greater recognition upfront to applicants with relevant postgraduate degrees that will enable them to contribute better to the Education Service. We will study his suggestion further.
We thank Mr Song for his suggestion.

Lu Cheng Yang
Director, Personnel
Ministry of Education