tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca/topics/east-asian-education-13941/articlesEast Asian education – The Conversation2016-02-25T09:09:29Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/552662016-02-25T09:09:29Z2016-02-25T09:09:29ZAsian cities tussle for top spot in new education ranking as London left behind<p>Singapore, Hong Kong and Shanghai have come top of <a href="https://johnjerrim.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/gla_paper_final.pdf">a new ranking</a> of how teenagers in cities and states around the world perform on global maths, reading and science tests. London, despite showing a <a href="https://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-why-do-students-in-london-do-better-at-school-34090">marked improvement</a> in domestic exam results in recent years, has not come out highly on the ranking. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.oecd.org/pisa/">Programme for International Student Assessment</a> (PISA) is perhaps the world’s most influential educational assessment. Conducted every three years by the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), it is widely used to compare educational standards across the world.</p>
<p>Results <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/pisa">from PISA</a> are typically reported at the country level – setting out how the reading, science and mathematics skills of 15-year-olds in one country compare to their peers in another. Now the OECD has expanded its interest into benchmarking regional economies, such as Canadian provinces, Chinese cities and American states. Perhaps the most prominent example is Shanghai, China, which topped the PISA mathematics, reading and science rankings in both 2009 and 2012.</p>
<p>In my <a href="https://johnjerrim.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/gla_paper_final.pdf">new research</a>, using combined data from the PISA tests in 2009 and 2012, I have estimated PISA scores for a number of major world cities for the first time. These results are presented in the graph below, focusing on how educational standards in London compare to some of the world’s other major regional economies.</p>
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<p>There are some striking results. With an average PISA mathematics score of around 480, 15-year-olds in London are around three school years behind their peers in Shanghai. The average score across OECD countries is 500, and for the rest of around 495. In London, where the data covered 42 schools and 1,057 pupils, only the top 10% of children can match the mathematics skills of the average 15-year-old in Shanghai. On the other hand, children in Riga, Latvia, achieve at or above the OECD average across the PISA reading, science and mathematics domains.</p>
<p>There are several possible explanations for this result. Countries differ in many ways, including education systems, teaching methods, use of out-of-school tuition and the role parents play in shaping their children’s education. It would therefore be wrong to interpret these results as suggesting there is a problem with London schools. Yet, what it clearly does show is that the reading, mathematics and science skills of the average 15-year-old in London is way below that in several other major world economies – a situation that needs to be resolved.</p>
<p>As PISA grows in terms of its political influence, it is likely that interest in such regional estimates is only likely to grow. <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-35305586">Some commentators</a> have argued that such comparisons are likely to be much more meaningful than the standard PISA country-level reports. I agree and think it’s good news that the OECD has now announced the launch of <a href="http://www.oecd.org/callsfortenders/CfT%20100001311%20Longitudinal%20Study%20of%20Social%20and%20Emotional%20Skills%20in%20Cities.pdf">a new study</a> on social and emotional skills in cities, and the further benchmarking of regional economies in upcoming waves of the PISA tests.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55266/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Jerrim does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Teenagers in Shanghai, Singapore and Hong Kong outperformed those in London, Madrid and Dubai.John Jerrim, Lecturer in Economics and Social Statistics, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/434182015-06-17T23:04:26Z2015-06-17T23:04:26ZEast Asian maths teaching method boosts English children’s progress by a month<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/85368/original/image-20150617-23259-jhfs43.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mastered it!</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Girl maths via NataSnow/www.shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>There has been <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-east-asian-children-get-so-far-ahead-of-their-classmates-32703">much discussion</a> in recent years about why East Asian children perform so well on international education tests. I’ve <a href="https://johnjerrim.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/australia_asia_paper.pdf">argued before that</a> there is no one reason for these countries’ stellar results, but that home background and culture plays an important role. In the UK, moves to introduce teaching methods popular in countries such as Singapore into the classroom have <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/elizabeth-truss-speaks-about-improving-teaching">been heralded by politicians</a> eager to replicate some of the successes of East Asian education systems. </p>
<p>We are beginning to see whether these borrowed methods are working in the classroom. My <a href="http://www.johnjerrim.com/papers">new study</a>, which looked at a <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-what-is-the-mastery-model-of-teaching-maths-25636">method</a> called “Mathematics Mastery” that was introduced in primary and secondary schools in England, has shown a small impact on children’s progress in maths after one year. In the programme, fewer topics are covered than in a standard maths lesson and in greater depth. All the children are expected to master the material before the rest of the class moves on. </p>
<p>Over the last two and a half years I have been evaluating the “Mathematics Mastery” programme along with Anna Vignoles from the University of Cambridge. The study involved more than 10,000 pupils in Year 1 (5-6 years old) at 90 primary schools and Year 7 (11-12 years old) at 50 secondary schools. Half of the schools were taught using the new method, after training and resources from the education charity and academy chain sponsor ARK, and half were taught with standard maths lessons.</p>
<p>We evaluated the <a href="http://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/projects/mathematics-mastery/">impact of the approach</a> via two randomised controlled trials – one for the primary schools and one for the secondary schools – funded by the Education Endowment Foundation. We have since written an <a href="http://www.johnjerrim.com/papers">academic paper</a> on the findings. </p>
<h2>Early signs of success</h2>
<p>The two trials both pointed towards a small positive effect of the maths mastery programme, though neither reached statistical significance independently. When combining the evidence across the two trials, we found children exposed to the programme made around a month more progress in mathematics than those who did not. To put this another way, in a school with a 100 children, the child would move from being ranked 50th in maths to being ranked 47th. </p>
<p>There is of course quite a bit of uncertainty surrounding this result. For instance, it is not clear how far one can extrapolate results from this trial to the wider population. Also, the fact that the trial has been based on only a sample of schools means that the “true” effect size could be a lot bigger (double) or smaller (essentially zero) than we report. </p>
<p>There is no escaping that the effect size we found was small. This suggests that introducing such methods across the education system would be unlikely to springboard England to the top of the Programme for International Student Assessment rankings. As I <a href="https://johnjerrim.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/australia_asia_paper.pdf">have noted previously</a>, there are likely to be a lot of other factors at play in high-performing Asian countries.</p>
<p>Yet, at the same time, effects of this magnitude are also not trivial, particularly given the low cost per pupil. It costs around £130 per pupil in the first year, dropping to below £50 per pupil in subsequent years once teachers are trained in the programme. For instance, <a href="http://cee.lse.ac.uk/ceedps/ceedp43.pdf">effects of a similar magnitude</a> were reported for The Literacy Hour – a daily hour set aside for literacy in primary schools – which many consider to be a good example of a low-cost intervention that was a success. </p>
<h2>Not enough to build national policy on</h2>
<p>Our trials only considered the impact after just one year, the first year such methods were used in these schools. But programmes like Maths Mastery are meant to develop children’s skills over several years, and so may result in bigger gains in the long-run. However, there is currently no empirical evidence available for us to judge whether this is indeed the case or not.</p>
<p>Given the above, our advice is that we need to proceed with investigations into the impact of East Asian teaching methods, while also exercising caution. The empirical evidence currently available does not have sufficient scope or depth to base national policy upon, despite showing some positive signs. What is now needed is further research establishing the long-run impact of such methods after they have been implemented within schools for several years, and after teachers have more experience with this different approach.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/43418/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Jerrim receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council</span></em></p>Analysis of a maths teaching method popular in East Asia shows promise, but not enough to roll out nationally yet.John Jerrim, Lecturer in Economics and Social Statistics, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/420142015-05-20T10:36:25Z2015-05-20T10:36:25ZSouth Korean universities remain challenging places for foreign students and faculty<p>Spurred on by a globalisation of higher education, <a href="http://www.iie.org/%7E/media/Files/Services/ProjectAtlas/Website%202014/Project-Atlas-Trends-and-Global-Data-2014.ashx?la=en">over 4.5m students</a> from around the world studied abroad in 2012, more than double the number of students a decade earlier. While the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, France and Germany remain the major destination countries, hosting more than 50% of foreign students worldwide, many countries which traditionally sent students abroad have started receiving them in recent decades – especially in Asia.</p>
<p>South Korea follows this general pattern: it is third place in Asia after China and India in the number of students it sends abroad to study. But at the same time, the <a href="http://kess.kedi.re.kr/eng/publ/view?survSeq=2014&publSeq=4&menuSeq=3645&itemCode=02&language=en">number of foreign students</a> in Korean universities reached 84,891 in 2014, most of them from China and less developed parts of Asia, especially Vietnam and Mongolia. The number of foreign faculty teaching in Korean universities has also increased from 1,373 (2.4%) in 2000 to 6,034 (6.8%) in 2014. Although the figures are still relatively low compared to the percentages in Europe and North America, they bring a potentially significant force of change to Korean society, which has 97% ethnic homogeneity.</p>
<p>The growing movement of students and faculty across societies naturally creates more culturally diverse campuses. In the US and Europe, such changes have led to significant efforts to create a culture of respect for diversity and inclusion, albeit with much regional and country-level variation in situations and strategies. Despite its critics, Europe has <a href="http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/highereducation/News/Intercultural%20dialogue_EN.pdf">consistently articulated</a> the value of “interculturality”, “diversity” and respect for cultural differences in debates about higher education.</p>
<h2>Diversity, just for show</h2>
<p>However, this is not the case with Korea and most other Asian nations. One major reason is that Korean universities primarily attract foreign students as a means to clear ends. The universities want them to come to enhance university prestige or create “education hubs” and improving international higher education rankings. They can also help to fill the gap in a declining domestic college student population: the number of high school graduates is expected to fall short of the college entrance quota from 2018. As a result, Korean campuses have become much more diverse. However, appreciation of the intrinsic educational value of a culturally diverse student and faculty body has not been embraced by university leadership.</p>
<p><a href="http://aparc.fsi.stanford.edu/research/diversity_and_tolerance_in_korea_and_asia">Our new study</a> on diversity in South Korean higher education shows a noticeable disjuncture between different aspects of diversity in the university environment. Korean universities may have accepted more students of varying racial and ethnic backgrounds, but the curriculum offers limited opportunities for students to think more deeply about assumptions concerning race, ethnicity and other individual or group differences. Courses focusing on racial and ethnic groups in Korea are conspicuously absent and those few addressing cultural differences focus on international (not internal) diversity, suggesting that diversity is viewed as something “out there” in the world that is still very unfamiliar and perhaps undesirable.</p>
<p>At the interpersonal level, both Korean and foreign students report very low levels of cross-cultural interaction. Foreign students often report experiencing cultural chauvinism and ethnocentrism in their encounters with Korean students. A female student from Iran studying at a top Korean university, for instance, said in an interview with us that: “my Korean acquaintances are not interested in getting to know other cultures. They seem to like to live among themselves in their own ways.” There is also a perception that foreign students gain easier admission to Korean universities than Korean students and often attend university on generous scholarships from the Korean government. As one Korean student put it: “We have to work really hard to get in, but international students can get in easy. It’s not fair.” </p>
<p>Foreign faculty, too, rather than being valued as full, contributing members of their academic communities, are often perceived as temporary skilled labour. Korean universities employ them largely to help boost their global credentials: the numbers of foreign faculty, their ability to publish in international journals and teach courses in English all help to raise domestic and international university rankings. There is also a tendency among Koreans to perceive foreign faculty as “second-tier” scholars who were unable to secure employment in their countries of origin. “I don’t feel valued here,” said one foreigner, explaining his reasons for choosing to leave his tenure-track position at a prestigious Korean university. </p>
<h2>Exclusive culture remains</h2>
<p>The Korean government and universities have worked closely together to promote structural diversity in university admissions, but core Korean values of <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Ethnic_nationalism_in_Korea.html?id=nNc2AzJmwPoC&hl=en">ethnic nationalism</a> remain firmly entrenched at the educational and interpersonal levels. At best, universities assist foreign students and attend to their adjustment needs but neglect to foster a tolerant, inclusive university culture where foreigners are considered full, valued members of Korean universities and society. Such an exclusive culture impedes Korean universities’ aspirations to become global.</p>
<p><a href="http://vserver1.cscs.lsa.umich.edu/%7Espage/thedifference.html">Much research</a> demonstrates the positive effects of diversity on various academic and social outcomes such as the ability to form wider friendship networks, increased cultural awareness, acquiring global citizenship skills, improving the campus climate and innovation. Universities are ideal settings for students from different backgrounds to meet, generate new ideas and interact with one another at an early stage in their lives. It is no accident that many of the innovative ideas associated with Microsoft, Yahoo, Google and Facebook were all born on American university campuses, where diversity is embraced. Facilitating diversity and recognising its long-term effects for <a href="http://aparc.fsi.stanford.edu/news/can-asia-emulate-silicon-valley">innovation</a> and development should be a major goal of higher education in Korea.</p>
<p>Korean universities often proclaim that their mission is to become “global” but they should first realise that this requires more than simply recruiting foreigners and offering more courses in English. What is most urgent is to produce “global citizens” through the creation of a campus environment and culture that appreciates and respects diversity. The educational value of such an approach is even more important for a society like Korea that has been built on pride in ethnic nationalism.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/42014/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>On a mission to become global higher education players, Korean universities still fall short on diversity.Gi-Wook Shin, Director of the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford UniversityRennie Moon, Assistant Professor of Research Method , Yonsei UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/351622014-12-10T19:33:57Z2014-12-10T19:33:57ZClaims of East Asia’s ‘chalk and talk’ teaching success are wrong, and short-sighted too<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66588/original/image-20141208-16329-e5x2jr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">East Asian academic success is based on culture rather than teaching methods. And Australia can't, and shouldn't, imitate that culture. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/downloading_tips.mhtml?code=&id=116494690&size=medium&image_format=jpg&method=download&super_url=http%3A%2F%2Fdownload.shutterstock.com%2Fgatekeeper%2FW3siZSI6MTQxODA0NDc1MCwiYyI6Il9waG90b19zZXNzaW9uX2lkIiwiZGMiOiJpZGxfMTE2NDk0NjkwIiwicCI6InYxfDEwMTI3NTg4fDExNjQ5NDY5MCIsImsiOiJwaG90by8xMTY0OTQ2OTAvbWVkaXVtLmpwZyIsIm0iOiIxIiwiZCI6InNodXR0ZXJzdG9jay1tZWRpYSJ9LCJoR2IzUlhjY3AxM0lNKzZvVXQrb01oOHkyWG8iXQ%2Fshutterstock_116494690.jpg&racksite_id=ny&chosen_subscription=1&license=standard&src=5cTlSv1jnwZO9IAlnDK9OQ-3-13">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since Shanghai, China, emerged at the top of international league tables of educational performance such as the OECD’s Program for International Student Assessment (<a href="http://www.oecd.org/pisa/">PISA</a>), there have been repeated calls for Australia and other western countries to learn from East Asian countries. </p>
<p>One of the more recent comes from Kevin Donnelly, recently <a href="https://theconversation.com/chalk-and-talk-teaching-might-be-the-best-way-after-all-34478">published in The Conversation</a> and picked up by <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/11/25/the-chinese-have-some-important-things-to-teach-us-about-education/">The Washington Post</a> and the <a href="http://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1651155/chinas-lesson-why-west-was-wrong-abandon-chalk-and-talk-teaching-methods?page=all">South China Morning Post</a>. This article advocated that we should learn from the “chalk and talk” teaching methods reported to be used in Shanghai, where a teacher directs instruction from the front of the class, and revive these in Australian schools.</p>
<p>The problem with such calls is the assumption that the success of East Asian countries is due to specific features of their education systems. Even at first glance, this assumption would seem to be dubious. The school systems in these countries are quite diverse and are certainly not universally characterised by the use of chalk and talk, or any other specific teaching method.</p>
<p>It was always possible that the success of East Asian students was primarily due to their commitment to educational success through hard work. <a href="http://www.ioe.ac.uk/newsEvents/104961.html">Recent work</a> has demonstrated that this alternative explanation is probably correct. This work compares the performance of children of East Asian ethnicity growing up in their country of origin with similar children growing up in Australia.</p>
<p>It is obvious that in migrating to Australia, these children did not bring their schools, their teachers and their teaching methods with them. So, if they continue to be high performers, what they left behind cannot provide the explanation.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/66589/original/image-20141208-16317-1pnjk4v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Educational success in East Asian countries is based on a culture of hard work, not chalk.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/downloading_tips.mhtml?code=&id=157595639&size=medium&image_format=jpg&method=download&super_url=http%3A%2F%2Fdownload.shutterstock.com%2Fgatekeeper%2FW3siZSI6MTQxODA0NDk0MSwiYyI6Il9waG90b19zZXNzaW9uX2lkIiwiZGMiOiJpZGxfMTU3NTk1">Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The <a href="http://www.ioe.ac.uk/newsEvents/104961.html">University of London study</a> found that Australian students with East Asian parents outperform those with Australian-born parents in mathematics by the equivalent of nearly three years of schooling. The results of students of East Asian ancestry in Australia were statistically similar to the average score of Shanghai students (613) and significantly higher than scores in Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan. Thus students of East Asian ancestry in Australia perform highly without access to the teachers and schools in their country of origin.</p>
<p>There is a lot of evidence pointing to the real factors involved, in particular long hours of out-of-school study. Homework starts early, often as early as pre-school, and increases as students proceed through school. Data from <a href="http://www.oecd.org/pisa/keyfindings/pisa-2012-results-volume-IV.pdf">PISA 2012</a> show that a higher percentage of students from East Asia participate in out-of-school coaching classes than in Australia. They generally spend much longer on homework and study at home as well. These intense study patterns are continued by students of East Asian ancestry growing up in Australia.</p>
<p>A <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02n680939.2014.892156#.VHvt1dKUd8E">smaller study</a> published in the Journal of Education Policy found similar results. It concluded that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>cultural background appears to be more consequential for the educational attainment of Chinese immigrant students than exposure to the educational systems of Australia or New Zealand.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>This success comes with costs Australia doesn’t want</h2>
<p>If the greater success of students of East Asian ancestry, both in East Asia and Australia, is a matter of cultural commitment to education, we need to ask if we should emulate the educational pressures imposed by East Asian parents and schools. There are two reasons for doubting that this is a sensible way to go, even if such a substantial cultural shift was feasible in a reasonable time-frame.</p>
<p>Firstly, while we may look to East Asia for lessons, most countries in East Asia are dissatisfied with their educational outcomes. They believe that they are not <a href="http://blogs.worldbank.org/education/node/755">producing flexible and creative thinkers</a>, and often look to western education systems for a lead. </p>
<p>Secondly, we also need to look at the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/02/opinion/sunday/south-koreas-education-system-hurts-students.html?src=twr&_r=1">impact of the educational pressures</a> imposed in East Asia on the children. There are many reports of mental health and attitudinal issues associated with these pressures. One of the best documented is the emergence of an <a href="http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2812%2960272-4/abstract">epidemic of myopia</a>, or short-sightedness, in precisely those countries in East Asia that score highly on both educational outcomes and out-of-school coaching and homework in PISA data. </p>
<p>In East Asia, <a href="http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2812%2960272-4/abstract">around 80%</a> of students completing secondary school are short-sighted. <a href="http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2812%2960272-4/abstract">Around 20%</a> have such severe myopia that they are at a markedly increased risk of irreversible vision loss later in life. <a href="http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2812%2960272-4/abstract">Studies have linked these vision problems</a> with extended periods of time spent indoors studying. The human cost of East Asian educational success is very high.</p>
<p>All in all, there is not a lot for us to learn from East Asia on educational success, despite the commentators and policy-makers who follow this line. Instead, it may make more sense for East Asian countries to look at western countries such as Finland, Canada and even Australia and New Zealand. They manage to combine reasonably high educational outcomes with more rounded and balanced development of students, and without an epidemic of myopia.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/35162/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ian Morgan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Since Shanghai, China, emerged at the top of international league tables of educational performance such as the OECD’s Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), there have been repeated calls…Ian Morgan, Visiting Fellow, Research School of Biology and Distinguished Visiting Fellow, Zhongshan Ophthalmic Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, CHina, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.