Objectives

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The Institute was established in July 2000 as an organization appointed by the Asia Pacific Student Services Association APSSA for training and development of student affairs practitioners in higher education on an international basis.

APSSA, since its establishment in 1988 has placed emphasis on training and development of its members. Positive results however only began to emerge since 1998. Several pioneering programs launched since 1998 have significant impact on training and development of student affairs practitioners on a global basis.

The Staff Attachment Program, introduced in 1998 as a regional program in the Asia Pacific has extended to include individuals and institutions in Australia, Germany and USA as participants and/or host institutions. By end of 2002, 20 persons and 16 institutions from 9 countries have participated. Each spent from two to 12 weeks in a host institution outside their own countries. Detailed logbooks on work done on daily basis and written reports are kept by the Institute for general reference of members.

From 1998 to end of 2002, four training courses have been organized for 80 practitioners from over 20 institutions within the Asia Pacific region. The courses so far mainly focused on concepts and practice in student affairs work and the role of student affairs in higher education. The typical format included two months of reading and writing assignments in distance learning for understanding of the subject matter and two full days of face-to-face seminar for sharing and analysis. All courses were conducted by experienced persons from within and outside the region.

APSSA by itself had organized study/visit tours to UK/Germany and USA in 1999 and 2002 respectively. The visit to UK included full participation at the annual conference of the Association of Managers of Student Services in Higher Education in UK and the one to USA included a symposium jointly organized by APSSA and a group of universities in southern California. The key feature of such visits was that all participants had each prepared a written paper on a topic related to the conference/symposium.

Basing on experience and observations gained so far, the Institute is developing new training programs that will draw on first hand experience of selected member institutions for case studies. It is believed that among member institutions, there is a sufficient number of best practice cases that can be shared among members.

Operations of the Institute are self-financed with income generated from fees collected from training courses. Credit balances have been used for providing awards for staff attachment activities. The accounts are under the administration and audit of APSSA.

Mr. Luke S.K. Wong, ex-Director of Student Affairs of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and founding President of APSSA was the Director of the Institute since 1998 till his retirement in 2008.

Dr. Kwok Hung Lai, Adjunct Assistant Professor and Senior Student Affairs Officer of the Hong Kong Institute of Education is the current Director of the Institute.