ABSTRACT
The chapter will analyze the reasons why Hong Kong teachers join the teaching profession. According to the findings, the teachers choose to teach because of intrinsic/altruistic values and goals, such as making a difference in students’ lives, enjoying working with youths, and keeping touch with a subject field, or extrinsic values and goals, such as job security and salary. Among these values and goals, making a difference in students’ lives emerges as the salient value and goal from the data. This value and goal also corresponds to the teachers’ moral conception of teaching and teacher. The analysis suggests that making a difference in students’ lives may be a socially constructed value and goal of teachers in teaching.
