Patience urged amid university confusion

By CHULARAT SAENGPASSA 
THE NATION 

 

 

BEST APPLICANTS KEEP OTHERS IN LIMBO BUT ALL PROBLEMS TO BE RESOLVED SOON COUNCIL
 

THE COUNCIL of University Presidents of Thailand (CUPT) has urged critics of its new central admission system to be patient as they anticipate that problems will significantly ease before the end of this week. 

 

“Let’s wait until the 3/2 round concludes first,” CUPT secretary general Prasert Kanthamanon said yesterday. 

 

Nearly half of applicants in the third round of the new Thai University Central Admission System (TCAS), which is being introduced for the first time this year, have cried foul because they were not awarded places despite the third round attracting just 106,495 applicants for 100,334 available seats. 

 

Some universities, meanwhile, are dismayed that some of their programmes have not yet received any new confirmed students. 

 

The problem has occurred because the third round of TCAS allows each applicant to choose up to four favourite higher-educational programmes and if their scores are high enough, they can be offered seats in all four. 

 

Although the best candidates will have to choose just one programme in the end, the fact they have the choice in their hands means many others have to wait to learn their fate. 

 

 

Universities also have to consider what to do with seats given up by successful candidates. 

 

Because of the outcry from students who failed to get a seat from the third round, the CUPT resolved to add the 3/2 round late last month.

 

The extra round represents a bid to fill nearly 50,000 seats that became vacant because successful candidates chose other options and the results came out yesterday. 

 

Anxiety ran high among students, their parents and university lecturers. 

 

Many academics lamented on social media that their higher-education programmes, which had long proven popular, had many empty seats at the end of the 3/1 round.

 

For example, Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Engineering has 610 seats available for new students but just 269 candidates had in the 3/1 round confirmed their wish to accept a place, meaning it still had 341 seats empty. 

 

The university’s Faculty of Science has 14 seats available for its maths programme but not one of the 14 successful candidates in the 3/1 round confirmed their wish to take up the offer. 

 

“But now that we have added the 3/2 round, problems should significantly reduce,” Prasert said. 

 

He said universities should not complain as they all took part in designing TCAS. 

 

“TCAS is designed with good intention. It’s designed to address complaints about the old university admission system,” Prasert said. 

 

 

Assistant Professor Athapol Anunthavorasakul, who teaches at Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Education, said the designers of TCAS might have failed to listen carefully to the involved parties “otherwise, such scale of problems would have not occurred”. 

 

Sompong Jitradub, a lecturer at the same university, said it was not wrong for highly-successful students to be offered several places by the system before having to make up their minds. “It’s not their fault. The problem lies with how TCAS is designed,” he said. 

 

Sompong said he understood the CUPT’s good intention in developing TCAS “but as problems have arisen, it is necessary that CUPT solve them fast”. 

 

Sompong said that if students vying for a place in a medical school were not allowed to compete against students for other programmes, the problems might reduce considerably. 

 

Most successful candidates confirmed their right to study at medical schools in the 3/1 round.

 

Students who have not yet secured any seat in a higher-education programme at the end of the 3/2 round may submit an application via the fourth or fifth round of TCAS. 

 

Prasert said the CUPT would evaluate the TCAS system in October.

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/national/30347054

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2018-06-06

TCAS Total Catastrophe Another Shambles

Edited June 5, 20188 yr by Dave67

This is a classic Thai SNAFU (Situation Normal All...er Fouled Up).

 

What possible reason is there for a central admission system? What possible reason is there to take away the right of a university from choosing their own students? If the old system was not broken (and it didn't seem to be), why was a new system introduced?

 

At a time when people with some experience in Education in Asia (like myself and others on the Forum) believe that the Ministry of Education is a 'clear and present danger' to the future of Thailand itself, why would it embark on a program of massive centralization? The trend around the world, based on both empirical and anecdotal evidence, is that Education and Education Systems are a prime case studies for decentralization. Simply put, if you want to create a more effective system of education, the best thing you can do is push control and authority down to its lowest level; Thailand, for some unexplained reason, has moved in the complete opposite direction.

 

It is pretty clear that in the coming years and decades a country will rise or fall based on the education, adaptability and flexibility of its workforce. Currently, Thailand does not have a well-educated, adaptable or flexible workforce, and thus is going to suffer the consequences.

 

Thailand, if you do not repair your broken system of Education, you are going to fade into insignificance behind all your neighbours; think of how much 'Face' you'll have when that happens.

 

Very Thai, another layer of bureaucracy added to make a simple system more complicated. Creation of important jobs for men in suits. 

 

"He said universities should not complain as they all took part in designing TCAS." 

 

And, these are the leaders of the education system. Is it any wonder the final products, graduates, lag behind the rest of Asia.

 

Other than creating imaginary hubs, what else are they qualified to do?

 

 

Make central system.

It breaks.

Way to go Thailand!

4 hours ago, webfact said:

IN LIMBO

Is that an expression for the whole Thai education system as one unit?

5 hours ago, Dave67 said:

TCAS Total Catastrophe Another Shambles

 

 

7 hours ago, webfact said:

“TCAS is designed with good intention.

So results are secondary.

7 hours ago, webfact said:

He said universities should not complain as they all took part in designing TCAS. 

As we've seen repeatedly throughout the Prayut regime, public participation does not mean listening to the public - it just becomes a check mark on things to do.

7 hours ago, webfact said:

the designers of TCAS might have failed to listen carefully to the involved parties “otherwise, such scale of problems would have not occurred”. 

Confirmed.

Yet another balls-up to add to the already burgeoning list.

 

It sometimes seems that this country can't get anything right, and stagger from one cock-up to the next while steadfastly blaming someone else.

 

It's a real embarrassment sometimes.

Ill-conceived and poorly executed. What other result than a debacle could have been expected. Who are these policy makers. The boys in charge are (hopefully) realizing that it is slightly more complex to run a country than it is to run an army.

2 hours ago, Get Real said:

Is that an expression for the whole Thai education system as one unit?

 

Just one item, why is there a central admissions system, which means a centralized rigid structured system and processes.

 

Many other countries deliberately went into a decentralized education system many years ago (with some limited core rules regulations especially quality of outputs).

 

The benefit, it pits schools against schools meaning that there are continuous, often quite innovative improvements to the whole picture, and the improvements / benefits very often adopted by other schools

 

It works.

 

Here in LOS (from my own experience at uni level) the folks that make the rules at the top have no idea what they are doing, they have no clear objectives, very very few have any advanced philosophical insights into education, nor teaching / learning methodologies, and nobody at the actual universities would dare criticize or argue or suggest.

 

Doomed until there is massive change, and change is not coming soon. 

 

 

 

Best thing to do is close down all Thai Universities and send everyone abroad, where they might get a decent education if they can pass a few tests now and again instead of coming out with useless pieces of paper that mean nothing in the outside world.

It seems to be an overly complicated system for a relatively simple process. All they have to do is organise a basic and well proven system in such a way that the applicants with the smaller envelopes get eliminated in the early rounds.

This allows those successful applicants of the first round to review the size of their envelopes and if need be make some upward adjustment before moving to the second round....and so on. 

Why should the selection process for universities be any different to any other selection process in Thailand, be it the military, civil service or the RTP where merit usually counts for nought? 

This complete shambles is a graphic example of my meaning. Idiots getting to high places via the envelope and then making an administrative mess of running the country.

This plan they have could work.  The challenge that they are facing is that they did not do a test run to see where the issues and problems may lie.  

 

The fact that it takes a month for people to respond I find interesting.  I would much rather have the fate of a student I teach lie with a national test rather than how they did on the ONET, GPA or have them study for a GAT.

 

Having individual schools do the testing leads to a lot of money handling and students that can get into good schools not being able to.

 

I for one support the idea just think that there need to be a few kinks worked out.  

 

SUGGESTION:  have all students put their choices for university and course on the test.  That way at the end of the test they can be informed that they got their first or second choice.  Not wait for them to answer after.

 

I will be interested to check with my students on Sunday to see how they think it works as 2 of them are going to university next year.

6 hours ago, Samui Bodoh said:

This is a classic Thai SNAFU (Situation Normal All...er Fouled Up).

 

What possible reason is there for a central admission system? What possible reason is there to take away the right of a university from choosing their own students? If the old system was not broken (and it didn't seem to be), why was a new system introduced?

 

At a time when people with some experience in Education in Asia (like myself and others on the Forum) believe that the Ministry of Education is a 'clear and present danger' to the future of Thailand itself, why would it embark on a program of massive centralization? The trend around the world, based on both empirical and anecdotal evidence, is that Education and Education Systems are a prime case studies for decentralization. Simply put, if you want to create a more effective system of education, the best thing you can do is push control and authority down to its lowest level; Thailand, for some unexplained reason, has moved in the complete opposite direction.

 

It is pretty clear that in the coming years and decades a country will rise or fall based on the education, adaptability and flexibility of its workforce. Currently, Thailand does not have a well-educated, adaptable or flexible workforce, and thus is going to suffer the consequences.

 

Thailand, if you do not repair your broken system of Education, you are going to fade into insignificance behind all your neighbours; think of how much 'Face' you'll have when that happens.

 

Great post, Samui. Yes, Thai education is going in precisely the opposite direction of where it should be heading. School classes are still big (around 40 pupils in each class), university classes are getting bigger (if anything), all sorts of silly buzzwords and substanceless slogans are applied to 'new teaching methods' - but the general trend is a retrogressive one into worse education for the students.

 

I've said it before: this has been happening for so many decades that it cannot be an accident. It is structured this way by design - to keep the Thais ill-educated, cheap and manipulable. Under an authoritarian government (you know what I mean - but, like little children, we are forbidden - oh, fear, fear, fear - to use the real word!) a complete re-structuring and improvement of education could have been forced through. Instead - things are getting worse.

I just read before on TV News that Round 1 & 2 are automatically picked from past results & sports ability, while the Tests only start at round 3 (if I,m correct ) 

On 6/6/2018 at 4:13 AM, Dave67 said:

TCAS Total Catastrophe Another Shambles

Tons of  Cash  Assists Selection!!