Govt urged to focus on boosting vocational education

By The Nation

 

File photo

 

UPGRADING VOCATIONAL education will be the key to boosting the country’s competitiveness and helping it step out of the middle-income trap, the Future Innovative Thailand Institute (FIT) has advised.
 

To implement the upgrade, the FIT called on the government to provide wage support to vocational students during their internship – which will last about six months per academic year – and introduce several other supportive measures. 

 

“The support should be equivalent to between 50 and 70 per cent of the minimum wage,” the FIT said in its proposal. Established in 2013, the FIT is a non-governmental organisation focusing on identifying the country’s problems and proposing practical solutions. 

 

“Today, Thailand does not have a comparative advantage from a large number of unskilled and a cheap labour force for labour-intensive industries. That advantage existed in the 1980s, not today,” FIT chairman Pisit Leeahtam said recently.

 

The minimum daily wage currently ranges from Bt308 to Bt330 in Thailand, sharply up from three decades ago, when it was under Bt100. 

 

Even more worrying, Pisit said, is the fact that the number of medium-skilled to highly skilled workers in Thailand is also relatively small, leaving the country unable to upgrade its industry to “technology-intensive” or “capital-intensive” levels.

 

“It’s necessary that we urgently invest more in vocational education in order to increase the number of skilled labourers, especially engineers and technicians, and upgrade the industrial sector to higher technology level,” Pisit said. 

 

He expected the move to generate higher productivity or higher value, and help Thailand emerge from the middle-income trap.

Thailand has been a middle-income country for several decades already. 

 

According to the FIT, while Thailand’s per capita national income in 2017 was about Bt16,300 per month, a survey showed that 74.84 per cent of Thais earned less than Bt15,000. Such figures were a reflection that most people working Thais have few skills and earn less than the average, Pisit said. 

 

The FIT presented its proposals at a recent forum in a bid to draw the attention of academics, politicians and representatives from various organisations to vocational education. 

 

Onstage were Dr Tharadol Piempongsant, the FIT’s director of the Public Policy Department, and FIT Policy Analyst Wipattra Totemchokchaikarn.

 

They said the government should support free education for vocational certification at both government and private vocational institutes, in technical, commercial and other fields, with budgetary support meeting international standards. 

 

They pointed out that, without adequate funding, vocational institutions would continue to lack modern equipment to properly train their students. 

 

They also recommended that the government establish an internship centre as a hub for the private sector, academic institutes and students, with vocational curriculum offering three months of theoretical courses and three months of internship, switching back and forth. 

 

The FIT also suggested that the government arrange free vocational training for interested people so they could improve their skills and learn new skills. 

 

“The free training could be provided via one million coupons for training, each worth Bt3,500,” it said. 

 

If possible, the government should engage the private sector more in vocational education and skills-training management, the FIT added.

 

The FIT hoped that in the future, the ratio of vocational students to general-education students would be 1:1.

 

It added that the salaries of people with vocational certificates should also be almost on par with those holding bachelors’ degrees.

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/national/30361141

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2018-12-26

Credit to this man for having the courage to admit that Thais in general are not educated enough to compete. That's a good first step. 

 

After focusing on the laborers, next please focus on the so-called educated university students from Thailand's top universities, who are also poorly educated. 

Many of us know what the role of govt and private schools are in Thailand, and it ''Ain't the 3 r's''..

Edited December 25, 20187 yr by mok199

14 minutes ago, mok199 said:

Many of us know what the role of govt and private schools are in Thailand, and it ''Ain't the 3 r's''..

I thought the 3 r's were alive and well...….rort, rort, rort!

lies, big lies & statistics

 

" According to the FIT, while Thailand’s per capita national income in 2017 was about Bt16,300 per month, a survey showed that 74.84 per cent of Thais earned less than Bt15,000. Such figures were a reflection that most people working Thais have few skills and earn less than the average, Pisit said.  "

 

nothing to do with the chinese families that earn billions and pay slave wages, right

2 hours ago, webfact said:

Govt urged to focus on boosting vocational education

By The Nation

 

If they think that I'd let a bunch of kids - who don't know their 6-times table, let alone how many foot-pounds of torque it takes to hold down my Kubota's cylinder head - loose on any machine of mine, they've another think coming. Let's get a few basics - yeh, some of those 'orrible 3-R's - into kids' heads before we think of running before we can walk.

 

And the FIT would respond, 'But Ossy, that wouldn't be much fun . . . would it?'

One million coupons for 3.500 Baht - and that will get you a vocational education yes? I rather think that somebody will have a nice “commission” on that amount.
If the people in charge - who are supposed to have a higher education - come up with these ideas are stupid what then does one expect from the less educated labor force in this country?

I always maintain with my Thai friends whenever we drive or talk about things like education - that if the local “ leaders” are to stupid to built a proper road or highway (yes not one where people can do U-turns into high speed oncoming traffic ) or if they don’t know and don’t care how to properly educate and train the workforce of this country denying them the opportunity to fight their way out of poverty - then these so called leaders who hold the country back are free to travel to Europe and educate themselves how it is done!
My Thai friends usually answer it it’s not in their leaders interest - the only interest they have is to fill their deep pockets.
To be proactive is unheard of in this country and now - if course after the fact that they find out that they’re lacking skilled labor they think they can pull a fast one and give somebody a vocational education for 3500 baht?

In the country where I come from a vocational education / apprenticeship takes at least 3 years and includes not only the practical work / training by masters in their field but also the theoretical part in vocational schools with teachers having usually decades of experience in the field they are teaching.
And here some FIT comes along and tells people you can get a proper vocational education in 6 month for 3500 Baht - and who will be the teachers?
The cowboys who work as electricians, mechanics, builders, painters e.g the ones one encounters here every day - who don’t have a clue what they are doing?
Decades of neglect to modernize and educate the labor force are showing now - there is no quick fix for that.




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Expanding Vocational training still requires a free gang ride and gang waring too. they need to tackle this problem. I would never ever let my kids close to any style of vocational training.

4 hours ago, webfact said:

“It’s necessary that we urgently invest more in vocational education in order to increase the number of skilled labourers, especially engineers and technicians, and upgrade the industrial sector to higher technology level,”

How about diverting all the military conscripts into non-military vocational programs paid by the military?

 

Thai education becomes worse and worse... we don't even have books in Thai for some subjects and then I'm told that I cann't buy books in English for those subjects because they are too expensive...
Then they talk about Thailand 4.0 and that we should teach paperless so they cut the budget for blank papers by 80%/teacher, but ...
* Only 1 in 10 students have a computer (vocational students out in the province, so not at a private school in Bangkok!).
* 1 in 10 students don't even have a smart phone.

* The WiFi coverage in this college is about 10% of campus.
* About 1/2 of the classrooms have projectors, but some are broken and there is no screen to project on in most classrooms.
* Many of the Thai teachers are basically computer illiterate, they can surf internet, maybe make a PowerPoint and maybe, just maybe make spreadsheets but then their capabilities are caped... and I'm talking about computer teachers!!!

The schools are a joke, completely corrupt.  They are very far behind now.   There’s no will to change same as the police.  Thailand is going down