Studying In An Isaan University As A Farang Retiree

[Martin]

'Joe' said he, and possibly others, would be interested in hearing about my experience, over the past eighteen months, of doing a study for a Master's degree in the Social Sciences at Khon Kaen University (KKU).

It all started when I noticed that some 'baby boom' farangs and their Isaan-village wives had built houses ahead of retirement and visited them each year for a holiday.

One day I had been at the Amphoe Offices and later in the day I met one such couple on holiday. When I had left them, the thought popped into my head: "When you retire to your village, you will be a formidable addition to its little society, and the Amphoe officials had better not 'look down their noses' at you", (like I had seen them do to "mere farmers from Ban Nork" in the morning).

My next thought was : "There's a sociology thesis in what effects the return of such village daughters may have".

I happened to be going to visit KKU, so I asked about doing research for a postgraduate degee. My contact said there was no reason why not, and told me how to start the ball rolling with an e-mail to the appropriate Dean.

It has been an intriguing experience that has given me a much greater insight into Thailand, mostly by making me do some careful reading of some books and theses that wouldn't otherwise have occured.

I did nearly all the reading, thinking, enquiring, and writing at home, with the aid of the Internet, but having access to KKU Library was useful in starting off a few lines of thought.

What has surprised me has been the amount of work that I have had to do after I thought it was all finished when I had successfully defended my thesis at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences.

An article had to be prepared and a Journal found that was willing to publish it.

Also the thesis had to be submitted to the Graduate School to be checked for 'conformity to protocol'. There, some formidable ladies have pored over it time and again; each time giving it back to me for further improvements to the 'desktop publishing' aspects. In my innocence, I had produced a document whose margins weren't exactly the specified dimensions, had used wrong fonts, had failed to put certain bits in the References in bold, and so on and on and on.

(It is the same for the Thai students, too. At the Graduate School's 'One Stop Shop' I met a middle-aged lady who had had leave-of-absence from her position in Pharmacy at the Teaching Hospital to do a PhD. We were in agreement----the scholarship had turned out to be easy compared to the difficulties of making the presentation acceptable.)

Previously, I had blithely accepted:"Thai culture is hierarchical and presentational".

Now I say:"Yes. Been there, and suffered that."

I think that, in these early days for 'Learning in Later Life' in Thailand, experiences could vary a lot. So anybody else giving it a whirl might come up with quite a different experience, and gain different things. So don't let me put anybody off.

And I am not put off. In fact, I am discussing the possibility of doing a PhD study on a slightly different subject.

Here is the short abstract of the article that will be published in the Journal of Mekong Region Societies. If anybody would like me to e-mail them the full article, please send me a PM with your e-mail address.

Short Abstract:

The study was undertaken in preparation of a thesis for an MA in the Social Sciences at Khon Kaen University.

It examined the general social situation in Isaan villages in the past, in the present, and in possible futures.

The development of national sustainable sufficiency, during the next thirty years, will depend upon the re-strengthening of the social (economic, political, and cultural) capital of the villages. A scenario developed of geopolitical impacts on Thailand causing its past rural-to-urban drift to reverse, and of this re-vitalising the villages.

Enquiries were made amongst Western men whose Thai wives are living, and often working, in the West. Some of those couples intend to return to the wife’s girlhood village for their retirement years. These wives can be expected to play a small, but significant role, in adding their part to the increasing social capital of the villages.

[cathyy]

This is interesting information. A retiree can attend Uni without getting an education visa? And about how much does it cost to attend, if you take classes? How does one go about getting admitted?

[Martin]

Sorry to be slow to reply, 'cathyy'. I missed putting in the 'track topic' request.

Yes,with the retirement visa, there was no problem about signing on.

They took the money for 6 credits at, I seem to remember, about 1300 baht per credit, plus an international student fee of 15,000 baht. Then, a couple of terms later, they took the money for another 30 credits and another 15k international student fee.

As I don't understand spoken, or written Thai, I didn't take any classes. Just did an old-fashioned MA-by-research. A friendly Thai ajaan did the 'Abstract in Thai' for me.

There were certain frustrations, which it wouldn't do to air here. But, if you (or anybody else) is considering going the route, please PM me and I may be able to give you some useful forewarning.

I am hoping that I can avoid those frustrations when doing my PhD study.

I found that "Learning in Later Life", although it has been going stronger and stronger in the West for some twenty years, hasn't got going in Thailand yet. Also "Futures Studies" appears to be non-existent among Thai academics.

I was well pleased with the 3-credit undergraduate course POLSC171 "Introduction to Futures Studies" that I did on-line with the U. of Hawai'i Center for Futures Studies Research. Got a lot out of it, but had to put a lot of hard work in.