Standard Evaluation Process Needed For Education: PM Abhisit

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Standard evaluation process needed for education: PM

By Thammarat Kitchalong,

Jeerapon Prasertpolkrang

The Nation

Various ways of evaluating Thai education should be integrated into one government standard to ensure one direction for future developments or planning, Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva told a Bangkok seminar yesterday.

The evaluation process should be simple and focus on specific areas, while lessening the academic burden endured by education officials and responsibilities of the Office for National Educational Standards and Quality Assessment (Onesqa), who direct national education plans.

Abhisit was responding to a recent evaluation that indicated Thai students' skills and scores in comprehensive reading, science and maths had dropped. The findings also showed that only students in renowned schools or demonstration schools maintained high standards in educational evaluations.

Speaking at the seminar, held to mark Onesqua's 10th anniversary, the PM said he would like to see one evaluation criteria under one standard put in place to assess the government's overall performances aside from education.

He said the one evaluation criteria should lead to improvements in the three subjects in which Thai students rated poorly in a survey by PISA, the Programme for International Student Assessment test by the France-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The evaluation should focus on end results and the impact of low scores in the subjects rather than details in the process which would burden pollsters or education officials with criteria unrelated to education.

Abhisit said what worried him was a huge amount of Education Ministry funds spent over the past decade had yielded little in productive results for Thai students.

"Many countries that have employed fewer teachers or invested less can produce better results than Thailand. This shows that budget plans and management of education have lacked efficiency."

Proficient teachers were a key factor in a country's education standards, he said. The standard of teachers needed to be boosted immediately.

What Onesqa had found in previous evaluations had not been fully utilised or recognised in the ministry's work. Abhisit said he had advised Education Minister Chinnaworn Boonyakiat to rely on details found in Onesqa evaluations in working out future policies.

He called on the private sector, businesses, and parents to take a greater role in improving Thailand's education through cooperation with the Quality Learning Foundation rather than relying solely on government support.

Onesqa chairman Chingchai Harnjanelak said Singapore led the performance table mainly because teachers were proficient and therefore paid high salaries. For while MPs' salaries could be raised, teachers' wages were not. "The government needs to make this a policy."

He said education reforms should not be held as first round or second round, because education should never stop expanding or improving.

Former education minister Rung Kaewdaeng said Onesqa's third-round evaluation should meet all criteria of the first two rounds. Schools or universities which failed to pass the first two evaluations should be helped and there should be no more schools that fail the third round.

-- The Nation 2010-12-21

[SweeneyAgonistes]

How silly. Why don't they all just send their children to Eton?

[asiawatcher]

There are serious flaws in education at primary school levels. Private institutions such as Regent et al charge huge fees for education which only middle or upper class can afford and for what? A 3 year old at Bangkok BiLingual is charged nearly USD5,000 a year and Regent upwards of USD6,500 a year. The education in the early years ay be important but even expats earning Baht 150,000 a month cannot afford to spend 10% on a child's 'day care with benefits'.

There needs to be education of higher quality than schools at the Wat's. I have seen Monks chanting monosyllabic rote teaching whilst kids throw darts, play, talk and laugh and show no respect and of course, learn nothing. But at what cost? The monks are doing the right thing but the majority lack the educational training to teach. You have to praise them for trying but the problem exists from the Govt on down!

An evaluation across the board, and not just at university where they hand out degrees like bus tickets regularly, more for encouragement than achievement for an acceptable level of international standard of education, is required and within the realms of budget for those who cannot afford it. Evaluation of the institution educating the masses is all very good but drop the entry level and increase the teaching standards and pay the teacher what they are worth. After all, they are setting up the future of not only the children but the country and as per the posts yesterday of promises of a 20,000 baht a month salary in 2017 after 6 years of training, ... get real!

[Siam Simon]

This is absolutely the one really important issue that Abhisit can sneak under the radar of the uglies.

How will it pan out?

[lungmi]

A primary school teacher told me that she could not accomplish a student appropriate work, because she is evaluated by a general curriculum which is far away from the local reality . I think this opinion describes the actual situation too.

[Scott]

There is teaching that is geared toward learning and there is teaching geared toward passing a test. My concern is that the second one will continue to be more important than the first one.