Tests Give Low Marks To Thai Education Standards

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Tests give low marks to Thai education standards

By Wannapa Khaopa

The Nation

The educational performance of Thai students this year has been poor despite attempts by various agencies to improve the quality of their education, according to local academics.

Results of international and local educational assessment programmes this year indicate also that Thai students are not reaching a satisfactory criteria, they said.

Chulalongkorn University (CU) lecturer Sompong Jitradab Angsuwathin said the national tests reflected that Thailand had failed to improve its education quality. Another educational academic Assoc Prof Witayakorn Chiengkul, dean of the Social Innovation College at Rangsit University, said a big problem for the country this year was that it had not seriously improved its education standards.

"Thailand does not pay attention to the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA)'s results, although our students' performance was low. We have not analysed why they received low scores so as to be able to solve the problem," said Witayakorn.

"I gave the government six out of ten for its education improving policies," Sompong said.

But Witayakorn said he gave only four. He voiced his concern for some policies - such as higher payment for academic standings - which the government seemed to use them to get votes from educational personnel.

Both academics said the academic standing evaluation caused teachers and directors to leave their students behind. They focused on creating academic documents to be evaluated for higher academic standings, rather than improving their teaching for the sake of their students.

Sompong said he wanted laws related to the evaluation to be changed soon - from considering their academic documents to focusing on their students' performance.

"I don't agree with the five per cent salary increase policy for all government officers. It will be better if the amount was paid to increase young government officers' low salaries to attract more skilled people to the teaching profession," Witayakorn said.

"A study showed Thailand has spent a huge budget on its education," said Witayakorn. "However, the education quality is not high enough."

Compared to other ministries, the Education Ministry is allocated the highest budget - of Bt388 billion for the 2011 fiscal year - Bt41 billion up from this fiscal year. It was also given a huge budget under the Thai Khem Khaeng project this year of Bt40 billion.

Sompong said an educator told him another big problem was that government officers were not daring to initiate useful ideas for the country, which could stop short educational improvement. "They just wait for policies issued by politicians, where each politician has different ideas and interests."

Many educational problems have not been solved this year, according to these academics, and Sompong agreed the education reform's progress was slow. There were many challenges for agencies to overcome next year to deal with around 500,000 teachers and more than two million students at state and private schools nationwide.

Sompong urged agencies to push for a change in the laws related to academic standing evaluations. Politics should be stable and policies should be continuous. To push forward education reform, he urged a start on work following proposals from all sub-committees of the reform policy committee.

Witayakorn considered urgent matters included allowing high performance schools to have their own legal entities so they would be able to improve themselves independently and faster. Education coupon programmes should give students more good choices, while schools would try harder to improve their quality to attract more students. He wanted teachers to provide writing tests instead of multiple choices to encourage students' thinking skill.

"To find skilled teachers in education soon, regulations should be more flexible - so skilled people in the private sector or proficient retired people were allowed to pass on their knowledge to students, especially those in rural areas as part-time or volunteer teachers," he added.

-- The Nation 2010-12-29

[Scott]

So many problems. So many committees telling teachers what they should do. But very little support for teachers, very little in-service training, a lot of expectations.

They might want to prioritize, because right now everything is a priority. Handwriting must be neat, all students must finish their work, no matter how slow they are. Then there is marching practice and the latest, doing the Tango.

[HenMeeMai]

What - the Thai education system is in a mess? Surely not?

Now that is news...

[Xangsamhua]

Thailand spends much the same percentage of GDP on education as Korea (4.2% and 4.6%); however its performance on PISA compared to Korea is much poorer (49th compared to 2nd). The reason may be cultural, e.g. initiative not encouraged, hard work unrewarded/poor work not penalized, or it could be socio-economic. Thailand is a more heterogeneous society with more poverty vis a vis Korea, which is a more homogeneous society with less socio-economic disparity. Korea is both a wealthier country (PCI $20,165 compared with $4620) and has a much lower Gini coefficient than Thailand; hence Korea has much less income disparity.

National figures mask lots of things, especially the urban-rural disparities and perhaps the public-private sector performance differences (gender also in some countries). That some elite Thai schools and some students do well in international academic tournaments, etc is well known, but it appears that, apart from these elites, the great majority of schools are well behind their Northeast Asian counterparts. But not having suffered the trauma of war and radical social change experienced by the Northeastern nations there appears to be little real, widespread interest in Thailand in making radical reform in education. Unfortunately, social upheaval and/or disaster seems to be a necessary catalyst for reform in traditional societies. Thailand is a traditional society, but has not yet experienced social crisis that is violent and large-scale. Incidentally, the only other ASEAN countries to submit data to PISA are Indonesia (56th) and Singapore (5th, but hardly a traditional society, though "Confucian" virtues and the dynamism of immigrants are still strong). It would be interesting to see data for Vietnam and Malaysia.

My feeling is that Thailand is not yet post-traditional and therefore it's probably no fairer to criticize the Thais for being traditional and undynamic than to criticize fish for being aquatic.

[chiangmaibruce]

Hi all. Does anyone happen to have a copy of the actual PISA 2009 results summary report for Thailand?

I am having a lot of difficulty obtaining a copy. With the previous survey (2006) you could just download the Thailand report from the OECD web site. This time round the Thailand results page is blank (apart from the names of the local contacts). Emailed the OECD = nil response. Emailed the two Thailand contacts. Nil response from one and a very slow response from the other saying that he/she was no longer the contact for PISA. Gave me the current name and their email - I sent an email there and it just bounced back .... oh the joys of doing research in Thailand

Can anyone offer a lead? I've also tried google searching to turn up a copy elsewhere. Thanks if anyone can assist.

[JimShortz]

I'm shocked! I thought Thailand had an excellent education system in place...

[Xangsamhua]

Hi all. Does anyone happen to have a copy of the actual PISA 2009 results summary report for Thailand?

I am having a lot of difficulty obtaining a copy. With the previous survey (2006) you could just download the Thailand report from the OECD web site. This time round the Thailand results page is blank (apart from the names of the local contacts). Emailed the OECD = nil response. Emailed the two Thailand contacts. Nil response from one and a very slow response from the other saying that he/she was no longer the contact for PISA. Gave me the current name and their email - I sent an email there and it just bounced back .... oh the joys of doing research in Thailand

Can anyone offer a lead? I've also tried google searching to turn up a copy elsewhere. Thanks if anyone can assist.

This is all I could find: http://pisacountry.acer.edu.au/

You just double click on the country whose results you are interested in and on another if you wish to compare.

Emailing doesn't work well in Thailand, I've found. You have to get a name and phone them or get a colleague to do so..

[edwardandtubs]

There were many challenges for agencies to overcome next year to deal with around 500,000 teachers and more than two million students at state and private schools nationwide.

So Thailand has one teacher for every four students? Best education system in the world.

[Xangsamhua]

There were many challenges for agencies to overcome next year to deal with around 500,000 teachers and more than two million students at state and private schools nationwide.

So Thailand has one teacher for every four students? Best education system in the world.

Yes, I wonder where they get two million from. The latest data on the MoE website are for 2005 and give a figure of 14.43 million students.

[richard10365]

I taught for a bit in Chiang Mai before I started studying at Payap. What I saw was, if a student fails a test(at least at the pratom level), they still continue on to the next grade. There is really no incentive for the kid to try. It is considered poor teaching as the reason the kid fails. They go through their entire 12 years of school with this type of education. By the time they graduate, all they know is they don't have to try to succeed.

I'm sure there are other problems. Those are some that I noticed most.

[chiangmaibruce]

[This is all I could find: http://pisacountry.acer.edu.au/

You just double click on the country whose results you are interested in and on another if you wish to compare.

Emailing doesn't work well in Thailand, I've found. You have to get a name and phone them or get a colleague to do so..

Thanks for that, but unfortunately that source doesn't seem to include the 2009 results - only earlier ones