Education Minister Says Thailand Lacks Scientists

[MaxLee]

They have JUST worked this out.

Any teachers on here ever seen a school with anything resembling a science laboratory?

I know of one friend who was the son of some university lecturers in my home town. i was working down South for a while, and he explained his education to me very very well. He was scooped up from up country (and he admits that this was down to his parents, and good scores) and transported to a demonstration school where he showed some aptitude for chemistry and physics. At 16 he was sent overseas on a government scholarship and returned with an overseas degree in physics.

He promptly became part of a large oil company here in Thailand managing corrosion on pipelines, but was about to leave to do the same job back in Europe for approximately 10 times his salary in Thailand. He has a brother who went to the USA and works for GM in the USA on engine development. Toyota Thailand tried to head hunt him and offered a salary 10 times less than he has in the USA.

So there we have it, Thailand doesn't produce scientists because the business models here extend to family majority ownership, or business connection ownership who don't see the value in innovation and invention. The top salary belongs to the owner, and the business model relies extremely heavily on having cheap workers, not innovators. Do you think a company in Thailand would pay royalties to an in house patent creator on the going international rate?

Would I encourage my son to become an engineer, indeed. Would I encourage him to work for the stultifying atmosphere present in most Thai companies? Never. Do it yourself or get out of the country.

And don't forget if YOU are innovative then someone else lost face.

Exactly... And the whole world already knows, what FACE is there to save, when thanks to social media EVERYONE CAN SEE IT?????? What's the point, in still saving face?????

[Markaew]

My gf is a scientist and associate professor with a PhD from KU. Her passion is teaching and hope to impart her knowledge through teaching. She is now a lecturer, administrator and Assoc Dean with Burapha U for the last 6 years since graduating. Her last drawn is less than THB30000. It's only her passion that kept her in the job.

What's your point. Teachers don't make any money. She has gone to school. What is her knowledge/experience beyond school?

Edited May 18, 2013 by Markaew

[newermonkey]

oh;really, der!

Thais have no hope in hell of producing thinkers take a look at this kid - 99.999% of Thais would have no idea what he is talking about!!!

Excuse my saving so but, 99.999% of Westerners wouldn't either!!

Your kidding me? I must be one of the 0.001% then as i quite clear to me. "did have to play it a couple of times before i fully understood it".

[Considered Opinion]

Normally when I see something like this, revolving will use the word science, invention, new development, technology, I just sit back and think about what could have been if circumstances had been different. But circumstances were different Thailand is what Thailand is and if you think really hard you may come up with a product that churns the water in a prawn pond, which is reputed to have come from Thailand and for all I know, may well have been invented and developed here I have no proof one way or another.

Then I think about the times when I taught Thai students. I talked about structuring their "learning", knowing full well the difference between learning and being taught myself, but at the same time being relatively certain that I would not have to face the issue of learning per se.

Over the period of several years with each new incoming class in semester one of the year I would discuss the process of teaching, and that I would present them with for assignments to be submitted over the semester and they got all four on day one. The expectation was that by the end of week four, semester one assignment one was ready to submit. I explained to them that if they copied their friends work I had no objection to that. I did point out however, that if the work they presented was the copy of another student's work, then the marks for the work would be divided between the number of people who submitted it. To explain briefly, for those not keeping up, if my best student submitted a paper which was good for 100 points/percent and then that same student shared with five of his friends, which wouldn't have been bad in a class of 50, then each student who presented that paper as their own would get the marks it was worth divided by the number of times I read it.

In essence, number one student present a paper definitely worth 100% shared with five friends each student gets 100÷6 = 16.7%.

This made me very few friends either in the foreign teachers lounge or the Thai teachers lounge, and the students didn't seem to appreciate it very much either.

My first lecture, on day one semester two was on the subject of "original thought".

It went down very well I thought.

[Bagwan]

I remember have some difficulty getting my head around quadratic algebraic equations and I asked the schoolmaster to run through it again. His response was to ask me if I was a thicky - shades of Another Brick in the Wall. I replied that I thought that I was reasonably intelligent and examination results tended to back this. I suggested that I had not fully understood because his teaching methods left something to be desired. This effrontery gained me a Saturday morning detention - which I did not attend.

Could anybody imagine such a scenario occurring in a Thai place of learning?

[Thai at Heart]

I remember have some difficulty getting my head around quadratic algebraic equations and I asked the schoolmaster to run through it again. His response was to ask me if I was a thicky - shades of Another Brick in the Wall. I replied that I thought that I was reasonably intelligent and examination results tended to back this. I suggested that I had not fully understood because his teaching methods left something to be desired. This effrontery gained me a Saturday morning detention - which I did not attend.

Could anybody imagine such a scenario occurring in a Thai place of learning?

The scariest answer from the teacher might be, that he didn't understand it either.

[rubl]

Education Minister says Thailand lacks scientists

Obviously that's because Thai schoolkids didn't have tabletPCs.