Isolated Schools May Not Have To Merge: Chiang Rai

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Isolated schools may not have to merge
Tanpisit Lerdbamrungchai
The Nation
Chiang Rai


Education Minister Phongthep Thepkanjana looks at students while they use tablets at a school branch of Pha Khwang Witthaya School in Chiang Rai.

CHIANG RAI: -- The Education Ministry will provide further assistance to small schools that are unable to merge with larger ones, due to their isolated locations, said Education Minister Phongthep Thepkanjana, following recent discussions with locals in Chiang Rai's Muang district.

During his visit to the province he paid a visit to a small school - a branch of Pha Khwang Witthaya School - which provides education for up to 39 students. Despite having only 39 students, the school will not be merged as it serves students in an isolated mountainous area, said Phongthep, who talked with locals and discussed ways to keep the school open.

The school's administrators revealed that they lacked the resources, but stressed it was crucial to keep it open for the students.

"The Education Ministry will provide the school with more resources for the sake of the students. The school will be equipped with a satellite for distance learning and temporary teachers will be assigned to teach subjects with which local teachers are not so familiar. Locals will also take part in passing on their wisdom - such as weaving and basketry - so that students can apply them in their working lives," Phongthep said.

Responding to opposition against the school-merging policy, Phongthep insisted that it was to improve the quality of education and was not just aimed at closing down small and inefficient schools.

However, he said those schools that could not be merged due to their isolation, would receive assistance from the ministry in the form of educational planning and temporary teachers, who would travel to the schools to teach subjects like mathematics and English.

Surajate Palee, director of Pha Khwang Witthaya School, said one of its school branches - Khwae Wuadam - was in a mountainous area where the Karen and Lahu tribes lived. He said it was too isolated for students to travel to another school and the parents were also too poor to pay for their children to attend schools further away.

Lerphong Phornphininworakij, acting director of the Khwae Wuadam branch, said its teachers had to teach students in combined classes with Prathom 5 (Grade 5) and Prathom 6 (Grade 6) studying mathematics together. Prathom 5 students often had to wait until Prathom 6 students finished their more advanced lessons before joining the class. This, he said, meant that the teaching process was much slower than in schools with proper resources. As a result, the school's national test scores were well below the national average, he said.

Naji Ja-nga, 48, a mother, said the school branch helped provide her child with some education. She did not want it to be closed down and said the ministry should instead provide it with more teachers, books and equipment.

Nako Waku, a grandma of a student at the school, said she did not want her niece, still in primary education, to have to travel far as she was still too young.


-- The Nation 2013-06-03

[tominbkk]

great photo op. wonder what a real school looks like.

[Thaddeus]

great photo op. wonder what a real school looks like.

[amecth]

This is what it was like before he came.

[colinneil]

Would does a real school look like!!! nothing like the photo . Set up for the cameras!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!