Lifting education system will require wholehearted effort

[Lite Beer]

EDITORIAL
Lifting education system will require wholehearted effort
The Nation

BANGKOK: -- Chaturon is right to end abuses of the system, but he may also need to simply offer teachers better pay

Education Minister Chaturon Chaisang is up against a great deal. He is taking on a big machine that has not functioned properly for many years.

Yes, we are talking about the national education system, a huge structure that never seems to generate the desired outputs, no matter how much calibration is done on it.

Of course, there is an argument that the government has not put enough much money into the system. But for Thai politicians, the Education Ministry is considered "Class A". That refers to the fact the ministry does get a significant amount of money - but it says absolutely nothing about quality, efficiency or sensible use of the funds it is allocated.

Over the years, each minister taking over the position tries to give the impression that they have some magic wand up their sleeve. And they opt for some high profile, quick-fix schemes like computer tablets or other headline grabbing activity. But in the end, few ministers have held this portfolio for long over the past decade or more, so few had had the opportunity to achieve significant changes.

Chaturon is man with more substance than most politicians and has shown that he knows better than making remarks for public consumption.

But he should be applauded for raising one embarrassing point that many of us know about but few talk of - the practice of allowing primary students to earn a passing grade if he or she helps teachers with errands and other chores that have nothing to do with their education.

Chaturon said he had heard that in many cases, students could automatically pass exams - and those who failed certain subjects could be "re-tested" - by helping teachers with work such as flower arranging or cleaning a classroom.

This is nothing less than a teacher passing their duties to others when he or she should address the responsibility on their own. If a student can't read or write at a basic level, what makes the teacher think he or she might do better in a higher level?

This problem has led to students proceeding to higher levels while their level of competency is still the same. If teachers do this often enough, the quality of education will go down the drain.

We may need to think "outside of the box" and be creative if we want to eliminate these sorts of faults. We have on our hands an education system that is largely ineffective, producing students who are ill-prepared to take on the real world, lacking skills such as the ability to think critically.

But where do we start? An entire industry of tutoring has been set up outside the official system to address shortcomings of the current set-up. But many of these "cram schools" are geared simply towards helping students pass their tests - not deeper knowledge and critical thinking.

Besides students' weak grades, perhaps we have to spend more time on the teachers and better teaching methods. After all, this is an issue of accountability. This means that test results should be used as a measure of teacher performance. Individuals should not look at this profession as a free ride.

One of the saddest realities is that our society does not value educators. People who come to this profession are often accused of not being able to get into other lines of work.

It goes without saying that higher pay and greater respect will attract better qualified individuals to the profession. A combination of higher pay and a better process for screening would-be teachers may be a good way to lift slumping Thai education standards.

-- The Nation 2013-09-22

[Tatsujin]

Besides students' weak grades, perhaps we have to spend more time on the teachers and better teaching methods. After all, this is an issue of accountability. This means that test results should be used as a measure of teacher performance. Individuals should not look at this profession as a free ride.

Stopping the "no fail" policy, and making students work for their grades might be a good start too. And stop blaming the Teachers for everything, make the students/parents responsible also.

[yooper2001]

Education or experience is not required to get a job in Thailand.

the requirements are

1. You must be good looking

2. You must be young

3. No experience is a plus

Thailand is all about appearance

[RickeyParkany]

Platitudes, anyone? ... two-fers!!! ;-} rap.

Edited September 22, 2013 by RickeyParkany

[kurnell]

Education or experience is not required to get a job in Thailand.

the requirements are

1. You must be good looking

2. You must be young

3. No experience is a plus

Thailand is all about appearance

I've had good looking girls in my office (a couple have been bimbos). one was excellent and moved on to a better job, and the remainder (plainer) girls have been fantastic. Very switched on. I do not employ men at all in the office, except the drivers/messengers and laborers (for the warehouse) and guess which lot cause the most trouble, work the least, take the most sick days?

[culicine]

Education or experience is not required to get a job in Thailand.

the requirements are

1. You must be good looking

2. You must be young

3. No experience is a plus

Thailand is all about appearance

You forgot....connections and money.

Right before our final exams, students appear so sabai sabai. Some were even spotted playing cards, fiddling on their phones, tablets, etc. Why not, when even the worst students get a 50%. Everyone graduates school in this country with a minimum 50%.

To top it off we got students getting into engineering courses who can barely do any physics or maths. Worse still, some of them manage to graduate. This mainly applies to private programs, and not some of the top, more competitive courses.

As for pay - they can pay what they like, it won't necessarily increase performance and outcomes of students - too many factors are involved. You could have a PhD in maths and be a lousy teacher, if you don't know how to teach children and understand them and their needs. School admin are more concerned with appeasing the MoE with tons of useless paperwork, and provide little assistance to teachers in terms of actual education of the students.

Certainly over the last 13 years I have seen a steady decline in the attitudes and performance of school students....they seem to study just to pass some entrance exam and not for the love of gaining (new) knowledge....this has to change or we will get nowhere.

[Netizen]

Education or experience is not required to get a job in Thailand.

the requirements are

1. You must be good looking

2. You must be young

3. No experience is a plus

Thailand is all about appearance

The same applies for every country in the world.

[Netizen]

Thailand is in danger of becoming a backwater and just a human zoo for foreign tourists wanting to view how villagers with a quaint language lived centuries ago. The lack of quality in education mirrors the lack of quality in industry.

1. Corruption is a way of life practiced and exemplified by politicians
2. English language proficiency not widespread and probably never will be because most Thais are extremely insular and have no interest in the rest of the world
3. Low grade service people who do low grade work
4. No quality accreditation system to promote those who are proficient and successful in providing services
5. No means of searching for proficient service providers

[cup-O-coffee]

Again!!!

[MaxLee]

Lifting education system will require wholehearted effort to stop placing value on FACE and degree, learning 8-10 subjects PER semester INCLUDING several test of tests and tests of tests of the testing testing testin tutor school to pass a pre test pre test and pre test to pass another stage of testing for getting accepted for another exam to get accepted for another exam in order to take another exam to get accepted to a university that teaches only crap and costs trillions Kachillians of borrowed loans and brainwashes the students' brains until the point of beyond brain damage and ending up jobless and zero social common sense skills, while for the rich kids they just get paid under their behinds by their influential parents and okay Facebook and social media all say long filling the office hours only being THERE

[upena]

No article or editorial has yet to hit the nail on the head. The Thai Government does not want an educated population. Much easier to control the masses if they believe spirits caused Thai Air to skid off the runway, tourism grows higher every year no matter what, and Thailand actually has some sort of positive image abroad.

[pomchop]

One simple step would be to ALLOW falang volunteers to TEACH CONVERSATIONAL ENGLISH in the public schools without all the BS about having a work permit for doing something for free.

There are thousands of warm hearted retired expats who are bored to death and would be glad to donate a day or two a week to interact with the kids and at least ATTEMPT to get them to speak English.

In my experience in a rural school I have found that many of the kids actually can read and write English fairly well...BUT...since the TESTS that are sent up from Bangkok all are WRITTEN and since the teachers all know that their performance can be based on these written test results they of course concentrate ALL of their teaching efforts on the reading and writing....meantime the kids receive basically ZERO instruction/practice on actually SPEAKING and UNDERSTANDING English....many Thai teachers of English teach their English classes in THAI.....

IF IF IF the govt would offer a one year no hassle visa to expats in return for them doing some basic conversation teaching they would likely get a lot of volunteers. Naturally there would need to be some rules and regulations and minimium qualifications like xx hours per week, always a thai teacher in classroom with ex pat (don't need the perverts) etc.

Of course I realize that this is likely a dream but I continue to think it is truly sad not to utilize the time and talents of so many expats who WOULD be willing to help FOR FREE. It is called a win/win to give bored retired expats something to do and the kids might actually get up the courage to attempt to USE the English they know in the REAL WORLD of speaking and understanding.

[alanferdi]

Besides students' weak grades, perhaps we have to spend more time on the teachers and better teaching methods. After all, this is an issue of accountability. This means that test results should be used as a measure of teacher performance. Individuals should not look at this profession as a free ride.

Stopping the "no fail" policy, and making students work for their grades might be a good start too. And stop blaming the Teachers for everything, make the students/parents responsible also.

Thailand... Education is not just giving away badges and medals, that do not mean a thing in the world! Education is teaching children to question, and giving them the tools to analyze their responses. Teaching children to be quiet and not question the teacher is the biggest mistake they make! Integrate with education systems in the world to help students understand their world! Teaching them to copy, imitate and follow instructions cease when the student first learns to articulate his own thinking!

[PatOngo]

a "wholehearted effort".......................the idea is doomed right there!

[thomash]

Actually the Latin word that education comes from means draw out from within and that is very difficult to do here in Thailand when it is mainly about image and appearance instead of real substance. Also a lot of this is connected with the insane obsession in Thailand of saving face no matter what. When that becomes ones priority it is very difficult to do a lot of things like communicate clearly, truthfully and directly, own up to and learn from your mistakes, take advice or constructive criticism from others and the list goes on and on. And all this is not going to change in Thailand in the foreseeable future so not much is going to actually change then it 's just wishful thinking.

[drdoom6996]

Education or experience is not required to get a job in Thailand.

the requirements are

1. You must be good looking

2. You must be young

3. No experience is a plus

Thailand is all about appearance

You forgot....connections and money.

Right before our final exams, students appear so sabai sabai. Some were even spotted playing cards, fiddling on their phones, tablets, etc. Why not, when even the worst students get a 50%. Everyone graduates school in this country with a minimum 50%.

To top it off we got students getting into engineering courses who can barely do any physics or maths. Worse still, some of them manage to graduate. This mainly applies to private programs, and not some of the top, more competitive courses.

As for pay - they can pay what they like, it won't necessarily increase performance and outcomes of students - too many factors are involved. You could have a PhD in maths and be a lousy teacher, if you don't know how to teach children and understand them and their needs. School admin are more concerned with appeasing the MoE with tons of useless paperwork, and provide little assistance to teachers in terms of actual education of the students.

Certainly over the last 13 years I have seen a steady decline in the attitudes and performance of school students....they seem to study just to pass some entrance exam and not for the love of gaining (new) knowledge....this has to change or we will get nowhere.

What about students paying for grades? It is happening whether you know it or not.

[bangon04]

"This problem has led to students proceeding to higher levels while their level of competency is still the same. If teachers do this often enough, the quality of education will go down the drain."

Confusing use of future tense here....must be just a bad translation, I think..

By the way.. where was Chaturon educated? Which schools? Does anyone know?

[TomTao]

It is very sad to watch this country that is considered to be a developing nation slowly slide backward on the developmental scale instead of slowly clawing forward toward being a developed country, the education system here is more like a feudal serf preparation factory than a place to prepare young people to face the world, thinking is not encouraged, critical or otherwise, questioning the status qou is often actively discouraged. On Friday I taught the conditional 'if' to M 1-3, for M 2 and 3 I taught for about fourty miniutes and the asked the students to write one sentence from each of the tenses, present simple, past simple and past perfect using the conditional 'if', the students already had examples in thier books and on the board from the lesson, I even gave them extra examples, nine out of every ten students just sat there with a vacant look on thier faces, the other one out of the ten got it immediately, I asked the teacher to tell them to think about what to write, the teacher said "they don't know how to think, they've never been taught to think.", and that to me is very sad.

[smotherb]

The entire education/career paradigm needs total overhaul.

Learning and mastery of that learning must be key--no learning no passing--this is very difficult, all nations suffer this social passing problem and it is getting worse with the 'entitled generation'

Respect and decent pay for educators is important--again all nations suffer this problem, perhaps because we see no immediate return on teachers' efforts.

The global mindset on education needs to change--the old adage, "those who can do and those who can't teach" may have merit, e.g., in the US graduates with educational degrees average the lowest GPAs--they couldn't pass any other program

A complete change in educational ideology is mandatory; e.g., if you want students to be competent in English, they must be taught in English by local (Thai) teachers who speak English--how? teach the teachers English

Higher education is not necessary for all and students are not worthless just because they work better with their hands, decent jobs need to be made available to basic education graduates--the old apprenticeships for blue collar workers need to be restablished

This needs to go on and on, more jobs, better education and educational decisions, better jobs and career planning--educators, business people, parents, students, governments, and cultures need to change.

Or, just have another cold beer and make belive it's not your problem.

[Thai at Heart]

One simple step would be to ALLOW falang volunteers to TEACH CONVERSATIONAL ENGLISH in the public schools without all the BS about having a work permit for doing something for free.

There are thousands of warm hearted retired expats who are bored to death and would be glad to donate a day or two a week to interact with the kids and at least ATTEMPT to get them to speak English.

In my experience in a rural school I have found that many of the kids actually can read and write English fairly well...BUT...since the TESTS that are sent up from Bangkok all are WRITTEN and since the teachers all know that their performance can be based on these written test results they of course concentrate ALL of their teaching efforts on the reading and writing....meantime the kids receive basically ZERO instruction/practice on actually SPEAKING and UNDERSTANDING English....many Thai teachers of English teach their English classes in THAI.....

IF IF IF the govt would offer a one year no hassle visa to expats in return for them doing some basic conversation teaching they would likely get a lot of volunteers. Naturally there would need to be some rules and regulations and minimium qualifications like xx hours per week, always a thai teacher in classroom with ex pat (don't need the perverts) etc.

Of course I realize that this is likely a dream but I continue to think it is truly sad not to utilize the time and talents of so many expats who WOULD be willing to help FOR FREE. It is called a win/win to give bored retired expats something to do and the kids might actually get up the courage to attempt to USE the English they know in the REAL WORLD of speaking and understanding.

OK that's English.

My sons private school had no science lab. A friend of mine taught at a school where there was a science lab with one microscope that was in its case so that it wouldn't get broken.

Add in the corruption and the system is not even 3rd world.

[willyumiii]

Education or experience is not required to get a job in Thailand.

the requirements are

1. You must be good looking

2. You must be young

3. No experience is a plus

Thailand is all about appearance

Excuse me!

1) I do not consider myself even remotely good looking.

2) I am old ( 60 years+)

3) I have "experience".

4) I am teaching in Thailand.

Thank you!

Edited September 22, 2013 by willyumiii

[Dennisdob]

Hello,

In my opinion and experience as a teacher and a12 year principal, and a PhD, I find that the best way to educate the students would be to educate the teachers! The teachers should be required to take English classes. If you are talking about accountability through a test, cheating will occur! If the students are to take a test I assure you the validity of the test will become compromised!

I have educated Chinese teachers and Korean teachers in order for them to go back to their perspective country and teach the students.

In step three, i feel that the age requirement of the instructors should not be limited to a certain age. The experienced teacher is of age, not a backpacker Nor a not experienced native individual. Teaching is an art it is not something that one learns off the street. Teaching requires experience, patience, compassion, and understanding of the communication skills to develop the student's needs.

Step four, English is not Regurgitating Individual words or phrases. Teaching English is an understanding.

Step five, To spend more time on conversation rather than grammar, reading, and writing. Eventually that will come, but to start off we must start off phonetically and being able to develop conversational skills.

I apologize for this message being so long!

[Phuket electrician]

More Thai bashing by quasi experts. Yes it's corrupt, yes students can buy grades and yes Thailand needs to change.

And it is changing, There are some very good universities here and many academics. Thai people are successful agricultural farmers, it's a developing economy. Industry is booming, tourism generates cash and now Thai people are looking to develop through education. It's generic economic development.

To say Thailand cannot and will not change just displays you own lack of education. Empty vessels and all that...

[Dennisdob]

More Thai bashing by quasi experts. Yes it's corrupt, yes students can buy grades and yes Thailand needs to change.

And it is changing, There are some very good universities here and many academics. Thai people are successful agricultural farmers, it's a developing economy. Industry is booming, tourism generates cash and now Thai people are looking to develop through education. It's generic economic development.

To say Thailand cannot and will not change just displays you own lack of education. Empty vessels and all that...

[Dennisdob]

Dear Sir:

I consider myself an expert in education. I have the qualifications and the certifications. I have never said anything negative about the Thai people. Your statement is contradictive and is rather confusing to me.

A booming economy? Generic economic development? Corruption? I believe the concern is educating the individual student and teachers and how they are going to achieve this goal. My concern would be to question how they are planning to achieve this goal by the year 2015. One article stated 1.6 million students will be Proficient in English by the year, 2015.

I mean no disrespect to you.

No one has mentioned the realignment of the curriculum in the Thai schools or the universities. Please understand that many of the Thai public schools are privately owned. Therefore they have complete autonomy! I believe the Thai's can change, however, it must be developed through the leadership. This is only my opinion. I have taught for three years at a private university that is well-known. Regardless, it is only my opinion.

[Crazy chef 1]

cogito ergo sum!

[Thai at Heart]

Hello,

In my opinion and experience as a teacher and a12 year principal, and a PhD, I find that the best way to educate the students would be to educate the teachers! The teachers should be required to take English classes. If you are talking about accountability through a test, cheating will occur! If the students are to take a test I assure you the validity of the test will become compromised!

I have educated Chinese teachers and Korean teachers in order for them to go back to their perspective country and teach the students.

In step three, i feel that the age requirement of the instructors should not be limited to a certain age. The experienced teacher is of age, not a backpacker Nor a not experienced native individual. Teaching is an art it is not something that one learns off the street. Teaching requires experience, patience, compassion, and understanding of the communication skills to develop the student's needs.

Step four, English is not Regurgitating Individual words or phrases. Teaching English is an understanding.

Step five, To spend more time on conversation rather than grammar, reading, and writing. Eventually that will come, but to start off we must start off phonetically and being able to develop conversational skills.

I apologize for this message being so long!

As I said earlier, the teachers are basically numbskulls themselves.

A 40 year old was going through the Thai system 30 years ago. What system. They are probably educated to the same level as a 12 year old in the west.

[bkkgriz]

Education or experience is not required to get a job in Thailand.

the requirements are

1. You must be good looking

2. You must be young

3. No experience is a plus

Thailand is all about appearance

The same applies for every country in the world.

Do you honestly believe this?

[Loptr]

Education reform will never happen in Thailand. Why? Because the Thai mindset in education will never be able to get past the aspect of face and petty personal gains for the betterment of the children's education.

Edited September 22, 2013 by Loptr

[bkkgriz]

It is very sad to watch this country that is considered to be a developing nation slowly slide backward on the developmental scale instead of slowly clawing forward toward being a developed country, the education system here is more like a feudal serf preparation factory than a place to prepare young people to face the world, thinking is not encouraged, critical or otherwise, questioning the status qou is often actively discouraged. On Friday I taught the conditional 'if' to M 1-3, for M 2 and 3 I taught for about fourty miniutes and the asked the students to write one sentence from each of the tenses, present simple, past simple and past perfect using the conditional 'if', the students already had examples in thier books and on the board from the lesson, I even gave them extra examples, nine out of every ten students just sat there with a vacant look on thier faces, the other one out of the ten got it immediately, I asked the teacher to tell them to think about what to write, the teacher said "they don't know how to think, they've never been taught to think.", and that to me is very sad.

I feel your pain on this topic. I will write examples on the board and invariably my students will just copy what I write. I ask them to think of their own sentences and not copy and very few can do it.