Thai Education Min Chaturon denies 30% of free tablet computers bust in first year

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Chaturon denies 30% of free tablet computers bust in first year
Chuleeporn Aramnet
The Nation

BANGKOK: -- Confirming that the Education Ministry would continue its "One Tablet per Child" project next year, Minister Chaturon Chaisang yesterday denied that the 30 per cent of computer tablets reported broken in the academic year 2012 represented the overall picture.

Chaturon was responding to a report by the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) that 259,000 computer tablets - or 30 per cent of the 858,886 devices handed out - were damaged.

He said Office of Basic Education Commission (Obec) chief Apichart Jeerawuth had discovered the 30 per cent figure came from a random OAG inspection of 990 tablets at 80 schools in 12 education zones across 11 provinces, which found 295 were broken.

Hence the sample group only represented 0.2 per cent of the approximately 30,000 schools.

Chaturon said the Information and Communication Technology Ministry reported that from August 2012 to August 2013, a total of 5,344 computer tablets were broken, representing just 0.62 per cent of the 858,886 devices handed out. Of these, 3,571 suffered hardware damage while 1,773 had software problems, he added.

He said no tablet-repair centres had been closed, but added three such centres had been relocated in their areas.


-- The Nation 2013-10-09

[clockman]

Well, is it a white lie?

[noitom]

Do they have the software on the tablets restricted to certain programs/sites? Such as reading, writing, and arithmetic? Or are the Thai kids playing games and listening to music?

[Crazy chef 1]

of course he denied that(just) 30% are crap bec he knows it is more closer to 100% .shenzen from china ....

[mike123ca]

I wish my classroom had good desk and chairs. Books and bookshelves are just a dream. My mistake this is a Bangkok classroom. Make a note to self, do not compare bangkok classroom to a Isan classroom.

[gemini81]

Gee, I wonder where all the initial money for this idea went.......

[jaltsc]

Gee, I wonder where all the initial money for this idea went.......

Well, looking at the latest photos of YL, I would say in a big money belt around her waist

[Katipo]

Obviously someone doesn't understand how samples, statistics, and margins of error work. Of course they aren't going to check every single tablet. I can tell you this, I'd believe the OAG before I believe any government muppet.

[Samaaw]

Actually tablet computers are not the way to learn ANYTHING in IT terms - desktops should of been the idea and taught at school

There is no need for tablet computers at all in a school !!

[LuckyLew]

low price = low quality

what did they expect

bet that even with a low quality and 30% brake rate the PTP will continue the same crap

[ChrisY1]

I don't think I have seen or heard a government anywhere else, having to make so many denials.....never ends.

Dreadful government.

[Pib]

Well, when I plug the that 858,556 total population into this sample size calculator to see what minimum sample size would be needed for a 95% confidence level with a margin error of 5%, the minimum sample size is 384. The article said The Office of Basic Education Commission had a sample size of 990, well above the minimum sample size needed to obtain above accuracy.

But hey, the Information and Communications Technology Ministry, the same people who monitor the internet to keep us from visiting unsavory websites, is reporting only 0.62% of the tablets have problems. Now let me ask you, how many of think if you went out and bought 100 tablets today (cheap or expensive), brought them home, let your kids use them for a couple of weeks or longer, that only 1 of those tablets (1%...close as I can get to 0.62%) would have a hardware/software problem. Yea, right.

[zakk9]

I know only one school child among the target group for these devices, and she tells me it's all fine. It's much more fun to play games on the tablets than to write in books. This all according to my 5 year old expert. Must be good then

[Gulfsailor]

Yep, statistics are a tough nut to crack for the totally uneducated ones in power...

At stated population size, sample size and outcome, (and provided that the samples are random chosen) I can say with 99% certainty that the percentage of damaged tablets lies within 28.6 and 31.4.

(That means if I run this test a 100 times, 99 times I will get a result of in between 28.6% and 31.4%.)

Edited to fix a little error

Edited October 9, 2013 by Gulfsailor

[slapout]

The entire government is being monitored, questioned and checked against other government statements, for which they have no answer, so continue to lie, ignore the problem, or trot out some number which have no real relivance to the intial problems pointed out.

Not to dispute the claim of support facility relocation, but why would the support people not be at the schools in their area of survice to tackle the software/hardware problems first hand?

The various government populist programs seem to have several things in common , they are being directed by incompentent people completly out of the sphere of their experience/knowledge, the providers of the services/product are giving substandard product/service/accounting, the budgeted/proposed cost were vastly underestimated, the goals promised have not been minutely approached much less accomplished. Over all on a scale of 1 to 10, the highest score would probably pertain to the portian of the overall budget skimmed off, around 40 to 50% by internal whistle blower.

estimates.

If these people are the best the people can expect, those yet to come and those allowed to contine may redefine human behavior in its most corrupt form.

[hitz]

Obviously someone doesn't understand how samples, statistics, and margins of error work. Of course they aren't going to check every single tablet. I can tell you this, I'd believe the OAG before I believe any government muppet.

Absolutely.

This month's Education Minister, Chaturon, doesn't even proffer the slightest explanation as to why the gargantuan disparity between the OAG's figure of 30% failure rate and his own figure of 0.6% failure rate.

(a sure sign his figures are dubious).

Did the 30% that failed just come from, statistically, very phenomenally unlucky unlucky 11 provinces?

It's ok, though, in another month or so there will be a different Education Minister trying to put out <deleted> information.

[hitz]

Well, when I plug the that 858,556 total population into this sample size calculator to see what minimum sample size would be needed for a 95% confidence level with a margin error of 5%, the minimum sample size is 384. The article said The Office of Basic Education Commission had a sample size of 990, well above the minimum sample size needed to obtain above accuracy.

Intuition told me it was a adequate sampling, but thank you for the specific numbers. It's certainly more than ample size.

The sordid tale of these tablets from the very beginning would lead anyone to be unsurprised of the 30% failure rate.

Billions of baht spent and lost. Billions that could have been better utilized to actually improve education.

[54321]

based on my personal experience, I bought a kindle fire which lasted about 3 weeks, followed by a google nexus which lasted a week. My mini ipad is (touch wood) now 4 weeks old and going strong. I suspect i have been a little unlucky but 30% broken in a year doesn't sound bad when my rate is about the same over a much shorter period.

god I'm bored

[tingtongteesood]

Sorry to say but this is what happens when you buy the cheapest of the cheap crap from China. And those young kids don't know much about taking care of things, can't help wondering how many of them were accidentally dropped...?

[icare999]

im surprised they have lasted that long and so well it seems project was not such a total disaster as many including me predicted GIven low cost 30% is not bad

[hitz]

Any word on how that free, nation-wide, WiFi service budgeted for (30 Billion Baht) and promised by the government is coming along?

In light of a third of the tablets being tossed into the trash can because they are trash, it would at least be good if these internet-based tablets could actually access the internet.

.

[Colabamumbai]

Why are they broken? Misuse, purposeful damage by students? Faulty product?

Teachers inability to instruct the students on the operation of such?

There must be a reason.

[Ricardo]

Why bother with a statistical-survey, when it would be easier to just add-up how many tablets have been repaired, and their repairs invoiced to the government ?

Or would the number & total-cost be embarrassing, so declared 'commercially confidential', or suppressed at-all-costs ?

It might be interesting if the OAG were to investigate, how many children & schools who had been promised tablets, had failed to ever receive them.

But no doubt that would similarly be 'commercially confidential' ?