Talk of 'good deeds passports' spurs doubt, cool response: Thailand

[webfact]

Talk of 'good deeds passports' spurs doubt, cool response
Supinda na Mahachai
The Nation

THE EDUCATION Ministry has sought to downplay concern among students that "good deeds passports" may determine their chance to go to their favoured university.

Many teenagers have voiced frustration about the issue on social media and web-boards after Education permanent secretary Sutthasri Wongsamarn suggested on Monday that good-deeds passports would be issued to all school students and may be a factor used to assess university admissions.

In the face of growing protest from students, Sutthasri yesterday explained that relevant authorities had not yet concluded that universities would look into the good-deed reports before deciding which students to accept.

"It was just an idea being raised and discussed at a recent meeting," she said.

Sutthasri said several key agencies under her ministry - the Office of the Vocational Education Commission and the Office of the Basic Education Commission - have already issued good-deeds passports or good-deeds reports to their students as a measure to encourage to children to behave well.

These documents are designed to nudge children into embracing key virtues such as honesty, discipline, a sense of gratitude, a focus on public interest, and a love for the nation, religions and the monarchy.

"We wish to inspire children to do good things and care about public interest," Sutthasri said, noting that the idea of using students' good-deeds passports came up at a recent meeting of key educational authorities.

So far, she said children need not worry at this point because the relevant officials would gather well-rounded information from all sides before deciding whether to go ahead with it.

One person who commented on a popular web-board said he thought good-deeds passports would very likely encourage children to lie instead of doing good.

He invited like-minded citizens to voice their opposition against the good-deeds passports at www.facebook.com/Antipassport-goodness.

Created on Monday, this Facebook page had already got more than 260 likes yesterday. It also attracted many comments.

"In Thailand, we are in fact told to do good without having to flaunt your good deeds. The good-deeds passports run against this long-held tradition," another person lamented.

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/national/Talk-of-good-deeds-passports-spurs-doubt-cool-resp-30239214.html


-- The Nation 2014-07-23

[chooka]

So help the little old lady cross the road and you get to go to University.

[Suriya4]

Attending anti-govt protest gets 1 point per day. Can this little red book be used to enter heaven too?

[Payboy]

So, how many 7-11 stamps to fill up one page of the passport?

[taony]

I want to see what gets recorded as a good deed. Have a feeling its not what i expect

-*I typed this myself*-

[cooked]

This means that if you protest about something in the school that is incorrect, you get a 'bad' passport.

[NongKhaiKid]

What's wrong with the tried and tested method of buying a place or because your family has a ' name ' or knows someone ?

if these ' passports 'are brought in there will instantly be a cottage industry in recording non-existent ' good deeds ' for a fee of course.

LoS will never run out of officials who open their mouth without engaging their brain.

[doremifasol]

Good idea................... then what?

They get home, switch on the T.V

and watch people barking at each other,

shooting, lying, cheating, stealing .......

It doesn't work like that,. Sorry.

[Songhua]

What's wrong with the tried and tested method of buying a place or because your family has a ' name ' or knows someone ?

if these ' passports 'are brought in there will instantly be a cottage industry in recording non-existent ' good deeds ' for a fee of course.

LoS will never run out of officials who open their mouth without engaging their brain.

800,000 baht deposit or verification of parents' income allows an extension of one semester.

[weegee]

Sounds to me....Bob-a-job....Boy Scouts 30yrs ago

[godden]

What a load of tosh

[leggo]

This is another fine example of Thailand showing everybody just how immature they are. It's time that this country grew up and started behaving like adults - this proposed scheme, under discussion , is one of the most pathetic and totally impractible ideas that any education ministry anywhere in the world has ever come up with.

[wandasloan]

Attending anti-govt protest gets 1 point per day. Can this little red book be used to enter heaven too?

There is just no one, no government agency, department or ministry that licks boots faster than the Education Ministry. They were on this before General Sarit finished the phrase "... and country-loving students" last Friday night. Dreadful people, all of them, first of all this woman claiming "Oh, it was just an idea". Nonsense. It will be rammed down the little darlings' throats with an extra verse of the national anthem and elimination of several math classes to study the history of glorious Siamese military expeditions and defences, because, as one knows, "Siam has always been at war with Burma".

.

Edited July 23, 2014 by wandasloan

[AGareth2]

This is another fine example of Thailand showing everybody just how immature they are. It's time that this country grew up and started behaving like adults - this proposed scheme, under discussion , is one of the most pathetic and totally impractible ideas that any education ministry anywhere in the world has ever come up with.

Don't be so serious

Anyway you're not Thai so you wouldn't understand

[Rorri]

So help the little old lady cross the road and you get to go to University.

No, just a little "tea" money to the teacher every week...this would not be a problem as the system is already in place.

[Rykbanlor]

It seems incredible the amount of ideas that Thailand can cook up to waste money and further hamper educational progress. Knowing that these are the type of ideas being floated, along with the new focus on promoting good behaviour and values (they have been doing this for the last however many decades - think national anthem/flag/morning assembley - and how much good has it done to date?) i can confidently estimate that the education system as it is has at least another 50 years to stagnate before somebody with a clue comes to the table.

[Rorri]

This is another fine example of Thailand showing everybody just how immature they are. It's time that this country grew up and started behaving like adults - this proposed scheme, under discussion , is one of the most pathetic and totally impractible ideas that any education ministry anywhere in the world has ever come up with.

Don't be so serious

Anyway you're not Thai so you wouldn't understand

So, I guess you must be Thai and therefore you know "all."

[StrandedBusinessPerson]

I see we are a cynical bunch here, but let's pull our fangs back for a moment. Rewarding students to "be good" in context of civil society is a great idea. Call it what you want, (badges, stamps, passport, report card) whatever the mechanism, it may be necessary. Educators try to provide incentives (at least they did in my day) for children to learn, even if it is (was) propaganda. The point being that as a society, we learn to be trained. As a retired teacher myself, in today's brave new world I see a complete lack of training to the light side of the force. But there is an overwhelming incentive to move to the dark side, as mentioned in this thread many times. Kids are bombarded with crap 24x7, and educators are at a loss, with no "Iron Dome" to deploy. So a good deed report card, why not? Why not note in a student's record the good that they have accomplished to date, just as vigorously as we note the transgressions? Any parent alive (that is mentally functional) knows this technique. "If you behave this way, good things will happen...if you behave that way, watch out." If a parent forgets a child's good behavior and focuses on the bad, all the child get's from that is a degeneration into the underworld. What mechanism that you use is irrelevant, as long as reverence is achieved. By this screed so far you can see I am a bit passionate on the topic... and that's because I grew up inside probably the greatest public school system ever devised by man to date (I am a 60's child) - but one that has now fallen to one of the worst, in just a few short decades. Sure we were brainwashed to think the Commies were set to blow the bejesus out of our country and lifestyle at any moment, and that your classroom desk was your protection during a duck and cover drill... but we were also taught there is a difference between right and wrong, regardless of the doublespeak used... we were trained to follow the "right" path... to follow the light. And as we learned that light comes in many shades of gray, we grew better goggles that filtered out the crap. God help the children of today, who are born and then left in the dark.

[Cheops]

They should make a bad deeds pp!

Involved in any student rivalry brawl > negative listing etc.

[HUAHIN62]

So much for education reform. Good opinion piece today in the BKK post about the education system and its reform. Until a government thats strong enough stands up to the civil service and dismantle the crony network (including the education department) nothing in this country will change.

[Hawk]

What a load of BS..

[LuckyLew]

How about a scheme that allows good smart students with good grades go to the top universities?

[WitawatWatawit]

So much for education reform. Good opinion piece today in the BKK post about the education system and its reform. Until a government thats strong enough stands up to the civil service and dismantle the crony network (including the education department) nothing in this country will change.

Precisely. This passport proposal clearly indicates that the buffoons and little big men are going to be hard to root out of the system and will continue to be an obstacle to progress because they are like vagrant squatters in a place where they should not be. I've mentioned this before, but it does remain, for me, the benchmark of buffoonery in the Ed Ministry - a number of years ago, Bangkok hosted a major world education congress, and a Thai Ed ministry official (perm sec, I think) got up before 2,000-3,000 of the world's top educators and said the Thai education system doesn't need to be reformed because it's already the best in the world. It doesn't get better than that.

[Krataiboy]

I see we are a cynical bunch here, but let's pull our fangs back for a moment. Rewarding students to "be good" in context of civil society is a great idea. Call it what you want, (badges, stamps, passport, report card) whatever the mechanism, it may be necessary. Educators try to provide incentives (at least they did in my day) for children to learn, even if it is (was) propaganda. The point being that as a society, we learn to be trained. As a retired teacher myself, in today's brave new world I see a complete lack of training to the light side of the force. But there is an overwhelming incentive to move to the dark side, as mentioned in this thread many times. Kids are bombarded with crap 24x7, and educators are at a loss, with no "Iron Dome" to deploy. So a good deed report card, why not? Why not note in a student's record the good that they have accomplished to date, just as vigorously as we note the transgressions? Any parent alive (that is mentally functional) knows this technique. "If you behave this way, good things will happen...if you behave that way, watch out." If a parent forgets a child's good behavior and focuses on the bad, all the child get's from that is a degeneration into the underworld. What mechanism that you use is irrelevant, as long as reverence is achieved. By this screed so far you can see I am a bit passionate on the topic... and that's because I grew up inside probably the greatest public school system ever devised by man to date (I am a 60's child) - but one that has now fallen to one of the worst, in just a few short decades. Sure we were brainwashed to think the Commies were set to blow the bejesus out of our country and lifestyle at any moment, and that your classroom desk was your protection during a duck and cover drill... but we were also taught there is a difference between right and wrong, regardless of the doublespeak used... we were trained to follow the "right" path... to follow the light. And as we learned that light comes in many shades of gray, we grew better goggles that filtered out the crap. God help the children of today, who are born and then left in the dark.

Did you actually read what the Thai educators think being "good" means? Surely education is primarily about teaching people to think for themselves and challenge established criteria. Should you believe otherwise, I can only say I for one am grateful you have retired.

[metisdead]

Some nonsense posts have been removed.

[Thai at Heart]

Just what Thailand needs. A bit more blind tub thumping nationalism.

I swear this will inevitably come back to bite them on the ass. This level of incompetence in education cannot continue unpunished by the global market.

Where do they get these ideas? How are these ideas allowed to get into practice. Doesn't anyone question the value of such things? Don't they wonder if this will help? Don't they know anything of what goes on elsewhere in the world?

[antsrule]

Duplicate

Edited July 23, 2014 by antsrule

[antsrule]

If you want to create a generation of scientists in this country you need to encourage students to;

1) think skeptically. In other words, believe no one, find out for yourself

2) think critically. Ask yourself 'Why do I think this way'

3) think analytically. One step at a time

Teach students that questions never change but answers continually evolve.

Teach students that innovative ideas come from simple questions and useful ideas come from difficult problems.

Curiosity is the primary motivator for all of the greatest thinkers.

The problem in Thailand is that skeptical thinkers do not get good deed awards. Thailand education inadvertently fosters an obsession for high marks, beauty and success. Fame and fortune. Nothing wrong with that but it is not science, it is the foundation of corruption.

[jpeg]

Attending anti-govt protest gets 1 point per day. Can this little red book be used to enter heaven too?

There is just no one, no government agency, department or ministry that licks boots faster than the Education Ministry. They were on this before General Sarit finished the phrase "... and country-loving students" last Friday night. Dreadful people, all of them, first of all this woman claiming "Oh, it was just an idea". Nonsense. It will be rammed down the little darlings' throats with an extra verse of the national anthem and elimination of several math classes to study the history of glorious Siamese military expeditions and defences, because, as one knows, "Siam has always been at war with Burma".

.

The extra verse to be included with the national anthem now to be played at schools twice daily, morning and lunchtime. Shudder.

[Thai at Heart]

Attending anti-govt protest gets 1 point per day. Can this little red book be used to enter heaven too?

There is just no one, no government agency, department or ministry that licks boots faster than the Education Ministry. They were on this before General Sarit finished the phrase "... and country-loving students" last Friday night. Dreadful people, all of them, first of all this woman claiming "Oh, it was just an idea". Nonsense. It will be rammed down the little darlings' throats with an extra verse of the national anthem and elimination of several math classes to study the history of glorious Siamese military expeditions and defences, because, as one knows, "Siam has always been at war with Burma".

.

The extra verse to be included with the national anthem now to be played at schools twice daily, morning and lunchtime. Shudder.

I am so glad I have got my kids a long way away from this type of thing. On the surface it seems innocent but reality is, it is indoctrination of the most obvious kind.