Teachers Upset Over Hiring Move

[george]

Teachers upset over hiring move

BANGKOK: -- The National Thai Teachers Union (NTTU) yesterday cried foul over local administrative bodies' decision to stop hiring teachers on a contractual basis for Education Ministry-supervised state schools.

The decision means more than 10,000 teachers are set to lose their jobs and many schools are bound to suffer a shortage of teaching staff, the union said.

"We believe this is a form of punishment by local administrative organisations after schools refused to come under their supervision," NTTU Council president Mana Sudsa-nguan said.

Mana shared his concerns with the ministry's permanent secretary, Khunying Kasama Varavarn, who will become the head of the Office of the Basic Education Commission (Obec) next month.

Initially, the government wanted to transfer responsibility for state schools from the Education Ministry to local administrative organisations in line with decentralisation laws. However, hundreds of thousands of teachers across the country strongly opposed the transfer plan. Finally, the government agreed that the transfers would take place on a voluntary basis only.

Most state schools did not agree to the transfer.

Mana blamed the problems surrounding the hiring of teachers on the Local Administration Department (LAD) decision to issue letters to all provincial administrative organisations and tambon administrative organisations, informing them that they cannot allocate budgets for state schools under the supervision of Obec.

Many local administrative bodies have paid more than 10,000 teachers on a contractual basis to help state schools cope with the shortage of teaching staff. This has been going on for three years, but could be stopped at the end of this month given the move by the LAD.

According to Mana, the LAD barred local administrative organisations from paying the teachers, citing the fact that the schools are not under the local bodies' supervision.

"Actually, the local administrative bodies can hire teachers by setting up learning centres inside the schools if they want to help," Mana said. He said relevant authorities should do something before the second semester starts in November. October is normally a school holiday period.

NTTU chairman Nipon Chuenta called on Obec to tackle problems faced by state schools such as a lack of teachers and budget shortfalls. Nipon also suggested that local administrative bodies should try and work closely with state schools instead of demanding immediate transfers. "When they are familiar [with each other], it's more likely that the schools will agree to the transfer," he said.

"In fact, local administrative organisations can pay for teachers because such acts benefit their community," Kasama said.

--The Nation 2006-09-13

[Loaded]

I think this is in reference to Thai teachers only.

But, considering the understandable lack of Thai teachers prepared to go south, this really does indicate that Thailand no longer cares about education or the development of its next generation.

Could be because:

1) TRT has spent all tax revenues for this year and the foreseeable future on populist policies aimed at getting the uneducated masses to vote for them.

2) TRT doesn't want to educate the uneducated masses, who presently vote for them, because they may start to realise what a mafia TRT are.

3) Thaksin is setting up a school supplies company (similar to his computer for every school company) and doesn't want education authorities to spend his... sorry, the tax payers money on silly things like teachers.

4) Thailand is bankrupt but is lying to the world. Similar to Thaksin telling the European Commissioner a few years ago that there was no bird flu in Thailand as millions of birds were being culled and scores of people dying.

[PeaceBlondie]

Again, this is for Thai nationals only, and my experience with them is two years, 2003-2005, in a northern province. At least the English teachers were fairly well prepared to teach matayom English, by 1970's methods (or 1870's methods). The English teachers in the rural prathom schools couldn't speak English and weren't trained to do it. At professional conferences, the level of English was apalling. I got familiar with a social science teacher, very experienced, who knew almost nothing about things outside of Asia, such as change of seasons and the length of days, names of countries, etc.

Other official Thai news articles in the last year have spoken of a severe shortage of teachers, due to hiring freezes. The teachers I worked with had 24 contact hours per week, with classes between 33 and 53 unmotivated students. Oh, five motivated students per class.

Yet, some people here have cited that Thai public education has accomplished miracles of progress in recent decades. Our current teachers, then, are the product of the pre-miracle days.

Please pardon my negativity. Just don't expect progress in Siam.