Stamford International University

[MatteoBassini]

Hi there, I'm a student at Stamford International University and since I'm seeing a lot of people interested in studying in Thailand and the fact that this university was never once even mentioned on Thai visa forum (as far as I tried searching), I'd like to share my experiences of being a student in this university and hear from you guys if you have any experiences or opinions.

I am NOT advertising, I am NOT getting paid by the university to post this, the university does not even know the existence of this thread.

I'll give you some basic info about the university, the good things, the bad things, and small little things that make quite a difference when studying here compared to other universities.

First, some basic info

Campus areas: Rama 9 (International), Hua hin (Thai language only), and Asoke Exchange tower (Masters degree only)

Tuition fees: 54,000 baht per trimester which makes it 162,000 baht per year.

We will be focusing on the Rama 9 campus as it is the main campus and I reside there.

The good things:

No uniforms.

You can go to classes dressed however you like. The only times you must wear a uniform are in special events like orientation day, and if you're enrolled in Airline Business Management or International Hotel Management.

Small classrooms.

Classes in Stamford range from 20 people to 30 people. While it isn't small compared to some high school classes, it is really small compared to opera theater sized classrooms in many western countries.

Small campus.

This could be a bad thing for you, but to me it's a good thing. I don't want to be stuck in a college bubble, I want to see the outside world.

It's... well... international.

You go to Stamford's website, their slogan is "The Difference is Real". And they're not kidding, the difference IS real. I've taken tours around universities located in central Thailand and all of them failed to live up to the 'International' name they put on themselves, lecturers who have trouble speaking English and so they switch to Thai and making non-Thai speakers feel completely left out (and they are left out).

Does that happen in Stamford? No. The opposite, actually. One of my Thai lecturers simply refused to speak Thai and told some students to stop speaking Thai. And the students are from all over the place, it's not everyday you see a student from Mozambique, Albania, and Myanmar all sitting next to each other.

Level of English is great.

I've seen people who only had limited English speaking capabilities going into Stamford's ACP (Academic Preparation) course and coming out being able to speak English nearly like a native. And as I said earlier, the level of English in most other universities in Thailand are downright bad.

Yeah I know my writing isn't good.

Internet is good and works on every campus on the same username and password

Okay, you're probably going 'DUH', but I come from a family of farmers and soldiers, it surprised me that my username and password for the college internet worked at Hua hin campus.

There are many more good things to talk about, but let's keep the post short.

The bad things:

Small campus.

Alright, you probably want a bigger community, a haven to escape the outside world and Stamford's Rama 9 campus' two 6-story buildings just won't cut it for a lot of people and the campus too small to have any big events and sporting facilities. Since it's a small campus, this leads to my next point...

Too many cars, not enough parking space.

The parking space is absolutely horrible. How can so many students own cars? There are about 500-1,000 students each day studying from Monday to Friday (very rough estimate) and there are about 100-200 cars in the parking lot. The problem isn't unique to cars either, even motorcycles have trouble parking sometimes and I don't understand the security guards prohibiting you from parking in certain places where it shouldn't be a problem.

So if you're studying here, make sure to limit yourself to only a motorcycle if you can. You will simply be unable to park your car.

No medicine, no science, no engineering majors

The only Science major Stamford offers is Information Technology. The lack of medicine and engineering is a bad thing because Thailand has very limited medicine and engineering majors in International colleges.

No college dorms

Excited about that dorm life? Being able to just wake up 10 minutes before your class starts and being able to walk there and still won't be late? Well too bad, Stamford doesn't have any dorms. You're going to have go to one of the three apartment/condos that have special promotions for Stamford students, these apartments are about 12 km away from the college campus. So how do you get to college if you don't have private transportation? That takes me to the next point...

You're going to spending a lot of money on public transportation.

The minibuses that go from the apartments mentioned above to Stamford and vice versa aren't free. They costs 30 baht every trip so you'll be spending 60 baht each day for 3 and a half years. It's alright if you've got the cash, but college students are known to be broke as hell and 60 baht a day for transportation sounds like a fortune. To give you an idea, fuel costs for a motorcycle that i use everyday to commute to college costs me 60 baht A WEEK, and that also includes the luxury of being able to go anywhere i want without relying on other people. So.. buy a motorcycle, it's fun and cheap, it's worth dying for; literally.

Food selection is meh and expensive for the quality of the food.

80 baht for a plate of rice and fish? No thanks. I'm just going to buy a 40 baht som tam in the morning and eat it at college. Not to mention the quality is worse than 40 baht kao pat from street vendors. So just like a motorcycle, buy your own food from street vendors or cook your own.

It's in Bangkok.

Seriously, who likes Bangkok? And to make matters worse they opened an Asoke campus instead of using the money on expanding the parking lot or giving an option to people who don't want to live in Bangkok. The Hua Hin campus is great, it's in the middle of nowhere, but it doesn't have international courses. Bangkok is just not for me.

There are more bad things and I would like to hear more from you guys.

One last thing, if you're interested in this university, you can just go into one of the classes. You won't look out of place because nobody wears a uniform unless you're over 50 years old.

So, thoughts?

[Stradavarius37]

Thoughts? You have too much time on your hands if you have time to post such a lengthy unsolicited OP. Go study.

[Scott]

Thanks for the information. It is appreciated.

[MatteoBassini]

Thoughts? You have too much time on your hands if you have time to post such a lengthy unsolicited OP. Go study.

Thank you for your post, I am on holiday.

[Craig krup]

Thoughts? You have too much time on your hands if you have time to post such a lengthy unsolicited OP. Go study.

Thank you for your post, I am on holiday.

I'm curious - where would you expect to where a uniform? (Unless by "uniform" you mean the kind of cotton rags rejected by the homeless and a supercilious expression, which was pretty much the higher education uniform when I was a boy.)

[richard10365]

Good post MatteoBassini. You sound like a good student focusing more on learning than on complaining. Im sure everythings not perfect but even in less than ideal situations you still can get a great education if you want to.

[bentfarang]

Thoughts? You have too much time on your hands if you have time to post such a lengthy unsolicited OP. Go study.

Thank you for your post, I am on holiday.

I'm curious - where would you expect to where a uniform? (Unless by "uniform" you mean the kind of cotton rags rejected by the homeless and a supercilious expression, which was pretty much the higher education uniform when I was a boy.)

You didn't know that Thai unis have uniform?

[Shoho]

The manager of International recruitment-Dutch national did not get along so well with a US veteran of Iraq, Said the American spoke funny, mocked his military service. Stamford accepts the GI Bill, but he former service member claimed in the FB post that the university i.e. the Dutchman screwed him out funds. Maybe it is the scam where the funds go to the school first rather than the student. Its hard to what is what but the American genuinely appeared to believe that he had been cheated.

[Shoho]

The problem with Stamford is it does not have much international standing. They have done well since being taken over by Laureate in terms of enrollment.

However the international credibility just isn't there. Stamford has no International accreditation that I am aware of.

I saw on the website they recently joined the lowest of the programmatic business accreditor IACBE, but only as a member. They are not accredited.

They could be though, the IACBE process is not rigorous and schools generally do not fail. Its more a matter of spending the money. Like a degree mill.

Problem is cross town rival Webster, has been accredited by the more respected ACBSP since 2008. ACBSP is focused on teaching excellence and demonstrating that learning outcomes are being met.

There is another accreditor AACSB, it is the one that Sasin has and it requires the highest percentages of PhD's and research output.

So what's up with that? Stamford decides to go for international standing and picks the lowest tier?

Give your students a credential that will travel!

Edited April 18, 2016 by Shoho

[TuskegeeBen]

The problem with Stamford is it does not have much international standing. They have done well since being taken over by Laureate in terms of enrollment.

However the international credibility just isn't there. Stamford has no International accreditation that I am aware of.

I saw on the website they recently joined the lowest of the programmatic business accreditor IACBE, but only as a member. They are not accredited.

They could be though, the IACBE process is not rigorous and schools generally do not fail. Its more a matter of spending the money. Like a degree mill.

Problem is cross town rival Webster, has been accredited by the more respected ACBSP since 2008. ACBSP is focused on teaching excellence and demonstrating that learning outcomes are being met.

There is another accreditor AACSB, it is the one that Sasin has and it requires the highest percentages of PhD's and research output.

So what's up with that? Stamford decides to go for international standing and picks the lowest tier?

Give your students a credential that will travel!

[TuskegeeBen]

Surfing upon and then "Capitalizing", within the wake of the waves created by the academic reputation of SU (Palo Alto, CA-USA), is what Stamford International U of Thailand does. Just another Malaysian style education "business" scam.

The OP would be well advised to invest the same effort, money and time @ Webster U, instead. Good morning

Edited April 19, 2016 by TuskegeeBen

[cgphuket]

I used to work for Stamford. I found the mgmt, to be clueless and disinterested, but the programs were decent and the students had reasonable expectations. It is not the degree mill it used to be and students are expected to work. The school in BKK has almost no services a university should have, but the academics are generally taken seriously.

[TuskegeeBen]

I used to work for Stamford. I found the mgmt, to be clueless and disinterested, but the programs were decent and the students had reasonable expectations. It is not the degree mill it used to be and students are expected to work. The school in BKK has almost no services a university should have, but the academics are generally taken seriously.

You found the mgmt to be clueless and disinterested, but the programs were decent, eh?

[laolover88]

I thought it was a sub-royal vanity project. Some sort of offshoot in Songkhla? No credibility in the real world

[geriatrickid]

Old thread, and still useful if only to serve as a caution. I don't know much about this place so I selected the MBA program to use as an indication of the quality of product at this for profit business. I did not see too many instructors with doctorates from internationally reputable universities. Ok then I said to myself. Maybe they are relying on entrepreneurs or industry segment specialists who gained their knowledge from real life success and demonstrable experience. All the top notch business universities will have an "entrepreneur in residence" or instructors recruited from the C-Suites of the real world. Nope, did not see that either. Hmm. What about R&D work, publishing? Surely there must be some sort of track record of important research Sadly, I could not find any.

I believe a "Stamford" diploma to be somewhat useless. I offer this from the perspective to someone who collected a few diplomas from well regarded universities. The sad reality is that there are only a handful of Thai post secondary universities that are well reputed and even with those, it is limited to specific faculties. I don't know what the point is in going to a Thai university, unless this is all one can afford. If someone has the financial means, there are options in Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Canada etc. all of which offer accredited courses.

[Oxx]

Interesting how a "university" plays upon the names of a respectable and prestigious one, i.e. "Stanford".

What next? Canbridge? Oksford? Harward? Yayle? MOT? Princesston? Camtech? Columbian? Johns Hopkiss?

[KhonKaenKowboy]

Actually, there is a well regarded university in the US named "Stamford.". 

[Rhys]

On 5/2/2016 at 9:52 PM, Oxx said:

Interesting how a "university" plays upon the names of a respectable and prestigious one, i.e. "Stanford".

What next? Canbridge? Oksford? Harward? Yayle? MOT? Princesston? Camtech? Columbian? Johns Hopkiss?

 

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