Thailand's education system is failing the country

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buksida
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Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by buksida »

Teach Thais to think
Thailand’s education system is failing its youth and the country’s competitiveness. Simply, it lacks accountability.

Thailand can no longer argue it lacks the finances to improve and sustain an effective education system. The government’s budget for education has sharply increased from about USD 3.5 billion in 2003 to nearly USD 14.7 billion in 2012, and Thailand’s public spending on education constituted 4 per cent of its GDP in 2011, while Singapore’s equivalent is just 3.2 per cent of its GDP.

Thai students spend more hours in the classroom, while Singapore adopts the ‘teach less, learn more’ approach.

Yet Singapore does much better than Thailand. Thai students achieve some of the lowest scores in East Asia in the Programme for International Assessment (PISA) test, an international study which evaluates students worldwide. The average score among OECD countries is normalized to 500 points and the standard deviation to 100 points. The average 15-year-old in Singapore scores 526 in reading, 562 in mathematics and 542 in science, far above the OECD average. By contrast, their Thai counterparts achieve only 421, 419 and 425, respectively.

How can it be that Thailand spends so much on education but remains in this humiliating position?

At the Thai Development Research Institute (TDRI), we have found one fundamental problem in Thailand’s education system — a lack of accountability.

Full Story: EAF
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PeteC
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by PeteC »

INSTAGRAM is doing its part.....at least with English language lessons. :D

http://bangkok.coconuts.co/2013/11/14/f ... -instagram
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by sand_dancer »

Buksi,

I think that the major problem of the failing of the Thai education system...... Is that the vast majority of teachers have came through the same failing system......

I am certain..... That there will be a lot of very intelligent students...... Who would go on to be great achievers for Thailand...... But they get crushed in the current system...... Dare I say it...... It cannot be possible for a student to be far more intelligent than a teacher.....

Most sane people..... Understand that you can throw as much money at a problem as you want...... It will sort nothing unless the core problem is addressed and eradicated.....

I dont want to touch on Thai mentality..... But until that changes..... Then IMO..... I am afraid Thailand is going nowhere fast......
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by centermid7 »

I sure hate it for Thailand but as far as I can tell, even the best educated are not that well educated.

TBS, there are smart and clever people here. Lots of them. But after going through the education system, such as it is, there just does not seem to be much there when they come out on the other end.
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by Lung Per »

As long as the students are not allowed to ask teachers questions because the teacher will lose face if he/she cannot answer, as long as this goes on students will go nowhere.
In order to get better students you must have better teachers. In my Thai son's class the English teacher cannot speak one word of English. She teaches from a DVD and a book with cartoons. Sigh...
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by Gregjam »

One of the problems in SE Asia is the learn by rote system that is probably good for learning languages like Chinese and Thai but does not teach the kids problem solving. Years ago when I moved back to the UK for my kids to go to school there I was told by the Mathis teacher that my son was miles ahead of the others in basic math but was not able to problem solve. This was before he could speak English. It is not just a Thai problem I see the same with the Chinese and Filipino lads at work.

A small thought but perhaps if the system was not like this there would be a lot less jobs open to foreigners here. Just look at all the hotels and most will have a foreigner actually doing the real management in a senior but not the top position.
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

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In order to get better students you must have better teachers. In my Thai son's class the English teacher cannot speak one word of English. She teaches from a DVD and a book with cartoons...
Better teachers would be great but there is ONE BIG PROBLEM it seems....

Shit like below you see all to often these days and who is to blame???

Website: Meebal dot com/foreign-teacher-scam-thailand/
(massive education scam)

Who is to blame? Teachers? Agency? School(s)?

Or maybe it is just Thai business style?

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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by nanyang »

buksida wrote:Teach Thais to think
Thailand’s education system is failing its youth and the country’s competitiveness. Simply, it lacks accountability.

Thailand can no longer argue it lacks the finances to improve and sustain an effective education system. The government’s budget for education has sharply increased from about USD 3.5 billion in 2003 to nearly USD 14.7 billion in 2012, and Thailand’s public spending on education constituted 4 per cent of its GDP in 2011, while Singapore’s equivalent is just 3.2 per cent of its GDP.

How can it be that Thailand spends so much on education but remains in this humiliating position?
It beggars belief that you, and others, keep asking the same old question.

Recognize the fact that the only thing your children will learn, in the current Thai 'education' system, is a comprehensive understanding of how to read and write Thai.

An awareness of Thai literature and poetry is rare.

I grasped the nettle, having soon seen through the veneer, and removed my daughters from Thailand.

I do understand that many of you are unable to do the same - your children have my sympathy.

The answer to the question is CORRUPTION and ignorance.

Do you honestly believe that 4% (sic) of GDP ends up where it was intended?
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by johnnyk »

Serves the country very badly, indeed.
But it serves those at the top very well. A limitless supply of under-educated people with NO critical thinking or analytic skills keeps wages down and limits advancement.
The top dogs educate their children at proper international schools with highly qualified western teachers then send them on to western universities. These graduates are as smart as anyone and are happy to come back home and coin easy money in papa's company.
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buksida
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

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nanyang wrote: It beggars belief that you, and others, keep asking the same old question.

Recognize the fact that the only thing your children will learn, in the current Thai 'education' system, is a comprehensive understanding of how to read and write Thai.
I simply posted the article to generate discussion, no need to get aggressive.

I am well aware how fcked up the education system here is thank you. Maybe others considering having or moving here with kids are not, so articles like this are worth posting from time to time as a reminder of the state of things.
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

Post by Spitfire »

Everyone knows that the education system here needs deep reform but the problem goes further than that. Something within the culture or society 'dumbs down' a large section of the populace but it's hard to exactly pin down what it is as it could be a combination of a few things. There seems to be motivational and ambition issues (the lack thereof) as if so many students are under some myopic spell.

I would surmise that places such as Singapore and some of the other better performing countries have many more students that are intrinsiclly motivated (motivated from within) as opposed to those that are extrinsiclly motovated (motivated from the outside) which often seems the case here. Perhaps it's a result of the national midset of 'mai pben rai' and the like, plus many youngsters are simply not encouraged to be a success with the "I'll just be mediocre with the herd and follow rather than stand out and achieve anything" mindset prevailing much of the time.

All students at the place I work at must go through an interview/speaking exam where they are quizzed about lots of things, and I sit there listening to ambitionless monotone pre-prepared scripts that are all sound fairly similar.........'critical thinking' my arse, never in the anytime soon future. It sometimes seems as if these students are sleep walking through university and on to a future which contains little imagination or flamboyance in regards to the possibilities that are now laid out before people of 20 years-old..........even engineers want to have a job 'near home' and consider Bangkok as step too far. :shock:

Like someone mentioned above....perhaps those that manipulate from positions of power want and like it that way so that the underperforming majority can be kept in place and used/exploited in the business and political worlds.
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Re: Thailand's education system is failing the country

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Amazing what 100 years of colonization could have achieved. Missed opportunity. :wink: Pete :cheers:
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