Get serious on education

Get serious on education

For all the talk of reform, the massive public support and all the committees and talking points it has spawned, it is unfortunate the National Reform Council (NRC) has carefully sidestepped the elephant in the room.

Its refusal to be serious about education reform is a surrender to the bureaucracy that drives classroom failure at almost all levels. Because they lack qualified graduates, industries plan to "import" one million people to work in Thai factories.

There are constant examples of the failure and continuing decline of schools across the country. The most recent proof came last week from the National Institute of Educational Testing Service (Niets), which released the shocking results of recent university entrance exams. Across the board, mean scores on the national tests earned "F" for failure. In one subject out of seven, applicants managed a mean score of 58%. In the other six, the scores were below 50%.

This means that a large number of students who just graduated from secondary schools throughout Thailand are unprepared to go on. These young people were all certified by high school teachers and principals as ready for tertiary education. Indeed, they took the entrance exams because they have the ambition to move to university. Eager to learn, motivated to step ahead, they were told by educators they were fully, intellectually prepared to move upwards.

And they were not. Many could not get a passing grade in maths or physics. The exam in English — a subject everyone knows is taught poorly and mostly by teachers who struggle at best — flummoxed the young people. Social science questions were beyond students who use social media constantly. Biology proved a mystery to recent high school graduates of a country where environmental issues are so often at the fore.

No one, it seems, doubts what the problem is here. Certainly, the education system is not underfunded. The most recent budget added 3.2% to education, bringing spending to just under half a trillion baht. It's the biggest budget in the country — two and a half times the military budget. Of course the money is not spent correctly. Of course there is endemic corruption. Of course teacher training and course curricula are ignored and textbook deals and incessant conferences are favoured. Of course students fail vital tests and exams.

This shows that education needs reform more urgently than almost every other field the NRC has focused on. Under the great kings Mongkut and Chulalongkorn, Thailand reformed education with neither fear nor favour. Another such effort is clearly necessary.

If the education system is a joke, it is a cruel one, and today's youth are the butt of it. If the need for educational reform is so clear, students aren't to blame for failing exams. Instead, put the spotlight onto the teachers who wrote the examination papers and the administrators and bureaucrats who approved them. The entire system needs the harsh light of reform daylight. It must be top-to-bottom reform, of the Education Ministry, its bureaucracy, schools, teachers and classroom methods.

Earlier this month, it seemed as if the entire education hierarchy, from classroom to ministry, was consumed by whether students would use Valentine's Day for unapproved trysts. It is exactly this type of focus on trivia that has prevented serious consideration of this vital problem. The authorities in charge have the power to make the revolutionary and necessary changes. Education reform is a legacy of which the coup administration could be truly proud.

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