Trotz der Bemühungen der thailändischen Regierung zur Förderung der Berufsbildung sinkt die Zahl der Schülerinnen und Schüler, die sich für berufsbildende Kurse einschreiben, stellt das Büro der "Vocational Education Commission" fest.
Vocational enrolments dip
Despite the government's efforts to promote vocational education among
Thai youngsters, the number of students enrolling in vocational courses for the
2016 academic year declined 0.4% from a year earlier figures released by the
Office of the Vocational Education Commission (Ovec) show.
According to
Ovec, 360,149 students have signed up for vocational programmes this academic
year, down about 1,692 students from last year. At the Vocational Certificate
level, there was a 798 drop in students across all enrolments, while at the High
Vocational Certificate level there was a fall of 894 students.
Ovec
secretary-general Chaipreuk Sereerak said the low birth rate is the most likely
cause of the enrolment decline, while the problem of violence among vocational
schools and parents' prejudice against vocational education may still be a
factor.
"Low fertility rates are an unavoidable reality, but we need to
keep working hard on improving the poor image of vocational education among
students and parents by dealing with student brawls," he said.
Earlier,
Ovec forecast that a slight increase in Thailand's population of vocational
students this year was possible, so it decided to set a target to shift the
vocational to general education ratio from 39:61 currently to 42:58 by the end
of this year.
Mr Chaipreuk said he was surprised when he first saw the
figures of Mathayom 3 students who applied to study further at vocational level
this year. He said 774,069 students finished Mathayom 3 level last academic
year. A slight increase was observed in the number of junior high school
graduates who opted to study vocational education, from 22.1% in 2015 to 22.9%
in 2016.
"The enrolment figure is not too bad because more than 300,000
students still chose to study in the vocational track this year and if we
continue to improve the image of vocational education, I reckon we will be able
to maintain this growth rate next year," he said.
In recent years, the
government has promoted the dual vocational education system to boost the number
of students enrolled to meet demand in the labour market. The dual system is a
collaboration between entrepreneurs, vocational and academic schools, allowing
students to enroll in a dual-track programme and graduate with both academic and
vocational qualifications.