As to whether an exam is considered difficult or easy depends to some extent on the type of training the candidates for the exam have been given. But surely an exam must present the students sitting it with a reasonable level of challenge. If it is very easy, then it does not assist in distinguishing between the good and poor students in the subjects being tested. If most of the students get more than 80 per cent on an exam how do we know who is good and who is not? By the same token, if it is too difficult and most of the students score less than 30 per cent then either we have an exam that is too difficult or we have a very weak group of students. Again, how can we tell?

With any examination system we should start by asking what is the point of having the examinations? What skills are we trying to test? Only after we have answered those questions can we begin designing our examination system properly.

For 20 years or more the university entrance exams were multiple choice exams. The effect of that is that students developed and were taught skills in recognising which alternatives were obviously wrong to increase their chances of getting the correct one if they were not sure of the answer. But the students did not have to write anything.

Consequently most of them never learned to write in school. Many of the best students who progress to the master's and PhD levels still cannot write well. Some teachers of English and lecturers in international courses think this is a sign of the weakness of their English skills. Wrong. They are no better in Thai. The important exams did not require writing skills, so they were never trained in them.

I would probably do very poorly on an old entrance exam because I have never done multiple choice exams. Educated under the English O-level and A-level system, all our exams were of "open" questions. We had to write essays in all subjects except mathematics, but there we had to do calculations and prove theorems. Consequently at university level we were able to do these things within the environment of our chosen discipline. The open-question format should certainly be retained in O-Net and A-Net tests. They will help to develop logical writing, expression and analysis - skills that are sadly lacking among Thai students.

As far as the marking of open questions is concerned, provided it is properly planned for and proper quality control checks are in place, it is quite possible to manually mark essay type exam answers.

When I did my O and A levels, computers filled whole rooms and were full of valves. There was no question of computerised marking. How could a computer "understand" a complex sentence or paragraph anyway? Yet the O and A levels in England were and are of a standard that employers use their results as a major guide for recruiting school leavers who are not going on to higher studies.

Thailand wants to be an international centre in a whole range of areas. In order to do so its school leavers and graduates must be trained to standards on a par with international standards.

Gareth Clayton

Bangkok

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Privatisation plans were a grand business conspiracy

 The privatisation of the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (Egat) does not mean a business reorganisation. It does mean privatisation of state assets. Privatisation is good as long as it creates the most liberally competitive climate that yields the optimal profit to all stakeholders, including consumers. However, people have to wake up and look at what the Thaksin government was trying to do: simply transfer ownership from the state to government leaders and their gang.

Look at the government's financial adviser Olarn Chaipravat, who served simultaneously on the boards of directors at Shin Corp, Egat and PTT Plc. How dare they do that? What did it mean? Use your common sense. Olarn has since resigned from the boards.

To who else but Shin Corp would the government give the use of the fibre-optic cables along the high-voltage lines across the country? That gives Shin another huge advantage over its competitors. Who do you think Egat would buy fuel from but PTT? Do you really think Egat would get the cheapest price? No way! Were you dreaming of cheaper electricity after privatisation? Keep dreaming.

We are lucky that Thaksin and Co were stopped in their tracks.

Washingtonian Thai

Washington, DC

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Foreign Ministry makes a weak case for its policies

 As someone who used to be in his position, I can well understand well why Khun Kitti Wasinondh, as Foreign Ministry spokesman, had to defend the administration's foreign policy since 2001 ("Thai Foreign Policy's Continuous Thread", The Nation, April 21). Whether he succeeds in doing so is debatable, however.

He writes: "Patching up snapshots of unrelated episodes, each purposely taken out of context, would not produce a complete account measuring a particular government's foreign policy. It would even risk engendering misconception of, and do no justice to, Thailand's diplomacy."

On reading the whole article, one gets the impression that he was doing exactly the same thing Don Pathan and Supalak Ganjanakhundee did a week or so ago in criticising the foreign policy. On the other hand, I also feel Kitti's piece to be closer to propaganda aimed at educating the so-called "uneducated journalists" that used to exist in the 1960s, when foreign policy was off limits to the common folks and the exclusive domain of the elite.

Kitti seems to have forgotten that all policies, let alone foreign policy, must have broad-based support if they are to be successful. In foreign policy, however, the dictum that it is the extension of domestic policy is no longer relevant today. You cannot have a popular domestic policy and assume that your foreign policy will be accepted internationally. You need the support of the international community to make things work.

Take, for example, the "extrajudicial measures" used in the war against drugs. "The UN is not my father!" was the prime minister's response to international concerns about human rights. But that is not all. We are still unable to explain the disappearance of human-rights lawyer Somchai Neelaphaijit, the massacre at Krue Se mosque and the Tak Bai incident. Worst of all, the 131 Thais who fled to Malaysia still refuse to return. Human-rights abuses have brought shame to Thailand and made this a dark time for Thai diplomacy.

From what the ministry's information department is doing now, it seems the tradition of sincere dialogue and openness to public input that was started in the 1980s by ACM Siddhi Savetsila is on the way out.

Why must the Foreign Ministry feel the need to respond to every criticism? Why could it not sit still even if three former ambassadors were washing dirty linen in public? If its policies are right, there is nothing to fear.

The many "initiatives" taken by the Foreign Ministry under the present administration seem to be mostly knee-jerk reactions and lack elements of permanence. Kitti mentioned Thailand's efforts in the Sri Lankan peace process. I wonder if that initiative could be compared to the efforts of former foreign minister Thanat Khoman in resolving the confrontation between Malaysia and Indonesia, which in the end paved the way for the establishment of Asean.

I wonder if the Asia Cooperation Dialogue and the Ayeyawady-Chao Phya-Mekong Economic Cooperation Strategy will develop into something similar to the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum or the Asia Europe Meeting. I wonder whether the so-called "good-neighbourly relations" with Burma, Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia and, most importantly, Singapore will not turn sour if Thailand insists on being the front runner in Asean and all regional initiatives.

I wonder if our good relations with North Korea will stop the US considering it part of an "axis of evil". I wonder if our participation in the relief efforts in Iraq will bring peace to our three southernmost provinces? And I wonder if the Singaporean military presence on Thai territory, never mind the stock exchange, will not hurt the feelings of the Thai people too much.

Are we not, in the final analysis, expecting too much?

Prachyadavi Tavedikul

Bangkok

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Iran's nuclear programme only an issue for the West

 US President George W Bush and his kith and kin in Europe like to talk about the conflict with Iran over the nuclear issue as one between that country and the international community. The fact is that most of the international community spread across Asia, Africa, South America, the Pacific and elsewhere don't give a hoot about this issue. They are preoccupied with their own problems and don't understand what all the fuss is about. If Iran wants to develop its own nuclear technology, then why can't it? Who has given the people of the "developed" West the right to decide who should not do what?

But some of us do understand why Bush and his cohorts are in such a huff. It's to do with getting Middle East oil as cheaply as possible and protecting their baby, the state of Israel, a baby that was created criminally at an enormous cost to the Palestinian people, and whose removal the Iranians are now rightfully demanding.

Aziz Anom

Songkhla

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Something amiss at the British Embassy

 Another embassy nearby used to be the butt of all jokes and complaints, but now, ladies and gentlemen, may we present the revamped British Embassy of Bangkok - the upmarket shopping mall that gives nothing away.

Such shenanigans: the selling of land, higher administrative charges, and the privatisation of the visa department. Is Britain going bankrupt? Has the war in Iraq gone over budget? Is Bangkok single-handedly attempting to bail out the insolvent British National Health Service?

The discourteous treatment of some Thai visa applicants is a separate area of concern. However, the sum of all this raises the question, what's going on in downtown Ploenchit?

We British expats (certainly the ones I know) are appalled and ashamed.

With bated breath do we await a response.

John Shepherd

Bangkok

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