Prestigious secondary schools around the country are to recruit half their new students from local communities and half via entrance exams, the Office of Basic Education Commission (Obec) announced yesterday. "There are about 430 schools in this category," said Obec secretary general Khunying Kasama Varavarn after a meeting with representatives from some of the schools.

The rest of the country's schools will be required to accept all applicants and instructed to hold draws to decide which children will be admitted if there are not enough seats, Kasama said.

Previously, it had been suggested that 50 per cent of the

positions in prestigious schools should go to local children, 40 per cent to applicants who pass entrance exams, and 10 other per cent to the children of school patrons or children with special talents.

"If the schools want to accept children with special talents, the quota must come from the entrance-exam portion," Kasama explained yesterday.

Education Minister Wijit Srisa-an qualified the new policy by saying that prestigious schools should cease giving preference to the children of their patrons except when the schools are operating on land donated by the children's parents, grandparents or great grandparents.

Kasama also announced that grade 7 classes would be restricted to 40 students or less.

"If a schools needs to add more seats to a classroom there must be sound reasons given and requests for permission must be submitted," she said.

Requests for up to 45 seats per class would have to be put before the school's admission board, while requests for 46-50 seats would need to be authorised by local education officials, Kasama said.

"If the schools plan to have more than 50 seats per class, they must seek permission directly from Obec," she said.

Director of Debsirin School, Prakasit Yangkong, eagerly welcomed the decision to restrict the admission of the children of school patrons.

"If this becomes a concrete policy, we hope that influential people will stop pressuring the schools," he said.

Khon Kaen Wittayayon School director Pradit Samrarnpat also supported the decision.

But he said the ministry should increase subsidies to the schools as well.

He said that patrons contributed half of his school's total income.

Both Debsirin and Khon Kaen Wittayayon schools are on the ministry's list of prestigious schools.

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Admissions meeting Friday

Education Minister Wijit Srisa-an will call a special meeting on Friday to finalise university-admission criteria for 2009 onwards.

Wijit will hold talks with top educators to select the best system from four proposals, according to National Institute for Education Testing Service director Utumporn Jamornmann.

Utumporn said yesterday that Wijit, herself and University

Presidents Council of Thailand chairman Pratya Vesarach would attend.

The first alternative would see accumulated grade-point averages (GPAX) and grade-point averages (GPA) in key subjects during senior-secondary years count during the application-submission stage.

GPAX and GPA would be recalculated through a weighting formula designed to guarantee fairness.

Following the application-submission stage, applicant scores in three subjects of the Advanced National Educational Test (A-Net) would become the main admission criteria.

The second alternative would use GPAX and GPAs in key senior-secondary-year subjects plus three A-Net scores. GPAX and GPA would be recalculated through a weighting formula.

The third alternative would use GPAX and GPA plus A-Net scores with GPAX and GPA recalculated based on performance in content-free tests.

The last formula suggests establishing a Central Admissions Office (CAO) to replace the Office of the Higher Education Commission in handling applications and holding A-Nets. The CAO would set monthly aptitude tests, too.

The CAO would submit A-Net scores, aptitude-test scores, transcripts and applications to universities to then admit students.

Utumporn said admission to university next year would be based on 10 per cent of GPAX and 20 per cent GPA and the remainder on scores in the Ordinary National Educational Test (O-Net) and, in some cases, A-Net.

The O-Net scores would account for between 35 and 70 per cent of final marks, depending on fields of study and a student's preferred institute. A-Net scores would account for between zero and 35 per cent.

"For 2008, the criteria should be pretty much the same as next year," Utumporn said.