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Published on January 25, 2008

Children who don't live in the area of the schools will have to compete against those from all other areas.

"These schools want to attract the brightest students," Basic Education Commission deputy secretary general Som-kiat Chobphol said yesterday.

Some 47 of the schools are located in Bangkok.

Somkiat said the schools were on a list of 364 institutions, which were the most popular secondary schools in the country.

While most schools on this list were still required to allocate 50 per cent of their seats to children in their neighbourhood, they couldselect successful applicants based on scores from entrance exams instead of lucky draws.

Last year, when the number of applicants from local areas exceeded the places available, the schools held lucky draws to identify those who would be accepted.

But this year, the Office of Basic Education Commission (Obec) will allow the schools to hold entrance exams to select children from their own areas.

These exams, however, will be separate from seats allocated to children from other areas.

The popular schools reserve 50 per cent of their seats for

the academically-brightest applicants, who must outperform others in the entrance exams.

Normally, the entrance exams are open to all children - not just those from local

areas - and are more competitive.

Somkiat said three schools on the "most popular" list

had to allocate up to 70 per

cent of places to children from their local area, because there were few schools in nearby areas to accommodate local children.

The Nation