Cram schools should be taxed and controlled

They are simply a reflection of the Thai education system's failings

The Thai educational system is a complete failure. What is the evidence? One example is the growing number of cramming schools throughout the country. Although there are no official statistics, over 100,000 schools, at least, are hiring more than 7,000 tutors for well over 300,000 students. The accumulated fees that parents of eager students have to dish out are to the tune of Bt7 billion. With such a huge income, it is about time the government collected tax from these education mafias. At present, cramming schools are proliferating at all levels and there is a saying among parents - the younger the better. The conventional wisdom goes that if they start late, kids would not be competitive.

There are different reasons why students flood into cramming schools. Some attend classes because they want to be with friends. Others just want to stay away from home or their parents over the weekend. But most students attend cramming schools to learn how to achieve good scores on their exam papers, which determine the students' chances of going to certain schools or colleges. Unlike music or sports camping schools, these cramming schools do not promote students' multi-intelligence or their body of knowledge. But they do tell students how pass entrance exams or to get good TOEFL scores.

Many parents decide to spend large money for these cramming schools because, unfortunately, Thai students are solely judged by their test scores. Thai students are not tested by their essays, a means to express their thoughts, or their understanding about themselves and their communities, which are more important to make our children better-equipped persons in their future.

The intense but inhuman tutoring and memorising of hundreds of patterns and questions put out over and over again have enabled students to become masters of fast and correct answers.

By answering the questions, which often repeat themselves once every few years in some form or another as examinations, the students exposed to such tutoring would be able to give the right answers and go to good universities. Given the right answers seem to be the indicator of how the future generation of Thai students would be assessed. What really happens now is quite simple: these students may not have an increasing body of knowledge. But they can go to good universities.

Living in a dream

The Ministry of Education is living in dream, trying to convince the whole world that Thai students are smart because they win all sorts of contests in mathematics and sciences. This type of news is often used to illustrate the superiority of Thai education and its students. In fact, this is educational propaganda. These days Thai students do not learn how to think through or know how to write and express themselves. Memorising the right answers and patterns are important. What is the theory of Knowledge? The advertisements for these cramming schools often show rates of success that help their students be accepted into well-known schools or universities.

These cramming schools are simply a reflection of the failure of Thai educational system which does not teach students basic understanding about themselves or their communities. Students simply grow up aspiring to become someone else instead of excelling through their own strengths and uniqueness.

Therefore, the cramming school cannot be allowed the privileges that other educational institutions are entitled to enjoy. A cramming school is merely the business of enabling students to produce good grades.

On the other hand, the government should make musical schools, language schools or sports academies more easily accessible for Thai children because the infusion of art and sport would help nurture them into well-rounded human beings. Language skills will make students better global citizens through their cultural diversity awareness.

The government should also draw on the strengths of these cramming schools and see why they manage to attract students. For instance, some students may prefer to go to them because of a less-rigid study environment or higher attention from the tutors which the students don't receive in traditional classrooms which often seat around 50 students each. Some tutoring schools are also successful through their tutors' easy-going and approachable style.

In the meantime, students should study harder but at real schools - not at the tutoring places where teaching answering formulas would leave the future generation mundane and empty.