STEM Education and Innovation for Teacher Development: New Challenges toward Thai Education Quality

Main Article Content

Montree Yamkasikorn

Abstract

This paper indicates STEM education and innovations as the key issues of teacher development in Thailand. Since 2017, the Ministry of Education of Thailand has implemented a reform to the in-service teacher training system. The key principles of teacher development consist of (1) school-based development model and (2) development of teacher. Firstly, School – Based Development model is applied to development process through the Professional Learning Community (PLC). Secondly, Development of Teacher is conducted based on individual need. In implementing the new reform policy, teachers will receive a budget of approximately 300 USD (10,000 baht)/person in order to register for training courses from the Teacher Development Unit that is qualified by Teacher Profession Development Institute (TPDI) or Kurupatana. Thus far, 2,659 training courses have been approved. In the year 2018, more than 270,000 teachers received in-service teacher training under the “Teacher Development Coupon” project which counted for 72.6 % of teachers affiliated with the Office of Basic Education Commission (OBEC). Interestingly, in 2017, there were 116 STEM-related courses which accounted for 6.31% of all training courses and increased to 203 STEM-related courses in 2018, notably 75% increase in the numbers of STEM-related training courses. Nevertheless, there were only 1,625 teachers trained in STEM-related courses which accounted for 0.46 % of total numbers of teachers’ received training. This suggests New Challenges toward Thai Education Quality.

Article Details

How to Cite
Yamkasikorn, M. (2021). STEM Education and Innovation for Teacher Development: New Challenges toward Thai Education Quality. Asia Research Network Journal of Education, 1(1), 32–42. Retrieved from https://so05.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/arnje/article/view/250673
Section
Research Article

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