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2552
Head of programme
Companies*
Students
North Thailand University
1
10
5
N-E Thailand University
1
5
5
South Thailand University
1
5
5
Total
3
20
15
* Head of Human Resources
During these interviews, three major aspects were brought to the fore: The recruitment of students in the
co-op programme, the content of the curriculum delivered to students, and the assignment at the workplace.
Though co-operative education has been presented as a key for national economic and educational development, it
has faced many hurdles, not the least being the training of university supervisors to ensure the follow-up of the
programme.
Result and Discussion
1. Recruiting students for co-op programmes
The first actors of co-op education are of course students. They are expected to acquire at the university
and in the company the needed skills and knowledge to act efficiently on the labour market. Investigating where
the students come from and how they had been selected to join the co-op programme therefore seemed essential to
grasp some key features of co-op in Thailand.
1.1 Background of the students
Most students we interviewed came directly from secondary education. Most of them finished in
Mattayom 6 (Mo6) and then directly got into the university. They are therefore rather young and have very little
job experience, apart from part-time jobs during holidays or week-ends.
Most students joining the co-op programmes we studied came from the general education stream. Only
very few of them came from technical education. In Thailand, the majority of pupils in secondary education level
are in the general stream. Moreover, most pupils from technical or vocational colleges would not go to general
universities but more likely to higher education institutions delivering technical oriented diploma, usually a 2-year
less-than-a-degree diploma.
General universities are therefore not attracting lots of technical and vocational secondary students; all
the more that nowadays these general universities are in competition with other more specialised higher education
institutions that have recently accessed to the rank of university. Since 2004, Rajabhat Institutes and Rajamangala
Institute of Technology are indeed universities and have developed curriculum to attract more students, including
technical students.
