Hi,

In a couple years time I'm going to have to make some important decisions about my son's education here in Bangkok. I know it's a while to go, but just thought I'd get ahead a bit with the research. Just a few questions I'm hoping ThaiVisa members can help me out with regarding the different options available.

My understanding is that the best standard of education can be found at International Schools, with the lowest standard being at Thai state School. A friend recently told me about "Bilingual Schools" also - what's the deal with these? My understanding is that they sit somewhere between International School and State School, and that you have to pay fees to send your kids to them, but a lot less than International School. Have I got this right?

Is the education at these Bilingual Schools of an acceptable standard, compared with a typical Western state school for example? And could a very good Bilingual School be as good as a lower-end International School, or is the gulf between them much greater? Any particular Bilingual Schools in Bangkok that anyone can recommend? Are there any members out there who teach at one of these establishments?

Thanks!

I teach at a Bilingual School. I'd say that the standards are higher than at a Thai Govt. School, but lower than at an International School. Class sizes vary from 15 to 25 students. Students here learn English, Science, Math, Geography, Health, IT and PE in English and Thai, History/Social Studies, Career/Guidance, Chinese and Scouting in Thai. The teachers all have BA/BSs and experience, but only one or two have western teaching credentials. The cost is 60K baht/term.

There are also EP programs at many Government Schools that are usually cheaper. Quite frankly, the schools and EP programs are rather hit or miss: I've never taught at a school in Thailand that had a real curriculum. Admins everywhere just tell the teachers to make it up as they go along! If a school happens to have good teachers and can hold on to them for a few years, the quality of education can be quite high. However, many schools fail to recognize the value of continuity and view their teachers as a disposable commodity.

If I were looking for a good school, I wouldn't use cost as a criteria. There are many very expensive private schools around where your child will have 3 different teachers every semester! If I were a parent looking for a good school, I would ask to see a printed curriculum and would ask how many of this years teachers were teaching there last year. If teacher turnover is much over 50%, it probably won't be a good school.

Thanks for the info. What's an "EP program" by the way?

EP = English Program. I know that that makes EP program = English Program Program, but that's what everyone calls them!

At my last school there were about 3,500 students total with about 300 in the EP. The cost was about 35K per term and most of the teachers were pretty good. However, the school has a new Director this year who froze everyone's salaries, so most of the old EP teachers left and have been replaced by a mixed bag of cheaper Filipinos and less qualified Westerners. I ran into one of my old students last week and she said that the students felt that their education was suffering this year.

This is interesting as we are currently looking into changing our children from an International school to a Bi-Lingual school. The reason being is that his current International school teaches extremely limited Thai and we wish him to be totally conversant not only in oral and written language.

Currently we have only looked at one alternative Bi-Lingual, Satit Bilingual School of Rangsit University ( SBS ) and at first glance and conversations with the Head of pre-school it does appear to be on a par. Interestingly we get feed back from others with experinece only of International schools that bi-lingual are academically inferior, yet strangly this one we are interested in do go on to offer older students an IB which very many International schools do not. Based on that alone I would assume that academic teaching levels must at some time at least approach and superceed those of many non IB international schools. I would be interested to hear from others of experince of both also.

From reading comments by teachers, I get the idea that BKK has a far wider variety than, say, Chiang Mai. You have so-called international schools who are only called so, and not accredited as such. You have demonstration schools in the best unis there, that rival the mid-level international schools. And other overlaps.Do not be fooled by names or prices.

International Schools

If the school offers the IB Program it is almost certainly sound.

If the school does not offer IB, but is linked to a 'mother' school in the UK, offers IGCSE followed by proper A-Levels, then it very likely is a good choice.

If the school offers proper AP courses (US system), it is probably sound.

If the school offers none of the above, then it is likely not much better than bilingual schools, only the cost will be three to four times as high. The quality of international schools varies considerably. Check for accreditation, and by whom. Check the science facilities. Check out the recreational facilities. Check about teacher qualifications, textbooks, the mix of ethnicities amongst the students, etc.


Bilingual Schools or English Programs

The variation in quality amongst these schools is enormous. Some are quite good with proper curriculum, but most are not. Some have high quality teachers, others do not. Some will prepare a child well for international education, others do not.

An Example: The EP I work for now took 1st and 2nd place in a mathematics competition against the very best Bangkok international schools in the two age groups we fielded teams for. Ten schools fielded teams and we were the only EP in the competition. We also took 1st place in an all-EP competition in the subjects of English/Social Studies/Math/Science in which 18 very reputable BKK schools fielded teams. At this school we use only Western textbooks, have a detailed curriculum, dedicated teachers, excellent facilities, good management, and it is a decent place to work. Over the years I have privately tutored students from every top international school in Bangkok and I would put the best of our students in a competition any day against the best of theirs. I would definitely consider sending my own child here.

Another Example: The last EP I worked for had very low standards, a nonsense curriculum, a terrible administration team, and under no circumstances would I consider sending my child there.

This post has been edited by way2muchcoffee: 2008-12-22 15:45:31

I would be very interested to know if Rangsit Bilingual does in fact offer an IB. When I was investigating IB possibilities some months ago I did not see Rangsit's name on the list of IB schools in Thailand. Maybe they've applied, but I'd be surprised if, as a bilingual school, they could meet the criteria for IB. I doubt any bilingual school in Thailand (including my own) could meet these criteria without doing a lot of upgrading and charging much higher fees.

I think the advice the OP has got above (from otherstuff1957 and waytoomuchcoffee) is pretty good. I've worked in two private bilingual schools over 8 years and have some idea about some others from networks and would agree that the quality of education varies, as it does among international schools and government schools. For example, class sizes will likely be larger in proportion to the level of fees charged and the quality of the teaching will be related to the educational and supervisory competence of the administrators.

Bilingual schools/EP schools fill a niche for parents who want their kids to get an education in Thai and in English; hence at our school core subjects are taught in both languages from Grade 2 to Grade 12. They also enable access to an English-through-content program for parents who can afford fees ranging from about 60K - 150K per year (our school is 60-70K p.a.). But there are certainly parents who could afford international schools who opt for bilingual schooling for their children.

A bilingual school should have a curriculum that is generally applied to both the Thai- and English-medium streams. Without a curriculum the program will not be bilingual, i.e. the kids will not be developing academic bilingual competence. They'll just be learning some things in English and other things in Thai.

Thank you all very much for these responses, some good information here.

Is there anywhere where I can find a list of all Bilingual Schools in Bangkok? And details on which ones have the various accreditations? I know I can just Google "Bilingual School Bangkok" but that just returns a list of individual schools' own web sites - if there's a central list somewhere it would help with separating the wheat from the chaff, so to speak.

Way2MuchCoffee, the school you teach at now sounds good, which school is it? And where is it?

Also, just another question about the abbreviations used, what does "IB" mean?

Yes I highly doubt they teach this. Ive had students leave *** to come to my EP and they are easly 2 years behind the average in their class. This was a very popular school on the teflwatch.org when it was in operation. Beware.

Yes the main problem with the EP's and bilingual schools is that they are supposed to follow the (arguably deficient) thai curriculum and have to study many subjects at higher levels that they aren't interested in. Dance classes for the grade 6 jocks! There is a very vague primary and lower secondary goverment curriculum and at the senior school it's even more hazy (and non-existant for many elective courses). I roughly know what is mean;t to be taught based on o-net, a-net exams and thai textbooks. What ends up happening is that the teacher just follows the book that is probided to students. Not very healthy education. I would say a 'good' EP or bilingual school is adequate to grade 9, but a good international school will be better for senior (simply because there is a coherent structured curriculum, external assessment, and students can focus of a few courses).

It's in Thai, but you can get a list of non-government bilingual schools at http://www.thaiapep.net/Documents/Bilingual-school.xls
IB stands for International Baccalaureate.
I don't think any Thai bilingual schools offer IB or IGCSE (at any level) at the moment.You'd have to go to an International school to do one of these courses

This post has been edited by Xangsamhua: 2008-12-23 07:24:22

My earlier post refers to this Bi-lingual school and which I quoted. I also have visited the school and hence spoken to teachers and admin. Please follow the link http://www.sbs.ac.th/en/index.php

Of course you can choose to disbelieve their syllabus and advertising blurb, along with disregarding feedback for the people, but there again that would also apply to International Schools.

Al Thai schools have to follow the MoE currciulum; they can write whatever they like about others such as IGCSE and IB. They incorporate all of these curricula. It's highly unlikely, especially at the IB level which requires projects and long essays. Even students in International schools find them very challengins. Ask the school how many of their students have passed the IGCSE exams (at C or higher). That should give you a good yard stick of the quality of the school and its students. At any rate. it's noble to try to get the students to suceed at external exams (if indeedd the curricula can be incorporated), but I don't see it happening at the IB level, given the depth and difficulty of the subjects that need to be covered (IGCSE is entirely believable though).

The official MOE curriculum for many subjects is actually mind-blowingly vast- it's kind of like the ads for teachers: we want a Ph.D in economics, psychology, education, English, and management to teach 40 classes of 50 students each at a remote provincial school, where we will pay 18K a month plus kanom; no work permit offered.

In other words, if you look at it on paper, it looks great; however, there's nowhere near enough classtime to do it (and many of the more provincial teachers may not be all that bothered or even able to go through it all). If it were done with well-raised, well-supported intelligent kids and quality teachers who cared, it might be possible. Just not likely.

The 'top' schools generally are the ones where it really happens- they get through all the subjects- and those are some bright students.

Thanks for this and all the other replies too. Do you know of any BKK-based bilingual or EP school where the MOE curriculum is properly adhered to, as you describe? Or does it tend to change regularly in schools as management and teachers move on and new staff join?

Basically, whether it's Thai or English language, you can pretty much depend on the university-connected schools. Each major public university has its own public school system attached. I don't know all of the relative merits/offerings of each one, but that's a good group of schools to check out. Then, the major high school that everyone wants to get into is Triam Udom Suksa. They're ok and not expensive, but you have to be smart enough to pass their entrance tests and it's pretty much all Thai except the English classes.

If I were making vague recommendations, in general for Thai-run schools stay away from private so-called 'internationals' and schools with religious affiliations- most of these are either very low quality and low return for money, and/or have disturbing social/employment problems. Your best chance is with the true-blue internationals- very expensive and hardly Thai at all- or the university-connected schools- still expensive but more affordable and possibly more Thai.

Sounds good, thanks IJWT. After reading this I'm leaning more towards the university-connected schools - I'd certainly like my son to have a strong basis of Thai, and the apparent lack of anything Thai related at the big international schools is a big turn-off for me. As is the cost (although I'd be willing to pay if it was really worth it...)

I know you're making "vague recommendations", IJWT, but lots of schools have a religious connection, without necessarily being sponsored by a religious organization. Others are directly managed by religious orders and I expect they vary in quality. The identification of "social/employment problems" with religious schools begs a few questions (what are these problems? Are they restricted to religious schools? What religious schools (Catholic? Evangelical? Muslim? SDA?)? I know we can all think of examples, but are we current? Is there something about religion that breeds bad management? Are non-religious private schools more just and generous than religious private ones? Are government schools the only good ones for reasons other than management practices, and so on?

You're right that the sathit schools, Triam Udom Suksa and the upmarket international schools are probably all very good, but if the parent is looking for a school in which the curriculum is taught in both Thai and English these schools are not going to provide it. He's going to have to do some research (as he is) and shop around for a good bilingual/EP school.

Well, to answer one of your quite good list of questions, I don't in general recommend bilingual schools. There's no way to get ALL the education in either language by learning half of it in each, or by learning it twice in two languages. I'd depend on the native environment, family, and if necessary private tutoring for Thai and go ahead and send kids to an all-English program.

With regard to more specific details about problems at schools, they run the gamut, but we don't do the 'name and shame' thing here on Thaivisa for a variety of good reasons, as much as I would like that to be possible. If you're going to go with one of those private EPs or religious-affiliated schools (when I say that, I mean usually CHRISTIAN affiliation, because by definition Thai public schools are Buddhist-affiliated), make sure you do LOTS of research.

"S"

All the research I would do is: is the school a properly accredited International school?

If yes, don't ask for price, just pay and don't worry.

My daugther is in American program International school, 12 students in a class and two female teachers for them. Yes, two teachers, for balance, perspective and authority, one in late 20s and one in low 50s.

Never ever had she brought any piece of homework home. Small class, 2 teachers, 8am-3pm, no way anything is left to wreck her afternoons or weekends.

The horror of Thai (it was a private) school and heaps of homework are distant past now.

Which school is your child enrolled in? Is it in Chiang Mai?

We are in Japan, International School here.

They have to fulfill the same criterias to be accredited as an International school as BKK based schools have to. Should not matter where the school is.

As a teacher for students wishing to have extra tuition after school I teach students from education schools called Demonstration Schools here in Thailand in Chiang Mai - their academic level is high and class size is not large - possibly a search on the internet of a list of Demonstration schools may also be worthwhile? Just a suggestion as it is Bi Lingual also. The one here in Chiang Mai is attached to Chiang Mai University. Maybe others online may also have more information regarding these types of schools.