Thailand Rajabhat Initial Teacher Education project: Project Report

The report draws on fieldwork and secondary data sources to review initial teacher education (ITE) in Thailand’s Rajabhat universities. The research team visited five Rajabhat universities spread geographically across Thailand to collect data from university leaders, middle managers, ITE staff and students. The report presented to Thailand’s Ministry of Education recommend policy consideration and possible reform in eight broad areas. These were: the quality and quantity of initial teacher education students; timing of the teaching practicum/internship: Student placement/internship; the undergraduate ITE course length; the importance of discipline knowledge (particularly for those students’ considering a career as a high school teacher); a simplified framework of teaching standards; curriculum alignment between school practice and university student instruction; ITT faculty organisation, and, a method to ensure greater collaborative working across the Rajabhats and Thailand’s other universities.