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Bangkok. Thailand’s conservative, top-down education system is poised for a radical dose of modernity: About 900,000 pupils aged between five and eight in 30,000 government schools around the country will get free tablet computers, in a scheme starting in May.

The program, one of the campaign promises that helped bring the ruling Puea Thai party a thumping victory in the election in July last year, is ambitious and expensive.

The 900,000 tablet computers required will be bought in a government-to-government deal with China for close to 3 billion baht ($96 million). About 2 billion baht has already been budgeted.

There is scepticism over the scheme, which critics at the outset said was just a populist strategy to win votes. They highlight the cost, and say the project will be stuck on the runway because of the lack of Internet access.

About 6,000 government schools have Internet access. The government’s plan is to roll out the scheme in these schools first. Subsequently, the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology will install wireless Internet access at the remaining schools so that children can use the tablets to their full potential.

Critics also say the tablets would be used for play rather than learning. In a pilot scheme, most pupils used them to play games.

But Minister for Education Suchart Thadathamrongvech said putting a tablet computer loaded with course books and exercises, and Web access, in the hands of primary school pupils between the ages of five and eight will enable them to think out of the box.

“With a book, you need to follow the teacher,” he said in an interview at his office. “If the teacher is not good enough, then the student is also not good enough; at best, you are at the same level as your teacher.”

“But if you have a tablet and the teacher does not teach correctly, you have an alternative, you can access information. It will allow students to discuss. Normally, they don’t discuss anything, they just remember what the teacher writes on the board. Students should have more discussion in the classroom.”

The ministry employs more than 400,000 teachers.

The tablet computers could also help in supplementing poor English instruction, he said.

Students’ test scores have been in steady decline — they scored below 50 out of 100 in mathematics, English and social sciences in just-released scores for national tests required for university admission — and attempts to give the system a badly needed jolt have usually defeated even reformist ministers.

An education reform committee set up about 10 years ago has been unable to achieve much, coming up against a wall of inertia.

But the 60-year-old Suchart, who has a PhD in economics from a Canadian university, was appointed during last month’s Cabinet reshuffle and wants to change the culture of the government’s education system.

“The Education Ministry has always liked to control,” the minister said. “It is an old conservative ideology. I am trying to change it. It is not easy.”

He is an impatient man. Drumming his fingers on the table, he barks out instructions. He waves his arms animatedly, laughing often.

His plan also calls for a reduction in the number of schools, and an increase in the intake of “native speakers” of English to teach the language to Thai students who are notoriously weak in it.

The minister also wants to address structural issues, such as the practice of the giving of “tea money” — or “donations” — by parents to schools to smooth entry for their children.

He wants to legalize them, arguing in an interview with the Bangkok Post: “It is better for rich parents to make a donation for school development than send their children overseas. And it should be OK to issue a donation receipt.”

For sceptics, the identifying of problems, proposal of solutions and announcement of new policies are all too familiar a pattern. In an opinion piece in The Nation last week, Priyakorn Pusawiro, who lectures at King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi, just outside Bangkok, wrote: “I have seen Thailand’s education problems becoming ‘never-ending stories.’”

“For decades, I have seen the relevant authorities repeat the same old cycle of identifying problems, proposing solutions and then devising new policies — but the problems never really go away. It seems the authorities usually lose focus halfway through.”

In a phone interview with The Straits Times, she said that while she did not disapprove of the tablet computer scheme, making the project work in practice would be a “gigantic” challenge, given the numbers of students involved.

But it is universally agreed that Thailand’s education system is in need of rejuvenation.

A Bangkok-based investment manager for a major corporation, who asked not to be named, said: “I worry about Thailand because the education system is not providing the quality employees — especially in professional services such as law and financial services — that would give it a competitive advantage over neighboring countries, especially with the Asean common market on the horizon.”

How will Suchart change the culture of the government education system when others before him have failed?

“I have to preach,” he said. “I am preaching every day.”

Reprinted courtesy of Straits Times Indonesia. To subscribe to Straits Times Indonesia and/or the Jakarta Globe call 021 2553 5055.