U-Net and fury of Thai students.

Greetings everyone. I hope you'll stay with me until the very end.
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First thing first, what is U-Net?

U-Net (University National Education Test) is a newly created test from NIETS (National Institute of Educational Testing Service). The ones who are going to do the test will be seniors in universities. ฺ Below is a Q&A picture made by NIETS' official Facebook page.

(Picture taken from NIETS' official facebook page. Here's the link.)

Here's translation by me.

Top-right, blue zone:
What is U-NET?
-University National Education Test.
-(Thai translation)

Top-left, light-green box:
Q: Does it have to be paid for?
A: No, because it is a government policy.

Left, green box:
Q: Does everyone have to take the test?/Is is a compulsion?
A: It is not a compulsion test and it depends on availability of subjects, faculties, and the academies. It is going to be used only with academies that are prepared and are willing to send their students to take the test.

Pink box:
Q: Do the test scores have any effect to consideration in job registration?
A: It depends on corporations whether they will include U-Net scores in their criteria or not. There are no coercion or agreements (from NIETS) with the corporations.

Yellow box:
Q: What reason is this test for? What does this test want to measure?
A: U-Net aims to measure the quality of academies, as graduates' quality is academies' quality. Also, the ones who take the test can use the results to assess their potential.

Orange box:
Q: The test is redundant with the academies' examination?
A: It is not redundant, as the test measure 4 subjects of basic skills. It doesn't emphasize repetition, and is based on Thailand Qualifications Framework (TQF), in which all universities take as guidelines.

Bottom right corner, green box:
Q: Why do you have to test on professional skills of specific majors when there are already licenses? 
A: For professions that already have federations/ professional associations, NIETS will not redundantly test again.


The 4 subjects of basic skills are:
1. Thai language for communication and English language for communication.
2. Information and Technology for subsistence.
3. Media Literacy
4. Critical Thinking


Now then, let's see what that picture didn't mention and the problems of U-Net.

Firstly, when they say there is no coercion or agreement with corporations, they didn't include the part that they ask for cooperation from corporations to use U-Net scores in job registration. So how is that NOT a compulsion/must do test?

Next, the 4 subjects aforementioned are going to be added with another two next year. Those two are Morality and Ethics and Professional Skills of Specific Majors. I really, REALLY want to know how can you measure one's morality through exams. I also want to know what happened with "For professions that already have federations/ professional associations, NIETS will not redundantly test again.".

Moreover, how can you determine the "correctness"? Do all of us have to think the exact same way as you and your exam? Any of us who have different ideas (answers) are considered wrong?

Regarding the aim of measuring academy's quality and redundancy, when GAT/PAT (another troublesome tests) was announced long ago, they also say that GAT/PAT emphasize understanding, not repetition. However, if you come to Bangkok you'll probably see A LOT OF tutor institutions. I'd say students even concentrate there more than schools, and there are a ton of GAT/PAT tutor courses. That being said, how is this not a repetition?

In truth, U-Net will generate U-Net tutor courses. Students can concentrate on normal schools less because they have to take on specific subject tutoring courses, O-Net tutoring courses, GAT/PAT tutoring courses, TOEFL/TOEIC/IELTS/SAT and probably more courses, university's specific test tutoring courses, and when they think they escape all that in the university, they have to take U-Net courses. U-Net will not be able to measure the quality of the academies, but it will boost the growth of tutor institutions, thus ruining Thai education even more.

And if these aren't enough to convince you that U-Net is terrible, allow me to show you some questions from the past O-Net (Ordinary National Educational Test) (U-Net is something like this, only in university level.)


(From 2013's O-Net)
The reason why Europeans like to eat Thailand's Mussaman curry is?
1. Spicy and tasty
2. Mellow taste like soup
3. Colorful and attractive
4. Fragrant spices
5. Sour like spicy lemongrass soup

What's your answer?


(From 2010's O-Net)
Nok is a 17-year-old tennis player who received Women's Singles and Women's Doubles champion titles.
Question One:  Nok is going to perform a valley, what position does she have to hit at the ball?
Question Two: What topic is Nok stressed about?
Question Three: How is Nok having sportsmanship?

That sentence was everything the exam provided. (Fun fact: The real Nok herself answered them wrong.)


(From 2011's O-Net)
If you get an erotic feeling, what should you do?
1. Invite friends to play football
2. Consult with family
3. Try to sleep
4. Travel with friends of different gender.
5. Invite close friends to watch movies.

The answer is choice one, invite friends to play football.


What a wonderful test.
There's a lot more details out there, but it will take me forever to mention them all. Anyways, I hope U-Net's going to be stopped.

Lastly, the reason why I'm writing this even though my English isn't that good to translate big topics is because it directly affects Thai students. Also, I've seen enough opinions from Thais, and I'd love to hear from others out there (by that I mean you). Please don't hesitate to comment!

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Wow, you really stay with me until the end. Thanks for reading!

12th Rant: Apology and Plea

Good day everyone.

Songkran festival has passed. It was crazy.

Not in a good way.

There were a lot of news about improper deeds here and there.

There were people showing their pubic areas.

There were girls dancing in a....erm...."priceless" way...

There were casualties and injuries, and there were accidents.

They all happen every single year. I repeat, every single year.

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The people who showed their genitals were arrested and paid 500 Baht each as their penalty.

They also apologized for their deeds, saying like they knew it's not good to do so.

My question is: Why bother doing it then?

Of course everyone knows it's not good to do that, yet you did. It shouldn't be like you did then apologized and perhaps paid a bit of money and finished. That shouldn't be how it works. maybe we should strengthen the laws so that people will never do it so carelessly again.

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Those cases ended up with apologies. Still better than pleas. There are some cases where you did wrong, but then you say what you've done was intentionally good, with the keyword being intention.

What I've seen so far are:

1. I have a good intention. I did it for the sake of goodness. You have to look at not only my deeds, but also my intention too.

2. I actually did something. What about you? Have you ever done at least something like me? If not, then don't complain.

3. You aren't me, you won't understand. I'm at hardship, that's why I have to do it this way.

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Well then, allow me to point out a couple of things here.

1. Whatever you do, regardless of your intention, your wrongdoing is still wrong. Good intention doesn't change the fact that you do the wrong thing.

2. What others do or not do doesn't affect YOUR doing. The point is you, not others. As long as you do wrong, others have perfect rights to complain your wrongdoings.

3. Hardship doesn't permit perpetration. In fact, nothing permits perpetration.

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I sincerely hope someone will come across this and spread it over to those plea-talkers.

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Lately it's been shorter and shorter, but that's me for you: unpredictable. Thanks for reading.

11th Rant: Ignorance

Hello.

Oh dear god it's DEADLY hot here.

Just, wow, c'mon this is not a desert!

This is the consequences of Global Warming, isn't it? Sigh, humans...

By the way, do you know that there are still people who do not believe in it? Yes, I really mean it. There are people who don't believe in Global Warming.

When I first learned about this, I was like "The heck!?", and I'm still like that.

People, oh people, haven't you got educated from schools?  I'm certain that your Science teacher must have told you before about this. Oh people.

I'm not really sure what could have made them so ignorant, probably false facts. We really need to be careful about facts nowadays. Lies are everywhere. Nevertheless, I don't think Global Warming is a confusing crisis that can be lied about so easily. You know.....

Uhhhhhhhh... oh people....

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There's even more about it. Recently I've heard about anti-vaccination stuff in the western world. I kind of dove into details and found something ridiculous. There are quite a couple of reasons for not getting vaccinated. The most reasonable one would be because you are allergic to the vaccine. The unreasonable one though...

Some people state that some vaccines are dangerous. Well the thing is some of them do provide evidences. Then another group of people provide their evidences, pointing out that those claims are wrong. I actually appreciate this kind of.....um...discussion.  Two sides fight with evidences and proofs, not with saliva. Anyways, the result is that vaccination is obviously something you should do. Yet there are people who still believe in the (proven wrong) facts and oppose against. Oh people.

The worse case is the idea of "Since other children attain vaccination, your children don't have to, because they are surrounded by protection.". Oh my gosh, how selfish. Seriously, it's so selfish. What if a lot of people think like this and choose not to get vaccinated? Furthermore, there are some who really rely on others to get vaccinated because they themselves are allergic, thus cannot get vaccinated. Now that's another case, but choosing to rely on others when you don't have to? Geez.

I heard there are already outbreaks ongoing. Let's see how ignorant can you be.

Oh people.

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While I'm not really confident about the aforementioned anti-vaccination issue, I am certain about this one.

It's about cosmetic products, more accurately cosmetic pills, here in my country.

Lots of them are sold by completely random sellers, not by doctors. They claim a lot of usage of the pills and even provide a lot of information of how they work. The types and processes come in massively various ways, from Collagen stuff to Hormone things.

Of course, many doctors and actual medical experts deny those pills and even warn about dangers from consuming them. Lots of the pills' information is totally false. Many of them are in fact useless, and a considerable amount of them are harmful. Some are claimed to lighten your skin tone, but in reality, and perhaps in return, you will eventually get skin cancer.

Some sellers defend themselves by saying:

(Let me warn you, the next thing you are about to read is the worst phrase I've ever heard in a while.)

"Don't believe those doctors, they oppose to us because they lose their own benefits from our business."

I'm literally speechless.

And guess what, some people believe them and spread it over.

People.....

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It seems like I too was ignorant about something.

I underestimate the level of ignorance humans can be.

I know I'm no one to judge others, but when reality is obvious yet people deny reality....

Heh....

Humans are interesting, aren't they? Sometimes they are so clever, yet there are times they are so blinded. They create awesome things, yet they destroy many. They try to maintain the world, yet they ruin it over and over. Some of them raise concern about dangers,

yet the other simply deny.

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Thanks for reading.