|
| about this site |
who we are |
site map |
reading tips |
teaching tips |
student tips |
build vocab |
|
|
|
Thailand’s American university
Napol (Paul) Pornsomboom graduated with a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Washington State University. An ambitious student, he stayed in the United States for his master’s degree, enrolling in Webster University with a double major in business administration and computer resources and information management. To take advantage of the advanced technology in the United States, Napol completed his computer resources programme at Webster’s main campus in St Louis, Missouri. Since he intended to work in Thailand, however, he then transferred to Webster’s Cha-am campus for his business courses. Most of his business courses, that is. "What I really want to do for my last two classes is to go back to the States," Napol recently told the learning post. "That way I can get practical training and get some experience working for an American company."
About the time Napol arrived at Webster in St Louis, Molly Angstman entered the university as an undergraduate, intending to major in international studies with an emphasis on Asia and religion. She, too, spent a year in St Louis before transferring to the Cha-am campus last August. She intends to finish a year here, return to St Louis for a semester, come back to Thailand for another semester and then go back to St Louis to finish her degree – "a perfect fit" for her interests, Molly says. If there seems to be a pattern here, there is. Webster students have remarkable flexibility in where they study. In addition to St Louis and Thailand, the university has campuses throughout the United States as well as in Europe and China. And wherever the students go, their academic performance is recorded on a single Webster University transcript. This is an intriguing concept and the learning post travelled to Cha-am to find out more. Starting out Vice Rector Suchitra Vuthisathira has been associated with Webster Thailand from day one – the signing of the memorandum of understand between Webster University St Louis and the Srikraivin-Bonython Foundation. "That was back in late May of 1996," Archarn Suchitra recalls. "Then in January 1997 we signed another contract which led us to the application for our university license. Finally, we got a license in December 1997. "We were ready to start in August or September 1998, but with the economic downturn, we decided to postpone it for a year, so we did not begin our operation until August 1999", Archarn Suchitra says. Setting up a new university in Thailand is a complicated process at any time, but as an American university in Thailand, Webster presented a whole new set of complexities. The first hurdle was to convince the Ministry of University Affairs to grant a university license..."The normal practice is to grant a college license. But we applied for a university license, so we had to make sure that we were ready to become a full-blown university," Archarn Suchitra explains. "Then we had to operate two systems all at once, the American system and the Thai system. We needed to meet the requirements of both sides in order to get it started." Archarn Suchitra says this involved a painstaking, but ultimately successful, process of reconciling two very different systems for credit requirements, electives and major requirements. As a result, a local graduate obtains a fully accredited degree from both Webster University St Louis and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Cultural diversity Given the complications the administrators had to overcome in getting started, it is not surprising that the Webster University model has not been replicated elsewhere in the region. "It’s the only American university in Southeast Asia or South Asia that offers the American accredited degree at the undergraduate and master’s level," says Rector George Hegarty. "In fact, it’s one of very few outside the western world," "You’re getting the authentic American degree, so the majority of the faculty – almost 90 percent – are westerners and probably about 80 percent are North Americans. We have a lot of teacher-student interaction. You’re taught ways of thinking. It’s not rote learning. You’re taught to think analytically," he says. At the moment, Americans are also the largest single group on campus, but not by much. "During the term we just ended two weeks ago, we had 27 nationalities from every single inhabited continent. The Americans comprised about 22 percent of the student body," Hegarty says.
Many of the students at the Cha-am campus are taking advantage of Webster’s international opportunities. Justin Tolliver, for example, recently arrived from the Leyden campus in the Netherlands. "I’m originally from the St Louis campus. Last year I went to the Leyden campus and I’ve just come here for another eight weeks. Then I’ll go back to St Louis to graduate," he explains. Tolliver, who majors in film production, says he is in Thailand to do his senior media practicum class. According to Hegarty, Webster Thailand’s relatively small size – slightly fewer than 300 students, 80 percent of whom are undergraduates – limits to some extent the number of majors and courses on offer. "The course offerings that are available through the (20,000-student) system are definitely more than we can have on this campus, but the faculty can move around the system. We always have a certain percentage of our faculty who come from elsewhere in the system, particularly the main campus. That helps teach a variety of courses." Hegarty explains.
Professor Kit Jenkins is one such visiting faculty member from the St Louis campus. She is spending one term in Cha-am teaching cultural diversity in the media and public relations writing. "I like to go (international) every three years," Jenkins explains. "I have been to the London campus. I’ve been to the Geneva campus and I taught at the Leyden campus in the Netherlands. It was one of the reasons I came to work at Webster because I knew there was an international opportunity." This is actually Jenkins’ second stint teaching at Webster Thailand. "I was here in 2001. I loved it so much I petitioned to come back." The reason, she says, is the students. "They’re the most exciting group of students because they’re so diverse. "I teach cultural diversity in the media. If you teach that in St Louis, you’re teaching students, most of whom have never left their own hometown. You’re teaching them to appreciate different cultures," Jenkins observes. "My class here has Indians, Nepalese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai and maybe even some US kids. They’ve already made that leap of entering into another culture. They’re very open about other cultures, so then I’m challenged to come up with material that will challenge them even more. That’s what’s fun. That’s why I come," Jenkins explains enthusiastically. Full-time faculty The local teaching staff at Webster Thailand is all full-time. Anthropologist Ted Mayer has been with the school since it opened with 50 students in 1999. Mayer says the cultural diversity of the student body has been a feature since the beginning. Like Jenkins, he finds this diversity a tremendous asset in the classroom in the courses he teaches. In his world religions classes, for example, one of the activities is to have students introduce someone with a different religious tradition. "The amazing thing is that students don’t even have to go outside the campus and they can find almost every religious tradition," Mayer observes. "Not only that, but they can find students who have personal experiences of a particular kind of religious festival, a particular kind of ritual. For an anthropologist like myself, I can see the incredible cultural resource that’s here." Mayer believes that Webster Thailand is performing a valuable service, particular for its predominately Asian student body. "We’re taking a high standard of university liberal arts in the US and bringing it to a place where a lot of people aren’t familiar with that," he says. "So I think a lot of students have an eye-opening experience because we emphasise the expression of ideas. We emphasise developing critical thinking skills and that’s really new for a lot of students. Literally many students who come here from different parts of Asia just have the experience of writing down what the teacher says and being able to reproduce it," Mayer notes. International relations professor Susan Landsfield originally came as a visiting faculty member, but has stayed on. "I’m still here because I love the experience. I love teaching the classes. I love the diversity in the student body," she says. Given the current world situation, international relations is a hot topic on campus. Opposition to the war in Iraq is strong among Webster students, she observes – "not just on the part of the Asians, but on the part of the Americans too. "It’s very interesting to hear them comment about what they feel is the sort of overwhelming propaganda that they’ve been subjected to for the last couple of months in America. I guess there’s a stark difference coming here where there’s not that constant noise," Landsfield observers. "The students I’ve talked to, they are overwhelmingly against the unilateral action. They feel that procedures should have continued through the United Nations," she comments.
Despite Webster’s distance from western media and academic centres, Landsfield says she feels no sense of isolation. "How is it possible with the Internet? CNN is on in the student lounge. We get BBC; we get Deutsche Welle. We are also lucky here in that we have access to an electronic library database from St Louis. So that gives us thousands and thousands of journals," she explains. According to Rector Hegarty that library is one of Webster’s most important assets. "As far as we know, we have the best on-line library of any university within the region and a top one in the world," he asserts. It has to be, he says, to be able to service 100 campuses in the United States and around the world. "All students are eligible to participate as part of their regular tuition – and they can do it from home. They can do research papers that way. There are a lot of things that are updated regularly and they have access to them," Hegarty adds. Meeting students
What about that diverse student body that has made such an impression on the Webster Thailand faculty? A good place to start is by talking to sophomore advertising major Tsedon Dorji from Bhutan. Fluent in English, one of the six languages she speaks, Tsedon has settled in comfortably here in Thailand. "I want to spend all four years here because I really love it here," she says enthusiastically. "I feel I’m closer to home. Home is just three hours away by air. I also love the spicy food." Coming to Webster was "totally unexpected and unplanned," Tsedon says. "I was all set to go to New Brunswick. I had all my winter clothes packed. All of a sudden my Dad said there’s this new American university in Thailand and you might want to check it out."
Like Tsedon, Chinese MBA student Taylor Zeng intends to take his full degree here in Thailand. "It’s hard work, but I have nearly finished. I will finish in May," he says. Taylor is a Mandarin speaker, but he can also understand Taechiew, the Chinese dialect commonly heard in Bangkok. "My grandmother on my mother’s side is from Taechiew district," he explains. Taylor says he is seriously thinking of beginning his business career in Thailand. "I can do a lot of jobs – international trade, marketing, sales and production management." Fellow MBA student, Mukesh Kumar came to Webster from northern India. He says he wanted to experience the American system of education "which is totally different from Indian education."
Cost was also a significant factor, he says. In the Webster system, fees can vary greatly from country to country and Webster Thailand is one of the most cost-effective campuses. Mukesh, too, intends to do his entire degree here in Thailand. "I’ve learned all the business techniques from the American system. The instructors are from North America, so there’s no need to go to the States," he says. What’s missing? For a university based in Thailand, there are surprisingly few Thai students – something Archarn Suchitra wants very much to rectify. "We would like to receive more Thai students, maybe up to 25 percent," she says. One of the biggest obstacles for Thai students is the relatively strict language requirement. Webster has a minimum TOEFL requirement of 550 for undergraduate students and 575 for graduate students. Still, that would seem well within the reach of the increasing numbers of Thai students who are graduating from local international schools, so Archarn Suchitra’s goal may soon be realised.
terryfrd@ksc15.th.com ||© The Post Publishing Public Co., Ltd. All rights reserved 2003 | Last modified: April 4, 2003 |
