The pictures of three male students with partially shaved head were posted on the teacher\u2019s facebook page, with a caption that reads \u2018For those who want to challenge me, here is what they get.\u2019 The photos went viral on social media and drew heavy criticism. The story was picked up by the mainstream media and was broadcasted more widely. In the end, the male teacher apologized and claimed that he did not know any better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What did this story tell you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have talked to many school students from various schools about their thoughts on the Thai educational system. When asked what they would like to see changed in the Thai educational system, they mentioned issues such as students hair do not need to be so short; socks with dark colour on the sole should be allowed; and that students be allowed to wear their own sweaters (and not those provided by the schools); and wearing earrings and wristbands should also be allowed. All suggestions centered around clothes and appearance. Nobody talked about the curriculum and the teaching\/learning methods. It could be that they felt heavily weighed down by rules about clothing and appearance that this aspect becomes the most prominent issue in the students\u2019 life. When asked about the nasty uneven haircut that was used as a punishment, they said \u2018don\u2019t ask us who else experienced such a punishment but ask who got away. Fewer students got away. The majority of students experienced such punishments. The students could not understand why the teachers were so strict on keeping their hair cropped. In their efforts to comply with the teachers\u2019 cropped hair rules, most students have to cut their hair more often than once a month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One student shared his vivid memory of school\u2019s punishments.<\/p>\n\n\n
\u2018I think it was wasting our time. When the school gave me an uneven haircut as a punishment, I didn\u2019t have time to go to a barber after school and so I had to go to school with the stupid haircut for the whole week. It was an embarrassing experience but, hey, I was not the only one. So it was not too bad.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n
Most students think that the schools should turn their attention away from students\u2019 clothing to the curriculum and school lessons. They said \u2018In classes, we use our brain and not our hair\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although I can understand that rules are often needed to keep large communities like schools running smoothly, they need to make sure they do not to violate students\u2019 \u201chuman dignity\u201d. Humiliating the students should not be allowed anymore. Teachers need to use reason with students rather than using the age-old authoritarian power. We are certain that most teachers care about their students. Some thought that training their students to strictly follow school rules is a way to help the students. But time has changed! Corporal punishment in schools is not accepted and has been banned by the Ministry of Education for several years now. The method to train students to respect rules will have to change as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\nAssoc. Prof. Dr. Suriyadeo Tripathi, a psychologist, shared his views on facebook saying that teachers need to be less authoritative and more understanding of their students\u2019 adolescent nature. Students should be taught discipline through \u2018positive disciplinary\u2019 approach rather than \u2018negative disciplinary\u2019 approach in which punishment is the norm. Thai teachers should be taught \u2018class room management\u2019 skills and learn to avoid using anger towards their students. This should help solve the fundamental conflicts between teachers and students. The concept \u2018Thailand 4.0\u2019, the country\u2019s current development framework which promotes innovation and creativity should also be used in guiding changes within the Thai educational system. Now is the moment to change the authoritative values of the current Thai education system so youths can become the main drive for our country\u2019s future and have the opportunity to grow in an innovative and creative environment; an environment in which everyone, young or old is equally respected and subscribes to the same rules. Students should not face any more intimidations and humiliation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The pictures of three male students with partially shaved head were posted on the teacher\u2019s facebook page, with a caption that reads \u2018For those who want to challenge me, here is what they get.\u2019 The photos went viral on social media and drew heavy criticism. The story was picked up by the mainstream media and was broadcasted more widely. In the end, the male teacher apologized and claimed that he did not know any better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":2440,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_yoast_wpseo_focuskw":"","_yoast_wpseo_title":"","_yoast_wpseo_metadesc":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-title":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-description":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-image":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-image-id":0,"_yoast_wpseo_twitter-title":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-description":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-image":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-image-id":0,"_hero_title":"","_hero_content":"","_hero_cta_text":"","_hero_cta_link":"","_hero_alignment":"","_hero_background":"","_hero_size":"","_hero_show":"","_hero_type":"","_hero_embed":"","_hero_video_id":0,"_hero_hide_image_caption":true,"_hero_hide_image_copyright":false,"_nav_style":"","_disable_share_icons":false,"_disable_sidebar":false,"_display_author_info":false,"_hide_featured_image":false,"_hide_featured_image_caption":true,"_maximize_post_content":false,"_reduce_content_width":false,"_sidebar_id":0,"_stretch_thumbnail":false,"byline_context":"","byline_entity":"","byline_is_author":false,"disable_related_content":false,"download_id":0,"download_text":"","show_published_date":true,"show_updated_date":true,"term_slider":"","amnesty_index_number":"","recipients":"","recipients_refresh":"","recipients_refreshed":"","amnesty_umbraco_data":"","document_ref":"","amnesty_updated":"","footnotes":""},"category":[1584],"location":[1588,1587],"resourceType":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-2439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","location-southeast-asia","location-thailand"],"datePosted":"June 21, 2016","mlpRelationships":{"1":2092,"2":2439},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2439"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2439\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category?post=2439"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=2439"},{"taxonomy":"resource-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/resourceType?post=2439"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=2439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}