Chidchanok Churngchow’s research while affiliated with Prince of Songkla University and other places

This study aims to examine the problems and the threat of university social engagement operations, as well as to study suggestions and guidelines for the development of university social engagement. This study is divided into two phases. First are fieldwork surveys and in-depth interviews of the head of projects, community leaders, local administration organizations, and population in the areas with twelve university social engagement projects. Second, researchers attended a seminar and training of the TSDF–TRF Sustainability Forum. The study found that university social engagement lacks integration between experts in many fields of study, lacks prioritizing community problems, and lacks deep research about the selected community and the university’s social engagement project. For the development of the university’s social engagement project, the university should prepare and train staff to be ready for all kinds of social engagements. In addition, the university should study the target area and do an analysis before setting the project up, and the project grants should be integrated between multidisciplinary sciences. The project grant should be used for a research and study program, including sub-projects, and have indicate the assessment process after the community engagement project is finished.

The objectives of this research were to study English learning, the guidelines for development of English learning, and the guidelines for government policies for English learning development in three southern border provinces of Thailand. This study presents and analyzes the results of eight research projects under the project title "Development of English Learning in Three Southern Border Provinces." The analysis found: 1) the problems of English learning and teaching include that classrooms and study hours do not meet the standard, classroom emphasis is on memorization and terminology, the teaching activities do not motivate students, teachers have numerous jobs and duties, there is a lack of tools and media for teaching, some teachers do not have English teaching degrees, English teachers do not speak English for the duration of the class but instead speak both Thai and English, schools close very often because of the violence situation, the number of students per class is over the national standard, and the curriculum is not appropriate to local contexts, 2) the guidelines to developing English learning and teaching include creating an English environment in the school and community, developing activities and tools according to the motivation and requirement of students, creating confidence for students to communicate in English, developing English teachers, setting up a higher budget to employ native English speakers to be teachers in all schools and universities, decreasing other jobs that do not involve teaching English, developing a curriculum that is appropriate for the local context and students in the area, developing e-learning systems, smart classroom, English laboratory, and setting up more activities for language development that include Thai, Malay and English, and 3) the guidelines for government policy for English learning development are to set up an environment in the school that is appropriate to English teaching and learning, to encourage families to support and increase student motivation, and to acquire a larger budget to develop English laboratories at the schools where the English laboratories are not appropriate and not good. In addition, the government should also support private schools, especially to encourage and set up higher budgets to employ native English speakers to be teachers in all schools and universities; develop teachers in other subjects to have more English skills; and improve students' books by including English content in the textbooks. In addition, the government should develop a curriculum related to local context, develop school to be smart schools, develop English teachers according to a national standard and assess and evaluate the teachers according to the national standard; be more concerned with developing the teachers by setting up a training center in the area; and set up a policy to foreign language learning in Thai, Malay and English.