Bangkok governor Chadchart Sittipunt personally visited the Chamchan School in Wattana district to ensure the first day of school went smoothly.

Schools reopened on Tuesday (May 16) for the first semester of the 2023 academic year.

The governor said the city’s Education Department, district offices and 437 schools under Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) have been instructed to implement the following measures to ensure safety and order, as well as facilitate students and parents on the first day of the semester.

The measures are:
• Ensuring all security cameras and electrical systems on campus are functioning
• Ensuring school buildings, classrooms, playgrounds, learning equipment and campuses generally are clean and safe
• Ensuring school security staff are in place
• Ensuring parents and drivers of school buses do not leave children unattended on board
• Ensuring school meals, containers and utensils are properly cleaned and kitchen staff maintain hygiene. Schools must ensure that fresh food and milk are stored properly to prevent contamination and spoilage
• Ensuring all medical personnel are fully vaccinated and healthy to prevent a possible outbreak of communicable diseases in school
• Ensuring that traffic lights, zebra crossings and piers near schools are working properly
• Ensuring traffic flow at school entrances is not disrupted during rush hour
• Ensuring preparations have been made to deal with emergency situations like fire or natural disasters within the school or surrounding areas
• Ensuring all steps are taken to prevent an outbreak of communicable diseases in school.

Chadchart said the city has been focusing on promoting primary education since 430 of the 437 BMA schools are primary schools.

“Bangkok still faces the problem of inequality in children’s access to education. We, therefore, are trying to free up teachers’ schedules so they can focus on educating more children,” he said.

Under the measure called “Returning Teachers to Students”, BMA has provided additional staff to oversee the administration and financial tasks so teachers have more time to teach. These jobs used to take up 40% of teachers’ time before. The city has also streamlined the application process for teachers who wish to upgrade their academic standing and make progress in their careers.

Chadchart added that the BMA has also improved education as well as the quality of life for students in Bangkok, such as providing fresh vegetables so salad can be served with school breakfast, upgrading equipment in computer rooms and implementing an active learning approach to stimulate students’ participation.

The city also aims to increase the number of foreign teachers to teach English and Chinese in selected schools to ensure students are equipped with the necessary language skills, he added.

“Another issue BMA is focusing on is traffic congestion in school areas during rush hours,” Chadchart said. “This leads to the question why are parents sending their children to schools that are far away instead of enrolling them in schools closer to their homes and not causing traffic jams?”

Chadchart said this issue can be fixed by ensuring all schools in Bangkok have the same standard so parents do not have to send their children to “better schools” and spend hours stuck in traffic daily.

“All parties must work together for this policy to succeed. I have asked school executives and teachers to use resources provided by the city to improve their education quality, and have urged parents to provide information on what children need,” Chadchart said.

“We also want parents to take part in school inspections covering issues like meals, uniforms, learning equipment, and child care.”